FantasticalDevPsych
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Posts posted by FantasticalDevPsych
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I have voted on here and my program includes health insurance along with the stipend! My now advisor is the one who told me the funding package but my program's funding info is on its website!
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Ask your advisor about computer requirements!!
I emailed my professor to see what kind of software is need to run, and whether the lab was Mac or PC. She had lots of useful information, the most useful of which is that **they have funding for graduate students' computers!** I tell them what I want (up to $1500 for computer and peripherals) and they will buy it. I return it when I leave, but hey, it's definitely worth it. All the graduate students I know (social science FWIW) had their lab buy their computers.
In sum, I don't recommend buying your own computer without a least testing the waters with your advisor.
This is such a great thread: so much I haven't thought about yet. I need to find an apartment!!
Seconded! I didn't know until I accepted the offer that all first year students in my program (also social science) have the option of having the department purchasing a computer for us. We get to keep it after we pass quals! The only downside is we don't get to pick the computer (and now this Mac user needs to learn how to use a PC again).
There's so much good advice on this thread (thank you everyone) and I'd also suggest the printer (saved me during undergrad so I'm certainly sure it will during grad) and someone to vent to (I wouldn't have an offer without this person supporting me).
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As a Canadian in America, I see this too. It's a little weird in Canada since we use some American spelling (e.g. we prefer "ize" over "ise" most of the time) but we also use a lot of British spellings (we keep the "u" in colour, neighbour, favourite, etc.).
For my homework, I spell the way I want to. No one in my program will care. Sometimes, my friend is the TA and they jokingly "correct" my Canadian spelling but no points are removed. To me, it's like saying "to-may-toe" vs. "to-mah-toe". There isn't a right answer.
I also keep speaking Canadianisms and when my American friends are confused, I explain to them what I mean. For example, in Canada, we don't say "freshman/sophomore/junior/senior", just "first/second/third/fourth year". Or "Grade 5 students" instead of "Fifth Grade". "Pop" for sweet carbonated drinks instead of "soda". Again, I think the "dialect" of English we speak is no more or less valid than the differences between American dialects in California vs. Florida vs. Boston vs. New York.
The only time the spelling differences actually matter are:
1. Writing computer code. My variable names will have the "u" in them, e.g. "starColour" etc. I guess this can be an issue when I share my code with others, or I edit someone's else code. When this happens, I use whatever spelling convention the original author/primary author uses.
2. Writing journal articles. I always follow the journal's style guide, no matter what my own preference would be. When I write for American journals, I use American spellings. When my American colleagues write for British (or Canadian) journals (e.g. Nature), they use British spellings.
Thank you for this! As someone with a British collaborator as well as a British friend (also an academic and likely future collaborator), it's good to see that what I had been doing was confirmed here. In informal correspondence, I use American words and spellings and receive British ones in return. If we use an idiom and the other person is confused we just explain it. My collaborators and I were considering submitting a paper to British and American journals and since I'm used to seeing both spellings from communicating and reading papers I just was going to use whichever spelling was appropriate.
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Also not in I/O but I had a similar situation when applying. I had identified specific interests while I was applying so then had to find someone who would hopefully let me study them. To make my list of who to apply to I broke my interests down into subtopics (e.g. what aspect of the literature existing helps inform your ideas). For example I had a list of people that studied children's ability to learn from different media and children's fantasy-reality distinctions while my interests lie in this intersection. I would then do Google Scholar searches to see what had been published and saved papers (since I was also doing lit review for my honors thesis) and authors. I also asked input from my undergrad advisor (a well known tenured prof in my area). If you end up meeting or emailing potential professors then mention that you are interested in projects that examine x specific thing you are interested in and see what they say.
For the program I ended up choosing such work had also paid off as I used this strategy to plan seminars and posters to attend at a confrence where I met my advisor (without such meeting I'd be applying again)!
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Late is better than never. Congrats!
So true! Thank you very much! Conference networking paid off for me big time as I met my advisor who had funding to admit me, liked my thesis work, and is letting me continue with my research interests (and they fit really well with their research interests)!
Like you I would have never imagined this process working out like it did!
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Thanks everyone! There are some very good suggestions on this tread! It made me think about what I'm going to do as well. I'm planning to do mine when I get my new email from my school and apartment address, then email them a small note of thanks and then mail a card and a small gift (something from the school or something that would please them) from my new address (as I wouldn't have gotten here without them).
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"If you can't explain it to a six year old, you don't understand it yourself."
In terms of not wanting to sound like I'm bragging, I don't often bring up my educational / academic achievements because I feel like many individuals don't view them in a good way. My friends an family view it like I must be highly intelligent, a model citizen and better than others who have not gotten degrees but chose to work and have families. In reality it's a combination of amazing opportunities I've had and hard work; some of my friends are more intelligent but just haven't applied themselves yet. For me it was the same with sports awards; the trophies and certifications hang on my wall to encourage me to keep working hard but are never brought up in conversation.
Love the quote, and, as a developmental psychologist, I actually do literally explain my work to a six-year old quite often... (Note to self: the quote is maybe something to use in my office or for RA training...)
I agree with all of that. I don't like to bring up my academic achievements in conversation because I don't really want to brag about something I work very hard in but because of that just seem to be good at. I think if this was true for some other nonacademic career I'd be like that too but with, some people's views of academic achievement, I'm even more so.
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So excited I can finally post on this thread after reading everyone's responses and thinking I'd not be able to do this until next year!
Due to a special circumstance I was allowed to apply to a university late, because of this I had been in contact with the grad admin throughout the entire application process.
Today I received an email from the grad admin saying the faculty are reviewing your application at this time (which I thought must have really meant right then) and you will hear shortly. Needless to say this made me very anxious. I decided to take a shower since I had just came back from Tae Kwon Do and it would prevent me from refreshing my phone every couple minutes. When I got out I checked my email again and there was an email from the admin with the subject line Acceptance Letter!
I wish I would have had some happy dance or something but I am about to meet with my current PI and I'm really looking forward to telling her!
Now I can say I got into grad school on Star Wars Day! May the 4th be with you!
- MathCat, xolo and Bookaddict
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Very interesting topic and I’m surprised someone from Psychology hasn’t chimed in on this yet!
While I’m not in as much of a technical field as many others here, I’ve encountered this challenge before with the language I use to explain aspects of my field that people know about but just don’t know what it was called in technical language. And I learned recently that sometimes research psychologists are thought of as weird by the community when trying to recruit participants (learned from a POI on interviews) as well as talking to others about that no in fact I don't/won't psychoanalyze you or your child (such a common question, no we are not all clinical!). Haven't gotten the smart comments as I'm an undergrad and not sure if I will...
I openly admit I don’t have to worry as much about finding a common topic of discussion as I get a lot of kid stories (or explanations about why they don’t like kids) when I mention what I study. (So yes asking Stay at Home moms about their kids is a very good way to get them talking...) Though I do agree that there is some very good advice about finding another common topic already (such as from Page228)!
I agree with GeoDude! on explaing your work. I’m not a grad student yet (undergrad – waiting on my last chance of admission this year) but have worked with specialists (my PI and lab mates) and nonspecialists (parents from many different backgrounds) since I’ve started doing research. At first it was actually much harder for me to talk to parents about what I was doing as I had a little blurb on what we were doing in nonspecialist terms that we used to recruit but I couldn’t figure out what to say when a parent asked something else. When I had my own study and more technical knowledge, I found it easier to further explain what I was doing even to a nontechnical audience (and have to children, parents, and other undergrads). I think my increase in knowledge allowed me to begin to think about my work in different ways and at least for now feel like I’ve arrived upon a way to explain my current work to specialists and nonspecialists.
And I like the advice about trying to find some practical implication of whatever you are studying that makes it interesting to others (some application to a well known disease, interesting application of a theorem, etc). I'm currently writing an interdisciplinary lit review thesis (my second UG one) and once got the advice of making sure to try and be able to answer “why should I care?” when this “I” is someone from various backgrounds (another academic in your field, another academic in a closely related field, someone who knows nothing about your topic, etc).
I think the best advice for learning how to explain your work to others is just to practice doing so!
Oh and my dad is a prof in a very technical field that is not well known to nonspecialists so sometimes when I'm asked about it I just have to explain very generally what the field is, what technique he uses in his work, and a very broad application of his work and they are satisfied.
(Long thesis writing procrastination post over)
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Free will
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Left out
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Or like opening a chocolate bar and hoping to get Willy Wonka's Golden Ticket.
Wanted to upvote this but I've reached my quota!
Good luck everyone!
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Yep! I'm happy I decided to apply starting this year because after I get the reviews I can start planning for how to be better next year and be ahead maybe.
Agree with you there! I also liked that it forced me to really think about what I want to study and the proposed study was great to mention in interviews!
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Hi! I figured I'd join the fun. Any other senior undergrads (as opposed to first/second year grad students)?
Senior undergrad here!
I'm currently wondering if getting pooped on by a bird is good luck for the NSF as it happened on my way home... (Why must a research direction in my lab be on superstition...?)
Obviously I've lost all focus to fill out lab manger apps... or analyze data for the (now) international collaboration which came from my undergrad thesis...
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Face down
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Door bell
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I had to google it as I hadn't either! It takes retrieving your U of T student number from SGS and a pin (info on the first page) of ROSI. Also I applied to the same program as you but I'm international (American) so I'd be interested to see if you see an update (I didn't as far as I could tell)! Who is your POI? (Welcome to PM that if you want)
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Pitch perfect
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Texas does have a common app for it's public universities (I'm an undergrad at one) and it saves a lot of time when applying as you'd only have to submit all the basic background info once instead of n (number of schools) times!Ditto! I completed a common app for summer research programs. I think Texas has such a system for its public universities. I don't know of any that have been implemented nationwide though, which is too bad.
I kept thinking while I was applying that it'd be great to have one for grad schools!
If I ever have that kind of power that's something I'd like to implement!
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Check on ROSI. I just checked and mine was updated!
Thanks for the suggestion! Hasn't been updated as far as I can tell! More waiting for me...
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^Thanks ArcticAI! And yeah it seemss POIs won't contact you back unless they're fascinated by your research interests! Best of luck!
^Very interesting! I wonder why they don't just announce their decisions if they've already been made! But I'll call and give that a try! Thanks!
Interesting to hear you think that! Before I even applied I contacted my POI thanking them for their help with something for my thesis (my undergrad advisor emailed them and asked for something and I wanted to thank them for sending it) and I actually received a reply...
Yes, really! Why not? I'd like to know if I'm actually shut out or not!
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I applied to a different program but same department. I contacted them this week and they said the Registrar's Office usually doesn't send letters out until mid to late-March.... So just be patient!
I only received one email response from a POI and they pretty much said "cool, good luck"
Thank you for this info and I definetely meant to upvote you not downvote sorry!
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So I've probably been rejected from everywhere this application season.
This is my first time applying and I applied straight out of undergrad. I plan to try again at least once more as I don't want to give up on my PhD just yet!
Upon revealing the devastating news to my undergrad advisor, they suggested that I take a lab manager position and that I'd benefit from the opportunity especially since they considered many current/former lab managers this time.
I am graduating from a state school, an R1, and ranked top 15 in psych with my BS in May. I am a psychology major with SPSS experience and some Python programming experience who will have been in my Developmental lab for 2.5 years when I graduate. I also will have completed two theses (a lit review and an experimental one) by then. I am already on the CogDev listserv which sends out listings for these jobs in my area.
My questions to the cafe (especially fellow psych geeks) are as follows:
Have you been in one of these positions?
Did it/or do you think it helped your chances of getting into a PhD program?
How close was the lab you worked in to your actual research interests?
About how many positions did you apply for?
What are interviews for these like (if they are done)?
What is your advice for someone applying to these positions?
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