quietq

I just had to make a very similar decision. I went with the program instead of the professor. The program offered me more opportunities to grow and become independent in my own right instead of following in a fantastic mentor's footsteps really closely, which I think will be important to my development in the long run. It was a really hard choice and I appreciate your dilemma! There is a case to be made for either decision, so I'll just tell you some of the things I considered and maybe that will help clarify your thinking a little. Something to keep in mind - it can be risky to go somewhere with only one advisor in your specialization. Professors move, life situations change, your needs change, etc. I would be wary of going somewhere with only one person you could imagine yourself working with. It's nice to have a reasonable number of peers learning alongside you and other mentors to bounce ideas off of. Connecting with people at other institutions could help, but they won't be as easily accessible as someone whose office is just down the hall. A great advisor is great, but they're not going to be perfect. You will be frustrated by them or disagree with them at some point in your graduate career, and having someone else to talk to will help at the low points. The short-term 1-on-1 special attention would be really wonderful in the beginning, but are you going to feel limited a couple years into the program? Here's another hypothetical question I thought about a lot: Are your potential advisors at School B good enough that you think you'd be happy and productive working with them? Independent of the fact that you really like the professor at School A, do you have a compelling reason not to choose School B?

Update: I officially accepted Program A this morning. It was hard because I do feel like I'm giving up some of the short-term comfort I'd have at Program B, and because I went against my mentors' advice, but I feel really strongly that I made the better choice for my long-term career. This thread was really helpful in reminding me to take the long view, so thanks for that! There's nothing I disliked enough about A to justify declining their offer. Getting out of my comfort zone and becoming more independent will ultimately be good things, and the ceiling for my research there is substantially higher. Telling Program B was difficult, but it went well enough and I am relieved to have some closure on this. I hope I've made someone on the waitlist happy, at least! Thanks for all the great feedback.

Thanks for your thoughts! It's really helpful to get some other perspectives on this. I'm not highly ambitious, but I am really concerned about the academic job market. Basically any tenure-track position where I can do research would be a total dream, and both programs are placing their students in those positions. At the same time, if I have the opportunity to shoot for a higher tier, it still feels a little unwise to walk away from that... So I guess I'm a little more wishy-washy than absolutely thrilled with B's placements. Both advisors have prioritized publishing with students, which is great, but they're young and don't have long track records to judge yet. The learning curve for Program A is decidedly steeper, so their students have been slower out of the gate. Historically, other advisors' students there have gotten rolling more around year 2-3. Once they start publishing they're doing well in terms of author order/high impact journals. Program B's advisor already has a lot of very strong student publications out there - it's one of the things that most impressed me about them. I need to take Program A's advisor more at their word that they're going to do this. I am also very lucky in that I may be a little ahead of the game because I had a fantastic undergrad advisor who prioritized getting me publishing even in college. I have a 1st author publication and some of my own data from working with her, and I have a couple projects further along in the pipeline that I could hopefully get out quite early. That could possibly help the slower start at Program A...? But I think Program B would be more supportive of me doing that, too. They seem very aware that they're a smaller name and they need their students to be very productive to be competitive, whereas Program A doesn't put quite as much early pressure on students to publish because they do have some security from their name.

I'm trying to decide between two social psych PhD programs and I can't quite make myself commit. Any thoughts? My career goals are academic, but I don't expect (or really profoundly want) a top-50 R1-type position. Program A: - Exciting research that is somewhat out of my comfort zone - Good advisor fit - Smaller/rebuilding social program in a good (top 20) general psych department - Less structured program that will require more initiative and independence - Prestigious, well-known school - Very strong funding offer - Reasonably good academic placements among social grads Program B: - Great research that matches my interests exceptionally well - Really awesome advisor fit - Medium, well-established social program in an okay (top 100) general psych department - More structured program with a solid, nurturing reputation - Less recognized name with a couple well-regarded faculty in the program - Funding isn't as good, but it's adequate for the location - Mixed/average academic placements among social grads Both advisors are junior faculty and don't have a long track record to go on, but they're publishing and presenting productively with their early students. Advisor B has a slight edge as far as that goes. I also like Advisor B's studies and network more, for what that's worth. My dilemma comes down to feeling like I really know exactly what I'm getting into with Program B, whereas Program A might have a higher ceiling but it also seems a little less predictable. I like the structure and overall warmth of Program B, but I also recognize that the difference between a top-20 and a top-100 department is not a minor thing. I have gotten advice from social faculty mentors (at an R1 and at a SLAC) and they're both telling me to go with my gut, but I don't want to be totally naive. I'm struggling to find any reliable information on social psych rankings and their importance in academic hiring, and because my mentors have been contradicting the conventional "Go to the most prestigious place you can get into," wisdom, I'm really confused about what to do. Please message me for names if you're curious or if you might be able to offer more specific advice.

I can't suggest an exact number to aim for, but you could look at the CVs of recent hires in your field to estimate.

I did a Skype interview with my POI in social psych at UW-Seattle. Their interview is scheduled around this weekend some time, and they've finalized their invitations. I can't remember the exact date because I didn't make the in-person cut.