eternallyephemeral

It's definitely never too late, someone in my lab is turning their undergrad thesis into a paper, and they just defended their PhD. If it's not related, it's still better than nothing! I had a completely unrelated, fourth author publication and various posters, none of which were related to the field I was applying for. Profs constantly mentioned that it was great I already got a publication and they saw that I could be industrious and work hard, even if the content wasn't the same. You can always turn a poster presentation into a paper later! That's the most common approach tbh.

No problem, regarding the citizenship thing, you should be alright for Canada (no matter where you live(d), if you're Canadian, you are eligible), but if you're applying to the US, consider very well funded public programs with international grad students and consider private schools if they happen to fit with your research. People might say that your experience isn't relevant at first glance, but this is why admissions committees do more than a quick glance at your application. Everything people are saying here about making the clear connection between what you've done and how it prepares you for clincal work is SUPER important. It's not impossible, but it might be more challenging. I don't know too much about school psych, but what I know about PhDs is that you don't have to work in the area that you studied, in a broad or a specific sense. For example, I'm going to industry, into a position that may or may not be directly relevant to what I studied. Obviously, qualifications are more limiting, but there are endless things you can do with any of these degrees!

Hi OP, I've bolded the two parts of your post here that stood out to me. First of all, you can't, can't, can't just apply to three schools and get discouraged, especially with clinical. Even an amazing person with perfect everything might not get in anywhere if they only applied to three schools. With clinical programs, you're going to need to look at over ten schools, from what I've seen as successful in the past. The second point is one I want some clarification on. You said you applied to UBC for a clinical PhD program, which I presume is somewhat funded. You are in Asia now. Are you applying as an international student? Because speaking from experience, that can kill your chances just as fast as a low GRE can, without the ability to change it so easily. Public schools across Canada and the US have funding structures that mean international students costs a LOT more, so typically they can not fund as many (if any) international students, making your chances even more dire than they already are in clinical, which has a lower acceptance rate than med school, as most people know. So keeping in mind that private US schools (as there are no private universities in Canada) see international and domestic students as equally expensive, I would consider those, unless you see that a sizable fraction of the accepted students at a publicly funded school are international. If you are in fact a citizen of the places you applied, then ignore the sentence above. But this can be a huge barrier for people applying to funded graduate programs. Trust me, I'm pretty irritated about it too : )

I totally agree, and I know how much these heuristics suck, OP. My SO is brilliant and amazing but took a winding route in school and has a lot of math test anxiety. He was rejected from a ton of places for these reasons, so they do lose out on great people (I'm not just saying this because I'm biased haha). Just in case OP thinks we're / I am cold-hearted about this. It's a problem, but they do have limited resources so they do what they can.

You need to either work or volunteer in a lab so you can get these things, and they often take a lot of time. If your GREs are only 50th percentile, I would highly recommend studying a ton and doing them again, in addition to working/volunteering as an RA to get posters and publications. The GRE tests how well you can learn how to do the test, and anyone can learn how the test tries to trick you and the strategies to answer questions quickly and accurately. Since you know how difficult clinical psych PhDs can be to get in, then you can make an accurate assessment of what your chances are now, and what they would be with higher GREs, a poster or a publication, etc. Unless you have an extremely high GPA, high GREs, research (with at least posters) as well as clinical experience, and sometimes a masters, consider your chances slim. You can improve them, but there is obviously only so much one can do to change their chances. I don't mean to be depressing, but as you know, the reality of getting into these program can be quite demoralizing.

Do you know what programs are available and/or which schools you are interested in? Work experience is definitely an asset for business PhDs, as most don't take people from undergrad. But if you're looking for a research-based masters, that might not matter as much. PM me if you dont want to discuss details out here. I'm in Canada and I also applied to business programs from a social/life science (psych).

I don't think there is anything about the CGS-M that publishes your research. The purpose of both scholarships is the same, and that is to fund students while they are doing research, and hopefully that will be published, but there is nothing guaranteed about publishing through CGS-M. It is a federal grant agency, not a publishing house, if that helps clarify things.

Some are available through the papers where they were first published, and others have websites (like for personality measures). Sometimes people who use the measure will include it in an appendix, but if none of those approaches work I contact the researcher and ask if I can use them for research. Good luck!

- Getting to create new knowledge, however theoretical and marginally important it might be at this point - Having amazing, in-depth conversations with people on lots of topics - Challenging my thinking and assumptions and therefore growing as a person - Supervising and mentoring students - Learning from faculty from my own school and others - its like having a job with a huge investment into your personal development - Super strong stats skills (in my department specifically), which is valuable outside of academia as well - Fun people and dedicated events/discounts/programming for graduate students - (obviously this differs for people): the chance to get scholarships, awards, and other recognition for your work, that also pay money - The chance to travel to new places to talk about your research for an hour and do whatever else you want (explore the city, go to talks/workshops/symposia the rest of the time - So much flexibility (this is good and bad, but I've harnessed the good for myself) - (probably more specific to my program): encouragement to do internships during school, and enough time to do them as well - (also specific to my situation): living in a low-cost city with a good stipend, so I'm actually saving through school - The freedom to collaborate across departments and shape my own research program (obviously not everyone gets to do this)

The CGS is more prestigious and more money, so because you have to choose one, you should choose that one. I will be doing the same thing if I get OGS. Congrats!

Thanks for your well wishes! I think you know that guilt is not a good reason for making this serious decision, and like you said, if you would just move again soon, that' snot a good idea. I think sometimes, it's good to be more selfish. We always think of that as a bad thing, but I know for myself (and some of the women in my family), they could use a bit less selflessness. Trust me, it's not good for your health, and its not good for your happiness either. I really, really wouldn't worry about the justifying aspect. That is way less important than your own well-being. And it's okay if people don't understand, sometimes they don't understand that a place like Columbia isn't actually as a good as U of Akron for some programs (that's true for I/O!), because it sounds better. And regarding the cog psych ideas, that's partly why we do this, right? Because the things we learn are relevant to everyday life!

I don't mean to reopen a wound or anything, but there aren't that many people around you at any one time that fit your values and would be compatible in other ways. But that's a good thing! I felt exactly the same way as you. And there are lots of contributing factors. And I settled, a lot of times, for people who were subpar because I thought my standards were wrong and why couldn't anyone like me. But the problem with that is, then you'r'e in a relationship, but it's not a happy one. And it's wayyyy better to be in a happy relationship than just to be in one because you don't want to be alone. It's hard to hear, and when people said that to me, I also didn't want to hear it, but a lot of these colloquialisms are true. Especially the one that says "when you're not looking, that's when you'll find happiness/love/relationships/the right person/etc. I met my bf of three years in my lab while I was in another (unhappy as I mentioned above) relationship. We now live together, with our adopted cats, and we've never been happier. I'm the more "driven"/successful/whatever one, and he is proud of me. That's what a healthy relationship has. An unhealthy relationship has jealousy and insecurity. It's hard to wait, and other people telling you that this is all you have to do is super frustrating. I can sympathize with that. But I don't know how else to say it - it's the truth. The best thing you can do is be as happy with yourself as you can, so that when you encounter that person, you have the self-esteem to make the relationship work. Best of luck!

I'm not in clinical, but I believe it is pretty important. And here's why I think so: You can think of it as a luxury, but in reality, it's important whether or not you have lots of choices. As you mentioned, you always have the choice to apply again. I used to feel the same way as you, I thought I would only apply once because it's a waste not to, and it would make no sense to work for a while or be an RA because that was just stalling and doing something irrelevant when I could be in a graduate program instead. However, I don't feel that way anymore (for a few reasons) and it has definitely changed my outlook. I'll explain more below. Are you coming out of undergrad right now? Because what I and other people applying directly to PhD programs thought was that we were super ready and anyone else could see that. So we were ambitious and we applied to lots of super competitive schools - spoiler, we didn't get in. Now, that could be for multiple reasons, but one of them was definitely that these places don't often take people right from undergrad. This is especially true for my direct-entry PhD programs, which were in business. But even people in know in areas like vision science were much more competitive after having been an RA or a lab manager for a while. This is especially true for the US - here in Canada, most PhD programs have a funded masters attached, so it's a bit different. Once I realized this, it changed my thinking a bit. Everything that I just said above is even more true for top programs. When I see the students' backgrounds in these top programs, yes, some of them come in right from undergrad. But others have counselling masters (if they're in clinical), RA positions, or maybe they've worked for a while. Who knows if they just decided to apply later, if they knew this strategy all along, or if they've applied multiple times? No matter which one of these it is, we can see that this waiting/RAing approach has worked very well for them. Of course, there are people it doesn't work well for either, but if you're considering a program right now that is not a good fit and maybe isn't the best place you feel you can get into, then it's a risk but it might make more sense to apply again after. Here's some cognitive psych applied to this decision for you to consider: people are risk-averse. Like, super risk averse. One bird in the hand is worth two in the bush is a popular expression for a reason. But that doesn't mean it's always the best way for you to make decisions. It can be very suboptimal in certain cases. Is a poor-fitting school right now really better than a great fitting school later, or the option between multiple schools? Another part of this risk aversion is being bad at forecasting: you might feel right now that you have a higher probability of not getting in anywhere in a second round of applications than you really do. If you got in once, it's really unlikely you will never get in anywhere again. You could very likely get into the same place, or places within that tier, and perhaps some better (objectively and/or better for you) a second time. So your probabilities could be way off. You also have no idea how close you were to being on the waitlist at the other places - you might think you are near the bottom, but you could have barely made the cut, and applying again could bump you over that cutoff. Fit sometimes has to do with the quality of the school. We say it as if it's totally subjective, but its also a but objective as well. There was one school I interviewed at which had just an atrocious atmosphere and seemed problematic for so many reasons. The funding was crap, the students were unhappy (and they told us), the profs were demanding in ways that didn't make any sense, the program lacked structure, the communication of the program was misleading/incorrect, and there was no ability to even have a conversation with the people who I was supposed to be supervised by. I don't think anyone "fits" within a program like that. So why are we blaming the "fit" or the student for not "fitting", when it's objectively bad? This is broader than just your question, but if you're chalking something up to fit and it's really about your basic needs as a student, then you should keep that in mind. No one "fits" with a place with bad funding, they either make it work because they might have to, or they choose not to go. A PhD is a super long time. I'm feeling this so much right now. And the thought of working in a place where such major things are a problem (not only your research topics but the structures to support you and how people who are currently there seem to be feeling) is a red flag, not just a bad fit issue. Even where I am, where the support is there, people seem less stressed, and there is (imo) the right balance between freedom and structure, the courses/research/general approach to the field is just not aligned for me. I would consider that more of a fit issue than what you're describing, which sounds more like a bad program issue. But either way, those two kinds of situations likely won't make you happy for 5-6 years. Also one thing about waitlists: I was on one, and I think the waitlist time gives you a lot of insight into whether you want to go there. I was actually not looking forward to having to make the decision between the waitlist school and the school I eventually chose, and not for good reasons such as liking both of them. I liked one, and I felt like I "should" have chosen the waitlist school, had I gotten in. In a way, I was fortunate that I didn't, because I didn't want to be pulled towards that choice by location (even though its so much better), ranking (again, much better), or overall prestige/how other people would feel (obv related to ranking). Don't go somewhere because you "should", really, it's a bad idea. I know people who are leaving programs now because that's (partly) why they made their decision in the first place. So this got super long, sorry! I think I really resonated with your question, as I'm dealing with similar things now (from a different stage, more masters to PhD) and there are a lot of commonalities. Best of luck with your decision!

I'm very sorry for your loss. This is a small change compared to the accommodation I think you should seek out, but have you thought about how working all day and potentially being more frazzled, and then trying to work harder can contribute to missing some things and forgetting some details? I have noticed that in myself through this semester, that I am constantly forgetting things (even when assignments are due!!) and getting the dates/times/locations wrong for important events. I think part of it might be that I'm trying to work all the time, even when I get home after going to school all day, and late into the night. Part of it for me comes from guilt I think, also of not seeming like I'm committed or taking the program seriously, because I'm juggling things outside of school. So maybe giving yourself more time to breathe, be calm, and not work count, counterintuitively, help you work better when you are working and focus on those key details. However, the bigger challenge of managing your ADHD and taking time to properly grieve is more important than this. I just wanted to offer that suggestion of diminishing returns of working too much, or the potentially harmful impact of working too much, beyond the hours making you less productive as they go on.

No problem! I understand if you want to target those journals anyways, you can look at where the people are located that publish in those journals. If they are from top international schools studying these topics, or from top IO schools anywhere, then you are in a good league! It's not always the best metric, but people do consider the impact factor (basically how many times their articles have been cited) as a measure of whether people are writing about the research done in those journals. Google scholar has some great tools to look for rankings of journals and other metrics.

I understand. If you are locked in, and you still want to go for the other reasons, I would show them how they are wrong by doing a great job but not by overextending yourself. I've faced various things like this (and so have my colleagues) in the past. Sometimes, as undergrads, we were told that we couldn't work in multiple labs at once because we needed to be around for a certain number of hours or that we would never be able to handle the workload. I've never followed these rules or guidelines - I'm working, in school, and collaborating across multiple schools/faculties. Obviously these people were wrong about me, as they are likely wrong about you. You know yourself better than other people do, so as long as you deliver, you will likely be able to relax this requirement or make a case for removing it. Alternatively, if these people are busy then it's impossible for them to need you at any time, 60 hours a week. They have their own things to do. Even though my supervisor likes to stop by my office, obviously she doesn't have time to hound me all the time. I don't stick around worrying that she'll visit and expect me to be there at 7pm, or 8am. And you shouldn't either in my opinion.

I visited a school that had this kind of culture, where students must be in their offices from 9 to 5 and they would be checked up on by the profs. The students told me this themselves at the visiting day (usually not a good idea). Some said they come in for the daily check-in and then they leave afterwards. This was highly concerning to me, and needless to say neither I nor any of the other people with acceptances to more than just that school chose it. However, my supervisor right now mentioned that she likes us to be around and in residence most of the time. I didn't have a problem with it when it was phrased this way, and I generally have the flexibility to be out once in a while. It was a guideline, and not a command. In fact, it is so chill that I've gone back to my home city for a few days and she hasn't noticed, and sometimes we've chatted on the phone while I was hours away (in that city) during a weekday. So if your situation seems like the first one I mentioned, I would personally be concerned. If your situation seems more like the second, it's personally worked well for me so far and I would recommend it. However, the bigger issue is that you don't know what to believe, because you heard one thing one day and another thing the other day. And that kind of inconsistency is problematic.

Thanks very much for your clarification! I did read your main goal that way (i.e., as relevant to academic and non-academic), but I wondered about the starting salaries bit and the balancing act of taking more time at a top-tier school (if I get in, that is) compared to taking less time at a lower-tier school. There are some added complications for my personal situation, but your advice (and salary info) is extremely relevant. I appreciate your well wishes, I have a big choice to make so all of the extra information and personal experience helps!

Hi TakeruK, This was very helpful for me as well, thanks for posting. I have one quick question: if my main goal is not exactly like yours, in that I am in an applied research program and I plan to go to industry (where PhD degrees are necessary for some positions), does the extra time and duplication of classes still make sense? To give you some context, I am thinking about applying to top US private schools that might have a better research fit and would open more doors (potentially) after my masters at a mid-tier school in Canada (a step down from my undergrad at a top Canadian school, but nonetheless the best step at the time). Sorry to hijack this thread, I am just considering the same issues as the OP and I am not sure whether going to an American school and taking longer makes sense if industry is my goal. To be clear, I still enjoy research, the industry jobs I am aiming for require research skills, but I have other concerns about taking more time in the PhD such as the opportunity cost of industry already being so high, two-body problem concerns, and thoughts about starting a family that loom closer as my last year in school moves more towards my 30s. Thanks!

"Since the thesis is based on the literature from collectivist cultures, it cannot be published in journals from north America." Is this the case? Did someone tell you this? There is a lot of research on collectivism and individualism in all types of journals. I don't think a journal would automatically reject an article about collectivist cultures if the journal was based in North America any more than if it was based in Europe or elsewhere. Here is a list of top IO journals: http://www.uh.edu/class/psychology/io-psych/about/about-io-psyc/journals/ I'm sure some of them are not based on North America (like the European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. It would also be a good idea to look up whether people have published on this topic in these journals (I believe they have).

I received other small scholarships when I had OGS this year, and I didn't read anything disallowing it when I was going through documents today. That also wouldn't make much sense, right? They want you to succeed and be recognized, I would hope!

Hi! I think you should contact the school you will be holding the award at. One of the options is Jan, it's 01/01/2018, which I understand makes it more confusing. If you can find someone relevant to contact at the tri-agency, then you could reach out to them as well. But the school will ultimately be in charge of awarding the money, so they are probably good to speak to asap about this. Best of luck!

Congrats! The dates are for when you would start the award. There are some charts that indicate when you can start the award. Most of our programs work on a September-next September basis, so I selected 01/09/2017. If that is how your program operates, and you intended to get the award for a year starting this upcoming September, then select that option (the middle one). I hope this makes sense!

@Adelaide9216, which other types of scholarships do you mean? You can still be supported by your school (like if you normally receive a scholarship to cover tuition, but this depends on your school's policy. As well, you can still win small scholarships and awards, but not things like OGS at the same time. @LuciFir, I believe the OGS deadlines are different for each school. For example, at mine, I believe we hear back April 30th. @rgood, I believe the first round of people have 21 days to accept their offer, so after 21 days you should be able to know. Unfortunately, this is too late for people to make admission decisions based on, which sucks. I got the SSHRC CGSM just now! Congrats and good luck to everyone else!

Hi! I don't know if this resource is completely comprehensive, but a good place to start would be this toolkit by a behavioral economics company: http://beworks.com/Toolkit That is going to be for behavioral economics specifically, including cognitive biases and heuristics, and books by Daniel Kahneman, Dan Ariely, and Richard Thaler would also be good to look into.