ZachOxford

Hey, all! Just got accepted to UCLA’s social psych PhD today, so I’ve taken the offer and will be starting in the fall. Looks like my spot at CU-Boulder, Portland State, and Northwestern will be less competitive from here on out hopefully, so good luck everyone! I’m excited to see where everyone ends up ☺️

Hey, all! Just got accepted to UCLA’s social psych PhD today, so I’ve taken the offer and will be starting in the fall. Looks like my spot at CU-Boulder, Portland State, and Northwestern will be less competitive from here on out hopefully, so good luck everyone! I’m excited to see where everyone ends up ☺️

Hey, all! Just got accepted to UCLA’s social psych PhD today, so I’ve taken the offer and will be starting in the fall. Looks like my spot at CU-Boulder, Portland State, and Northwestern will be less competitive from here on out hopefully, so good luck everyone! I’m excited to see where everyone ends up ☺️

Hey, all! Just got accepted to UCLA’s social psych PhD today, so I’ve taken the offer and will be starting in the fall. Looks like my spot at CU-Boulder, Portland State, and Northwestern will be less competitive from here on out hopefully, so good luck everyone! I’m excited to see where everyone ends up ☺️

Hey, all! Just got accepted to UCLA’s social psych PhD today, so I’ve taken the offer and will be starting in the fall. Looks like my spot at CU-Boulder, Portland State, and Northwestern will be less competitive from here on out hopefully, so good luck everyone! I’m excited to see where everyone ends up ☺️

Hey, all! Just got accepted to UCLA’s social psych PhD today, so I’ve taken the offer and will be starting in the fall. Looks like my spot at CU-Boulder, Portland State, and Northwestern will be less competitive from here on out hopefully, so good luck everyone! I’m excited to see where everyone ends up ☺️

I'm interviewing too! That's really nice that they're so accommodating of your schedule. Good luck at both!

After a short hiatus (to maintain my sanity) I've updated some things!
 
Cleaned Institution and Program - the past few days have been rough. I've realized what kind of garbage fire the Institution and program data from the results survey is. I emailed grad cafe in hopes they would standardize the text inputs for the aforementioned columns. You'd be surprised at how many different ways someone can type in "UCLA". Hopefully the data is more accurate but there is still a lot to do.
  Added more graphics. I've split the decision plots by clinical, not-clinical, and everyone combined because who cares about clinical applicants? Kidding. Their apps tend to be due a lot sooner, you can see this in the plots. I've also added result by day of the week thanks to  statisticalsleuth's suggestion. Further there is a table of the top schools that adds Rejection postings as a % of total postings (I removed postings involving other).
  R nerds: added a function file behind the R code so the script wouldn't be so overwhelming...though it's still overwhelming. This file is necessary for running the script (see the script here). I've also added an index of schools and programs for the string matching algorithm. ALL OF THESE FILES NEED TO BE IN YOUR Working Directory for the procedure to run. Finally I wanted to thank everyone for being supportive and giving me ideas. Best of luck during interviews! I've attached the PDF. You can also view it here. 

It's almost over....
Grad Cafe Decisions.pdf

Just received a phone interview from CU Boulder as well!  First interview invite that’s social neuroscience-based, so I’m excited. Here’s hoping it all goes well for both of us! 

Just received a phone interview invitation from CU Boulder. Super excited as this is my top choice!

This might sound dumb, but I'm speaking from experience... Watch your caffeine intake if you drink coffee/tea. A lot of places have coffee available all day, and it's easy to mindlessly drink it while you're waiting for interviews, etc. I always find that I get way more anxious if I drink a lot of caffeine while nervous. 
Make sure you get a good night's sleep, drink water, eat enough. 
Finally, don't listen to other applicants if they start competing with each other about their qualifications or interviews. If you've made it to the interview stage, you are qualified and deserve to be there. They chose you for a reason.
Good luck! 

I can't even begin to express how important this is. Imposter syndrome starts in immediately. I actually felt more comfortable with current grad students and in interviews than I did with other applicants. Tune it out best you can.

Hello everyone,
I've seen quite a bit of chatter around the timing of results, and the answers are obscure. I wanted to provide my services, and give you all some extra data. The beauty of grad cafe is that it is one of the most (if not the most) centralized data source for graduate students. Some data examples: What schools are most popular, what degrees, applicant metrics, dates of results, etc. Yet, I've yet to find someone that uses this information to help those applying.
 
Until now...
 
I used R (for those unfamiliar) to scrape the grad cafe results data related to psychology. I returned about 35000 records. There were a lot of un-tidy text strings (e.g., PhD and Ph.D.), especially in relation to program-title and institution; however, that is a project for another day. Data regarding dates and decisions did seem clean enough for me to analyze it and turn it into something nice for you all.
 
So what is it....?
Here is a PDF based on the results of all Psychology students (over 35000) since the origin of grad cafe. The first 3 tables show the 10 most common dates (by count) for getting an interview, getting accepted, and getting rejected ? .  I would do relative frequency and should've...maybe tomorrow.
Then a longitudinal line graph (which shows these decisions throughout the year)
Finally, one that focuses more on the "critical-period" when most decisions are made.
 
Conclusion
This was a piecemeal job that I should be done in R Markdown. I'll link my code at the end. Similar methods could be used to look at the "most popular" programs, probability of acceptance by degree type or program type, average GRE score for accepted candidates, and the list goes on. If anyone wants a csv of the dataset I used, please feel free to message me. I also welcome critiques and suggestions.  I wish you all the best.
 
R code here

Finally heard back from UCLA! This week has been so stressful waiting for official word after the phone interview hahah. This is probably my top choice - so stoked! 
School Name: UCLA
Date Interview Invite Received: 12/22/17
Degree: PhD
Type: Social Psychology
Notified via: Phone Call 
From: POI
Interview Date: 1/18 - 1/20/2018

ahhh I'm so bummed! I was waiting on learn&behav. area to get back to me...I feel like they must have gone out already then. Congratulations! good luck!! ....ACTUALLY just called the department so I am not out of luck yet! For all of you still looking into UCLA some of their areas won't be sending out invitations till mid january because the interviews will be in feb.!

Finally heard back from UCLA! This week has been so stressful waiting for official word after the phone interview hahah. This is probably my top choice - so stoked! 
School Name: UCLA
Date Interview Invite Received: 12/22/17
Degree: PhD
Type: Social Psychology
Notified via: Phone Call 
From: POI
Interview Date: 1/18 - 1/20/2018

At this point, I'm just waiting until tomorrow for all of my hopes and dreams to be crushed. I'm sure many others are in the same boat.
 
Also, for an update on UW interview invites, POI told me that the faculty will have area meetings in early/mid January, and then applicants will receive official invites after that (early-mid Jan).

Heard formally back from a POI at UCLA! Got a formal invite!
School: University of California - Los Angeles (UCLA)
Track and/or specialization within psychology program: Developmental
Interview type: Campus Visits / In-person interview
Date: February 2nd - 3rd

nothing is worse right now than receiving stupid spam emails about cat litter coupons. Or emails (thanks to taking the GRE) from schools that are like "INVITED ....to apply!".
ahhhh

Just got an email from Northwestern to attend their interview weekend for Social Psychology! In the email they said they just contacted their top group of candidates, so I'm thinking most of their interview invites were sent out today. Best of luck, everybody! 

Just wanted to send an update about Northwestern: The interview invites for Cognitive Psychology with go out around Monday. So, if you applied to Northwestern and haven't received an interview invite, it's still possible that the administration will send you an interview invite next week. Perhaps the only official invites that have gone out are for Social Psychology.

Just got an email from Northwestern to attend their interview weekend for Social Psychology! In the email they said they just contacted their top group of candidates, so I'm thinking most of their interview invites were sent out today. Best of luck, everybody! 

Just got an email from Northwestern to attend their interview weekend for Social Psychology! In the email they said they just contacted their top group of candidates, so I'm thinking most of their interview invites were sent out today. Best of luck, everybody! 

Hi everyone,
Just wanted to jump in here and say I'm also applying for social psych PhD programs. I'm only applying to 6 schools and they're almost all reach schools: Stanford, Princeton, Yale, Northwestern, University of Washington, UC Berkeley. I'm an international (Canadian) applicant.
Every time I see another person say that they've heard back about interviews from one of the above schools, I freak out a bit. Also, I've been checking my email constantly for the past week (but haven't heard anything).
Good luck to all with applications!
 
Oh, and @nicokren I've been wondering the same thing about who has already been sending out interview offers at Northwestern.

This is relevant to anyone applying to UCLA. I emailed the graduate administrator about my GRE scores being listed as "awaiting" rather than "received", and I received this response. I hope it eases some concerns.:
 
The UCLA Graduate Division has informed the UCLA Psychology Department that the application status in the UCLA Graduate Division application is not yet linked to display test scores and documents received from external sources such as official transcripts, letters of recommendation, etc.  Therefore, all applications submitted to the UCLA Psychology Department will not indicate whether official GRE General and/or Subject Test Scores, official TOEFL/IELTS Test Scores, official transcripts, letters of recommendation, etc. have been received by the Department. 


 
Our Psychology Graduate Admissions Committee has begun reviewing applications. We will be contacting applicants directly if we need any missing materials such as official transcripts, official GRE General and/or Subject test scores, official TOEFL/IELTS Test Scores, letters of recommendation, etc.