Arcadian

Yeah, I definitely gave myself a challenge with those programs. I also decided to apply to Georgia Tech. Of the schools you suggested, I have no desire to apply to three of them when I consider their locations. I really would not want to live in Arizona, Tennessee, or Rhode Island. However, I am considering applying to one more school. What do you think about UC Davis?

I'm applying to cognitive neuroscience programs as well. I'm mainly interested in the neuroscience of decision making, memory, attention and consciousness. I would like to use imaging technologies like fMRI. I'm applying to UT Austin, UT Dallas, UC Santa Barbara, WUSTL, Michigan, and Duke. These are all departments of psychology except UT Dallas, which has a "School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences" with a "Cognition and Neuroscience PhD." I have no idea what to expect with the admissions process. I've been optimistic just to get myself through the application process, but I know I will be competing with people who are more qualified than me. My GRE score is 550 verbal, 680 quantitative (1230 total). My GPA is 3.0 overall, 4.0 over the past two years, 4.0 in psychology (I'm a case of the bad freshman year). I have one year of research experience in a memory lab. I have teaching experience through the SI program at my school. I think I have a good SOP and am a good fit for the programs to which I have applied. I honestly don't know how good my letters of recommendation will be. They're all from psychology professors, but they have all known me for less than a year. I decided to follow through with this, but I'm prepared to apply for Master's programs next semester.

(reads this entire thread) Thanks guys, I'm now terrified about the admissions process. This is not an encouraging topic for new applicants to read.

Wow, that's harsh. Are you saying that any letters written by people other than those with whom you've done research are worthless? I have two of these!

Oh, okay. Good to know.

I took the General GRE on October 1, and my scores are still "Absent or not available" on the official website. Is this normal?

From what I understand, the GRE is the least important part of the application. Considering the rest of your application will be strong, you have nothing to worry about.

I just took the general GRE today, and the experimental section was an identified Quantitative section at the end (with the $250 prize offer).

Oh, I see. Interesting. I'm not confident enough to know that I'll get any interviews, haha. All the programs on my list are really interesting to me, but I have no idea if they'll consider my application. So for those of you who applied to 10 programs, does that mean you wrote 10 different essays, and your recommenders had to write 10 letters as well? Seems a little ridiculous.

I'm getting ready to apply to PhD programs this fall, and I'm still trying to narrow down my list. Originally I was going to apply to 10 or 12 programs, but the expenses for that would add up to a ridiculous amount. Also, it seems very inconvenient to have transcripts and letters of recommendation sent to 12 different places. Intuitively, the main advantage is that I would have a better chance of getting accepted, but that's not necessarily true. I could apply to 12 programs and get rejected by all of them. I would like to cut my list down to 6 programs, but it's very hard to do that. Every time I try to cut one out, I think, "What if that's the one that would have accepted me?"

I see nothing wrong with this for two reasons. 1) The style of a LOR can't be held against the applicant. Your recommender's choice of words has nothing to do with you. 2) The statement is a compliment! It's not like she was saying you like keg parties - she was saying that the average college student likes keg parties, and you are not average. So actually, this is a very helpful statement.

Wow, really? I can't believe the majority are saying to go to school that would separate you from your boyfriend. I mean, there are some good obvious reasons to do so, but I think clearly the intuitive answer is that you should go where he is going. I find this answer ironic: Sure, and I can easily turn this scenario on its head and produce an equally bad outcome. What if you go to the top program and the relationship ends during the next few years - but it would have lasted for the rest of your life had you gone to the same school? Yes, relationships begin and end all the time - which is precisely why it would be a mistake to let one slip away. If you're going to separate PhD programs, you'll be separated for the better part of five years. Honestly, I can't imagine a relationship continuing under those circumstances. In fact, it wouldn't be much of a relationship at all.

So there is. Cognitive Neuroscience Society Even without becoming a paying member, I was able to view last month's newsletter which has a listing of RA positions. The requirement is usually a bachelor's degree. I'm glad I found this, thanks for the advice.

No problem. I'm in the same situation as you. I only have one Bio course under my belt, but I have taken some Psy courses involving biology, and I have done a lot of reading to teach myself the relevant neuroscience. However, you won't be expected to know much neuroscience when you get to grad school. You'll take courses for functional neuroanatomy and neuroimaging (the areas most relevant to cog neuro). What I've found is that there are four ways to approach studying neuroscience: Biology departments - focus on cellular and molecular neuro Neuroscience departments - trains you in the breadth of neuro Psychology deparments - focus on cognitive and behavioral neuro Cognitive Science departments (rare) - focus on cognitive and computational neuro (as well as computer science, philosophy, and other approaches) In your case, assuming you are like me, you should be most interested in applying to psychology and cog sci departments. They don't expect you to come in with a lot of Bio. However, the general neuroscience (and obviously the biology) programs require a certain amount of Bio coursework. All of this I've gathered just by searching online.

I have a long list of programs in the area. I found them by searching individual websites. There's sort of an art to navigating college websites. Once you get the "rhythm" down, it's easy to search for programs in a matter of seconds. And I found most of these through Google. Here are the programs I've gathered. This is not a comprehensive list of all programs in the U.S. These are simply the programs I found that interested me. UC Berkeley Washington University in St. Louis UCLA UCSDPsy and UCSD CogSci UC Santa Barbara Chicago Dartmouth Duke CN and Duke Psy Harvard Indiana Maryland Psy and Maryland CogSci Miami (Ohio) Michigan Michigan State Northwestern NYU PrincetonPsy and Neuro SouthernCal Texas Arizona Boston College Boston University BowlingGreen Brandeis Brown Buffalo UCDavis UC Irvine Carnegie Mellon Colorado Columbia Denver Florida Illinois Iowa Johns Hopkins Psy and Johns Hopkins CogSci Kansas Minnesota MIT Oregon Penn Pittsburgh Rice Rochester South Carolina Southern Illinois Stanford StonyBrook Utah Vanderbilt WayneState University Wisconsin Yale UT Dallas UTEP Texas A&M

Alright, thanks for the suggestions. How does one go about acquiring a position as a lab assistant or manager? I wasn't even aware that you could do such a thing as a non-student.

Not necessarily. They're both very good for psychology graduates. If you read the description for the CN program, it is quite unique in that it requires you to affiliate with a relevant department (e.g. Psychology and Neuroscience), and it requires you to choose secondary department as well. You then get two advisers, one from each department. Personally, I like that approach a lot. By its very nature, cognitive neuroscience is an interdisciplinary field, so I think it would be very useful to study it from two different angles and to work with two different professionals in the field. Basically, if you love the interdisciplinary approach, then the CN program is better for you. If you'd rather just have one adviser and a more straight-forward coursework, then the Psy/Neuro program is probably better.

Honestly, I had never considered that option, mainly because I have never heard of anyone doing this. How would one go about acquiring a position as a lab manager with just a BA in psychology? Also, I don't know of any labs where I live that do cognitive or neuroscientific research outside UTSA...and the only way to participate in those is to be a student.

Remember, I'm not done yet. I still have two semesters left full of psychology classes. The degree requires 39 hours in the major, and I'll surpass that requirement after this fall. (BTW, the psych minor is 18 hours at my school.) Alright, so let's say I do an MS in experimental psychology and get more research experience. Then would I have a chance at getting into a prestigious program? I think the MS is a good option for someone like me who changed majors halfway through but wants to do research. At the same time, I know very precisely the kind of research I want to do, so I think I would be a very good fit for many of the PhD programs on my list. Even though I haven't done any research yet, I've done a lot of reading (not just text books, but research articles). Is that worth anything?

Have you looked into the Duke Program in Cognitive Neuroscience? They are the only university I know of with a department specifically for cognitive neuro. They also have the department of psychology and neuroscience with an area in cognitive neuro, but those are two separate programs. Duke CN Duke Psy/Neuro Also, U Texas at Austin has an excellent department of psychology with a "cognitive systems" area. I know they do some research in social neuro. UT Cognitive Systems

Hello everyone, I'm new here. Just to be clear, I am applying during the Fall 2010 season, but I'm applying to attend in the Fall 2011 season. I wasn't sure what to put for "application season." I will be applying to several PhD cognitive/neuro programs and a few MS experimental programs. My GPA situation is a little complex. After my first two years, I changed my major from engineering to psychology, and as a result of this I had to change schools as well (from UT Austin to UTSA). In spite of my rough start, I really struck gold with psychology. I love it, and now I want to pursue a career in basic research. Here is the quick summary of my various GPAs. Overall: 3.0 UT Austin: 2.6 UTSA: 4.0 Psychology: 4.0 At the moment I have a lot more hours at UT, but in the end they should be close to equal. I have 30 hours in psychology. Honestly, I expect to finish with a 4.0 in psychology. How should I expect these grades to be evaluated? From what I understand, many programs emphasize your major GPA and upper-division GPA. Will the bad grades from my engineering background be viewed as a strike against me, or will it be viewed more admirably for versatility? Also, I will be gaining my first research experience this fall when I will work in a professor's cognitive aging lab. Obviously, I couldn't have possibly done any research until now because of the change of major. I won't have the chance to write any research papers. The professor said I will simply be assisting with experiments and discussions. Is this sufficient preparation for a PhD program? I have a preliminary list of programs that interest me. The list is long. It ranges from Harvard to UT Dallas. Should I bother applying to highly prestigious schools?