eternallyephemeral

I'm in social psych and I agree with what's stated here.
@crystalcolours, while there are social psychologists who do applied social psychology, your best bet if your interest is applied work is I/O. I also wouldn't go into social psych if the primary reason is because you're enamored with the course content. While the replication crisis (and associated issues) aren't exclusive to social psych or even psychology, it is the hardest hit by it. Undergrad classes haven't exactly caught up to reflect these contemporary issues. Because of this, I wouldn't go into social psych because of its flashy findings without looking into these issues.

The people here who are saying there is a difference are making an assumption that would make sense, if there was any sense to be made in the titles of different programs.
The first school I went to had an MA, and the school I'm at now has an MSc.
One is not "more scientific" than the other, as you do a thesis in both.
One is not more of a "hard science" than the other, as they both offered neuroscience, cognitive, social, personality, etc in each of the programs.
One was not more connected to comp sci, math, and natural/life sciences any more than the other was connected to fine arts and humanities and other social sciences.
There was no. difference. whatsoever.
 
Look beyond the name of the program and look at the subfield, whether you are doing a thesis, how many classes you have to take and what they are in, whether it is funded or not, and other aspects than the degree title.

Hi! I did my undergrad in cognitive psych and human factors, and just finished my first year in IO.
Obviously you could say I'm a bit biased, however I would highly recommend IO over social for a few reasons, and I would also argue that you should go right into it (you don't need a post-bacc) because you have the right background and you may even be able to bring more to the table than someone who was just from social or IO.
Social psych can be really exciting and fun, but the reasons you provided are very legitimate for not wanting to do a social psych program. Another reason, though quite controversial, is that all of those flashy and exciting findings in social are built on a bedrock of shaky research, sometimes with questionable methods, and always with too small sample sizes. This means a lot of that research is not as replicable as things from cognitive or personality subfields would be.
However, IO gives you the best of both words: it's basically taking social and personality psych, and applying it to practical problems (well, there's a lot of theory too, but the end goal is meant to be about the work world). As well, it's not as competitive as social, but it's much more applicable and there are specific jobs that look for a background in IO (at the masters at PhD level), in a hugely growing field that will mean your degree is in high demand.
Also, you can look into marketing or organizational behavior, both just versions of social and I/O (respectively), but in the business school. You can go into those straight from a psych background (this was something very new to me when I learned it), and learn similar things (with less of a focus on the industrial side of I/O psych though, which is important for things like data analysis and assessment/psychometrics).
A competitive applicant for IO can look like anything! In my interview day, there were people from neuro, cognitive, business, HR, social, and personality psych. I was very competitive with an above average but not super amazingly stellar GPA, and they require the GRE, but it's not impossible to get a decent score. It helps to have research experience, even if it's not in that exact area (as most schools don't offer IO anyways, how would you get that relevant experience?).
Best of luck with your decision!

Hi! Aside from economics, you may want to look into marketing graduate programs, which have a quantitative side and a consumer behavior side, both of which you would be qualified for with a background in stats and psychology.
As well, organizational behavior and industrial/organizational psychology uses a lot of stats, and not just for psychometrics (which is about more than education - its also about market research, analyzing HR/employee data, and doing data analysis on any of the psychology subfields that collect questionnaire information, like personality, quantiative, I/O psych, and social). I/O psych and org behavior also use social network analysis often, and they especially want students with strong stats and coding backgrounds. A lot of people from these areas go on (aside from academic positions) to data scientist positions, people analytics teams (like the one at google!), and consulting jobs.
Population trends would be more of an epidemiology or public health thing, but you could look into business analytics, industrial/organizational psychology, organizational behavior, or marketing masters degrees.
There's lots of options for combining these two fields. Good luck!

Hi! I did my undergrad in cognitive psych and human factors, and just finished my first year in IO.
Obviously you could say I'm a bit biased, however I would highly recommend IO over social for a few reasons, and I would also argue that you should go right into it (you don't need a post-bacc) because you have the right background and you may even be able to bring more to the table than someone who was just from social or IO.
Social psych can be really exciting and fun, but the reasons you provided are very legitimate for not wanting to do a social psych program. Another reason, though quite controversial, is that all of those flashy and exciting findings in social are built on a bedrock of shaky research, sometimes with questionable methods, and always with too small sample sizes. This means a lot of that research is not as replicable as things from cognitive or personality subfields would be.
However, IO gives you the best of both words: it's basically taking social and personality psych, and applying it to practical problems (well, there's a lot of theory too, but the end goal is meant to be about the work world). As well, it's not as competitive as social, but it's much more applicable and there are specific jobs that look for a background in IO (at the masters at PhD level), in a hugely growing field that will mean your degree is in high demand.
Also, you can look into marketing or organizational behavior, both just versions of social and I/O (respectively), but in the business school. You can go into those straight from a psych background (this was something very new to me when I learned it), and learn similar things (with less of a focus on the industrial side of I/O psych though, which is important for things like data analysis and assessment/psychometrics).
A competitive applicant for IO can look like anything! In my interview day, there were people from neuro, cognitive, business, HR, social, and personality psych. I was very competitive with an above average but not super amazingly stellar GPA, and they require the GRE, but it's not impossible to get a decent score. It helps to have research experience, even if it's not in that exact area (as most schools don't offer IO anyways, how would you get that relevant experience?).
Best of luck with your decision!

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.

- 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)

Therapy is a very broad field - if you are saying that people with MSWs don't have a background in CBT and therefore can not administer the most efficacious and scientifically sound form of therapy, yes it is true they have less experience in CBT than someone with a clinical psychology PhD would, because they have internships and placements and are supervised through these encounters to ensure they are adequately executing the therapy type.
However, if someone did a philosophy degree and then was doing psychoanalysis, which is obviously not empirically supported through randomized clinical trials and is basically pseudoscience, then they are still doing "therapy", they are just not doing scientific therapy as you're describing.
So yes, not everyone is doing the same therapy. As well, people with an MSW do not cost as much as someone with a clinical psych PhD, for a reason. But there are many different ways of administering community health programs, most of which do not use the best scientific methods we have available, and improving that so that people can have better outcomes would obviously be ideal. This movement towards evidence-based therapies, policymaking, governance, and business is slow, but it's gaining a lot of momentum.
To summarize, yes @rising_star, there is a "right" and "proper" way to be trained to be a counselor, if we define counselor as someone who administers scientifically-based therapies that are more effective than controls and placebos, just like there is a right way to be trained to be a medical doctor or a scientist. If we define counselor as someone who talks to people, then of course anyone with any background can talk to people. But that won't necessarily be empirically supported. I'm sure you understand, being a scientist yourself.

Here's how it works in Canada, for the physical sciences. I'm going to assume the "traditional" path (i.e. going into the field right away, not taking time off etc.)
 
1. Getting into an undergraduate program / a BSc.
There are two main paths that Canadian students use. 
 
a- Direct entry to a University. Students take certain required high school science and math courses and admission is based mostly on the average score on these subjects. Some schools will allow/require applicants to submit "supplemental" applications where they write essays, get letters of recommendation, and show other things like community involvement. Things might have changed since I did this (8 years ago) but if your grades are high enough, you can just get in -- the supplemental stuff is only required if you are borderline. Also, there are no standardised tests (like the SAT or GRE).
 
b- College then transfer to University. Some students will attend a college first, for about 2 years, then transfer to a University. Colleges are institutions that usually do not grant 4 year degrees in science (but they might in something like business). There isn't much research either -- they are mostly for teaching!  The 2-year college program is designed to be transferable to a 4-year university -- there is a system in place to keep the courses aligned with each other. However, it might still take a transfer student 3 years at the University to complete the BSc.
 
Either way, the student generally leave with a BSc or an Honours BSc. Top grad programs in Canada prefer students with an honours degree. An honours degree usually requires the student to maintain a certain GPA, maintain a full courseload (5 courses per semester), take about 10% more credits, and complete an honours/senior research thesis. 
 
As for tuition -- in most of Canada, University tuition costs about $5000 per year plus books. College tuition is about $3000 per year. There are scholarships (merit-basis) or bursaries (needs-basis) available, but most of them will only pay for the first year. Student loans are available from the government on a needs-basis and usually you can get a few thousand dollars per year forgiven (don't have to pay it back). These loans are interest-free until 6 months after graduation. 
 
There are no private universities that perform scientific research in Canada (nothing comparable to say, the Ivy League or Caltech). The public universities are mostly funded by the government (although this has dropped slightly below 50% in recent years), so the real cost of tuition is probably at least 2-3 times the numbers quoted above. International student tuition is much higher (about 3 times higher). I think the general philosophy is that since educating our population will create overall benefits for society, every student's education is partially subsidized by taxpayer dollars. In the province of Quebec, they have even higher taxes and Quebec residents have access to even cheaper tuition (about half the amount that the rest of the country pays). 
 
2. The next step is to go to graduate school and get a Masters degree. There are no standardised tests in Canada for graduate school -- the main criteria is your academic performance and research experience. Students submit essays and letters of reference from former supervisors.

The MSc program is usually 2 years and is fully funded. MSc and PhD programs in Canada are separate programs, however many students will choose to stay with the same supervisor from MSc to PhD (see next step). Graduate admission in Canada is more like the job hiring process. Students submit their applications to the school, and there is a committee that decides which ones meet the standard for the school. Then, they forward the applications to the profs that are named in each application (and/or the profs that meet the applicant's interests). It is usually then up to each prof to decide whether or not they want to accept that student since the prof is responsible for a large portion of the student's stipend. The department is also responsible for a portion of the stipend too (through awards or TAships) so there might be some negotiation between profs and the department if the total number of students wanted exceed the budget. However, this usually means that a MSc student is admitted to a school to work with a specific prof or research group.
 
This is because the MSc program is generally research heavy. In the two years, the students take courses and do research concurrently. The courseload is pretty light, usually 4-6 courses over the two years, and research usually starts as soon as the student arrives, although most students don't make a lot of progress until the first summer. After the two years, the student is expected to have completed a MSc project, write a thesis, and defend it in some kind of oral examination. Unlike PhD work, the MSc project does not have to be original research or even publishable quality work, although it generally is. 
 
Funding comes from doing work as a TA, money from the supervisor's grant (to pay for the research work you do on your thesis) and fellowships awarded by the school or external agencies (such as the government). The funding packages have values that typically range from $25,000 per year to $35,000 per year at the MSc level. However, the student is expected to pay for tuition out of this money. Tuition is about $4000 to $7000 per year. 
 
3. After the MSc, the next step is to get into a PhD program and complete it!
 
The standard path is to apply to a PhD program after completing your MSc. Most students stay at the same school, but you have to reapply to the school since it's a separate program. You would even have to get transcripts and letters of reference from your own supervisor! However, this is mostly a formality. This also allows the student to change schools or just change supervisors (or change projects with the same supervisor) from MSc to PhD. If the student is extending their MSc work to a PhD, they can probably finish in an additional 3 years. If they change schools or projects, it might take another 4 years. 
 
There are two common exceptions though!
a- Many schools will allow MSc students to "skip" to the PhD program after the first year of the MSc. This allows them to skip the whole MSc thesis/defense thing and probably finish their entire degree in 4-5 years total. Each school/department has their own regulations of what is required to do this, but some people will recommend that you complete the MSc first!
 
b- Some schools will follow the US system and only admit students to a direct-PhD program. These students might get a MSc along the way for completing coursework, like the US system.
 
For a PhD, there would be additional course requirements. Unlike the US system, courses aren't front-loaded necessarily...usually students take them throughout their years. Most schools have some kind of comprehensive exam partway through and the comps are also a defense of the PhD student's thesis proposal in front of a committee (which is usually the eventual thesis committee). Many programs will consider the successfully defended proposal a "contract" -- i.e. once the student completes everything in the proposal, then they are ready to graduate! PhD level work must be original research and definitely publishable quality. The thesis can be a traditional manuscript, but some places will accept 3 first authored papers by the student instead. This kind of thesis would usually just require reformatting the published papers into thesis format, and some introduction, transitional text, and summarizing text added. 
 
Funding for PhD students work the same way as MSc students, above. Some programs may award higher stipends to PhD students.
 
4. After the PhD, the next step is usually post-doctoral positions for the academia-oriented graduate. These are 2-3 year research only positions. I think it's expected that you do at least one, usually two stints as a post-doc before you are seriously considered for tenure-tracked positions. At this stage, you are almost solely evaluated on your research performance/output. Transcripts from grad school are not usually needed, except for maybe fellowship applications. Most Canadians seem to do at least one post-doc outside of Canada if they did their PhD in Canada. 
 
5. The next step for someone who wants to be a tenured faculty member at a research university is to hope to get hired on a tenure-tracked position. Usually these are assistant professorships at Universities. The hiring process is a big deal. The Department usually have to compete with other departments in order to get the Dean/University to award a professorship position to them. The Department forms a search committee to solicite applicants. The committee usually consists of faculty members of all rankings, and some graduate student representatives. Sometimes undergraduates are involved as well. After they make a shortlist, these applicants visit the school for interviews and to give "job talks" -- usually these are department seminar or colloquia. Research is probably the main criteria, but teaching is also something that might be valued, depending on the department.
 
6. After someone is hired as an assistant professor, there is some period of time (usually about 5 years) before they are considered for tenure (and promotion to Associate Professor). In this period of time, the new faculty member is working really hard to generate a lot of research, serve on committees etc. When it's time for tenure review, it's an evaluation by a committee again. Sometimes students are directly involved in the committee, but the department might ask the students to write in letters in support of or against a faculty member up for tenure. If the tenure application is not successful, this usually means the dismissal (but not always) of the faculty member.
 
7. After getting tenure, then the Assistant Prof is considered for promotion to Full Professor some 5 ish years later. The process is similar to the tenure review. The difference between Full and Assistant Prof is mostly only in department bylaws (for example, they might require the department head be a Full Prof etc.).
 
That's pretty much all I know about how it works in Canada. Obviously, I know more about the earlier stages (that i've experienced or know people who have done so), so my descriptions are longer in these steps! 
 
As for my opinion, I think this works great. You only pay out of pocket during undergrad (and it's already mostly subsidized). Grad school is basically a job (and the admission/hiring process is like that of a job). I'd consider grad school as some sort of apprenticeship, where you are slightly underpaid for your skills in exchange for the ability to learn/develop them. In the physical sciences in Canada, graduate students are generally treated decently and our stipends are generous compared to other fields. The take-home stipend amounts are even above the poverty line in most cases!

Why I would:

1) Autonomy/independence.  I get to determine what I work on, when I want to.
2) Flexibility of schedule.  I may have to work 80 hours a week, but they're any 80 hours I want!
3) Intellectually stimulating environment of the university.
4) Shaping young minds, I guess.  Helping to influence the future of my field.  I'd like to advise pre-health undergrads in their careers, and maybe advise new doctoral students one day.

Why I wouldn't:

1) I don't really like teaching.  Every time I get involved in it, I always think it's just distracting from my research, so I think that's a sign.
2) I would prefer some geographic mobility.  I don't want a job in a place I hate just for the opportunity to be an academic.
3) I prefer a more medium-stress lifestyle, and I don't want to fight for tenure.
4) Tenure doesn't appeal to me.  I don't want to be tied to one institution for my career; I want the freedom to move if I want to.  I know it's a bit harder to move on in academia when you're an associate or full professor unless you are prolific.
5) I don't want to pay my own salary through grants.  I would prefer a guaranteed salary.
6) Academia moves too slowly for me.  I want my research to go towards applied programs that will solve problems in the more immediate future.  I want to work on very applied issues and help people in the more proximal future.
7) I really don't want to run my own research lab.  It's not that I'm not a good manager, but I would prefer the structure of an established company rather than being, essentially, the proprietor of a small business.  I just want to worry about the science and not the money or the equipment or the space.  I would rather work on a team with other researchers at my level, all of whom have a particular skill set they bring to the problem at hand.  And I want to work for a corporation that hires other people to worry about the money and the equipment and the space and leave me to play with data and write papers.
8) I hate committees, and I hate meetings.  I realize that those happen in corporate, too, but from my (admittedly limited) experience, academia = endless pointless meetings whereas corporate seems to have mastered them a little better.
9) I like routines and predictability.  I know that I enjoy the flexibility of academia, but I also would not mind one bit working a 9-5 and knowing that at 5 or 6 or 7 pm I can drop everything and go home and not think about work the next day.
10) I like juggling multiple research projects at once, but I don't like juggling multiple tasks at once.  I want to be a researcher working on a variety of projects, but not a teacher, adviser, and researcher all at once.  I'm not really good at segmenting my time properly, and I've found that I waste a lot of time transitioning my brain from one task to the next.
11) I like to call myself a "research mercenary."  I am more broadly interested in public health research, but there are a wide variety of fields within that area that I am interested in.  I feel like if I became an academic, I'd be expected to dig a specialized niche within a particular area and burrow into that niche for the next 20 years.  But that's not what I really want.  I'd much rather be a semi-generalist, and know a little about a lot and a lot about one particular area of that lot.
12) Again, I have limited experience, but I find corporate bullshit more understandable than academic bullshit.  Corporations want to make money, and people in corporations work together to make money somehow.  Even in think tanks and policy institutes, the goal is to compete for government contracts and produce good end goals so that more agencies want to contract with you.  Government agencies and institutes produce research for the national good (theoretically) to serve priority areas.  But academic politics drive me nuts.  I always feel a little bit alienated around other grad students who really, really want to be academics.
13) I don't like conferences.  I know I will still go if I am in non-academic research, but they'll be less critical to my career (somewhat) and so maybe I will go to fewer.

Now I sound like a misanthropic academic, lol.

Yes, I have several former students with BAs in psychology who got jobs out of college in a variety of fields.  I also have some friends from college who got a job with a BA in psychology - 30% of our majors are employed at graduation (most of the rest decide to go to graduate school).
 
BAs in psychology work in marketing and advertising firms, in business/corporate/general management, human resources, management consulting, banking, nonprofits (in general roles and especially as research associates), community organizations (ditto), educational testing firms like ETS and Pearson, school systems, social service organizations, colleges and universities (admissions, recruitment, advising, institutional research), and in mental health provision (usually in adjunct positions like rehabilitation counselors or residential staff at halfway houses or residential facilities).

You know, I think we all know some people who we might think would be better off quitting and doing something else. But I also think that our own evaluation of our self-worth is completely clouded by the emotions we feel on the horrible roller-coaster that is the job market. I don't think any of us can think about it objectively, I think the job market messes with our heads in a way that's hard to deal with without some external support and help. When I occasionally have these feelings, usually following some setback or bad result in my career, I am lucky enough to have trusted mentors in my life who I know I could turn to and ask straight up: am I good enough? (Also: mentors who will reach out to me and say: that sucked, I'm sorry, but hang in there, you can make it.) No one can guarantee that things will work out just because you are good enough and deserve to make it, but I hope you have people who will give it to you straight and tell you if they think you have a fair shot, or if you'd be better off either aiming at a different tier of schools than you have been, or quitting and doing something else altogether. Beside mentors, maybe there are other peers who are going through the job market ordeal at the same time as you. It helped me to learn that my friends, who I think are amazing people and I am sure will be successful, were feeling just as miserable and insecure as I was. It's not an easy conversation to have, but this feeling is unfortunately extremely common. The support of friends who can really understand what you're going through is extremely valuable.
The question of how long you want to try is a very personal one, but also one to think through with trusted mentors. I don't think giving you a number would help, exactly. It also depends on how well you've been doing in previous years - even if you didn't get a job, did you get interviews? my impression is that people who get multiple interviews are generally attractive enough to make it, and then it's just a matter of time until things click and the stars align just right so they are the chosen ones. It can still take a while and be demoralizing, but it's a different situation than if you've never even gotten a long-list interview, in which case you should really get help with your application materials and also again seek out the advice of someone who's been on hiring committees and can tell you how competitive you are. 

In my opinion it's worth the try, but in this early stage you should only apply to jobs that you actually really want and you'd be happy to give up your fellowship for. Unless your field is different from virtually every other field I know anything about, the job market is tight, and prospects even for the best candidates aren't great. So if you can get an offer, that would be amazing and you should obviously go for it. But even if not, even though the process of going on the job market is time consuming, the documents you'll produce will be a good foundation for later years on the market, so you'll be saving yourself a lot of time and stress in later years. My own experience was that creating the original documents was incredibly time consuming, but every year since, I haven't needed more than a few days of tweaks to be ready for another round of applications. So, doing a good job the first time around can really pay off down the line. I think a good goal for the first year is a long-list interview and perhaps an on-campus visit. You'll get to see much closer up what's actually out there, you'll get some experience prepping for interviews, and if you're successful, you'll put together a job talk and get to go on a campus visit. You might also learn from this process how to situate your thinking in the bigger picture, which you might find will help with the dissertation writing, especially when you move beyond the detailed analysis to the discussion of implications, next steps, and how your work fits with other advances in your (sub)field. If you come without any expectations beyond getting an interview -- which, for a fourth-year PhD student would be wise -- I think that it's a win-win. You do have the time to do this now. Anyway, that's my $.02. 

I can second the definitely not too late part. I published my undergrad thesis 7 years after my undergrad :-)

I'd be interested to hear why people shouldn't be a data scientist? The majority of people leaving my program (with or without degrees) and also leave academia go on to positions as a data scientist of some sort or another. Ultimately, to me, the type of work that a data scientist does matches my ideal career path: find answers to questions by learning how to analyze large datasets. Academic positions are the same skills but applied to academic questions, while the many other industries that use these skills to solve a wide variety of problems. Some types of problems won't interest me or I wouldn't want to contribute to but I feel that there are many other worthwhile problems to solve that will make a positive impact in the world

I think the first thing you have to do is review all the math that will be on the test, however anxiety provoking and daunting that may feel. I don't know what your budget is. If it's high, you could get a tutor. If it's not, you could get a GRE study guide instead. I actually found ones online for free (do a google search and see what you find). Usually, study guides will outline all the math you need to know along with sample problems and then short quizzes. I set a date for my test and then created a study schedule for how many topics I would cover per day. On the weekdays I would study a few topics of math and then on the weekends I would take quizzes to brush up on what I had learned. I did this every night before bed and after work. If you feel like you'll need a lot of time to review your Quant, then set your test date for many months from now. Apps aren't due until Dec 1 at the earliest so you could set your test date for September and have several months to study. I find that the most important thing is to be methodical. Create an actual physical schedule either on a spreadsheet or google calendar and be detailed about how you split up your time. For example, "Monday I will review area formulas and Tuesday I will review linear equations." 
If the study guides you find aren't teaching you enough math in the way you need, try Khan Academy or again, googling. When I need to brush up on random math concepts, I've found that there are awesome videos and websites out there that break down the math into more basic language that are designed for high schoolers. Research statistics may seem like something totally removed from high school math but it's not. There are elements (especially in Regressions) that will pop up when doing statistics math. If you feel ok with research stats, you can do GRE math! I am a true believer that everyone can do the stuff they teach in high school. It's just a matter of finding a way to digest the knowledge in a manner that works for you.

Anybody can, but should they? 

Yeah, I second @eternallyephemeral. A lot of programs will do a first-round sweep and remove people solely based on GREs/GPA. That super sucks, but when they're getting thousands of applications for a handful of positions, they use heuristics that might mean they miss out on awesome people who aren't great test-takers or who have viable reasons for lower GPA. 
I'm not sure where you are in your education, but if you're still in undergrad, look into completing an honors thesis with a lab. I ended up publishing my thesis work, both as conference posters and as first author in a peer reviewed journal. If you're not in school any more, I don't think it will be fruitful to approach a lab saying, "I'm trying to get publications, please take me on." They'll want you to be of help/service to them, and after building a relationship and demonstrating your research and writing abilities, you may have an opportunity to become a co-author. Another idea I had (that might not be feasible, but no judgement in brainstorming!) is if you have a faculty member mentor who likes you and is invested in your doing well, you probably could be a little more open with them about really wanting to write something up / create a poster and they might take you up on that. Sometimes labs will have old datasets that could still be generative, but there is no one who wants to / has time to do the work to analyze data and write it up. 

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)

- 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)

If you don't go looking for a relationship, they will happen. That said, you also don't have to exude yourself as also being a strong independent woman that don't need no partner (although you may just do that naturally, being all successful and stuff).
In my experience, I have found that the best partners were not intimidated by my success but actually inspired by it. They were inspired to be better, do bigger things, because I myself was doing bigger and better things. Not once has the "gender power imbalance" between my partners and I ever been an issue and it never will because I am with them not for what they can provide for me but how their minds work.
The right people are inspired and want to better themselves for them, the wrong people are intimidated and try to bring you down so they are on top.

I mean, I am an undergrad, so that's how I'm going to be viewed regardless.

Well, hopefully they can understand that funding is really important in the decision. And -- I really believe this is true -- there is no "one perfect fit" that is the only one for us. There are many options out there that lead us in different directions, and you never know what would have been if you'd gone down another path. All you can do is embrace the one you're on and believe that it, too, has good things about it that will get you toward your final goal, although the actual path you take might be different. 

If they weren't offering enough money for you to sustain yourself, were they really that welcoming? Well intentioned, maybe, but you should remember that they were willing for you to take on serious debt in order to be there. Taking the offer with funding was and is the smarter decision! It's okay to be unsure, but once the dust has settled, you should start finding ways to get excited about your new school -- sometimes it can take some time, especially when the process is emotionally difficult, but at the end of the day you made the right decision, and you should be proud of that.