spunky

A similar topic was discussed previously here: http://forum.thegradcafe.com/topic/65130-adler-university/#comment-1058268279

Your post kind of reminds me of a famous quote of physicist Max Planck related to the progress of scientific knowledge: “A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it.” For the case of psychology I find this to be particularly tricky because, like Thomas Leahy pointed out in his classic book A History of Psychology, psychology (like most social sciences) advances horizontally as opposed to vertically. His argument kind of goes like this: in physics, math, chemistry, etc. you start with a theory, say the motion of objects as described by Aristotle. At some point what Aristotle had to offer was no longer enough (and many things were wrong) so whatever was useful of his theories remained and along came Newton with classic mechanics. Then Newton’s laws were not enough, physics kept what it needed from it and then Einstein and relativity comes along… and the processes continues on and on. Think about what happened in psychology. Leaving aside Wundt and the psychophysics people, say we start with the dominant theory of psychoanalysis. Then at some point there comes a certain Skinner and Watson and whatnot, tears it all down and starts with his own separate theory, behaviourism. Then came Rogers and the humanist bunch… and the cognitive-behavioural people… etc. etc. Not all the theories are completely mutually-exclusive but they are sufficiently different from one another that any one person can, at one point or another, identify with a particular school and keep on building it further. So whereas you can’t really apply to a Physics Dept and say you exclusively ascribe to the Aristotelian laws of physics because there really is just one big tower of physics, you can definitely apply to any of the many condos of psychology and keep on developing their theories and methods further. Will the psychodynamic approach eventually die out? I guess so. But it will probably happen at such a slow rate that we will not see it within our lifetimes. I do hope that the biological model of behaviour and brain function eventually triumphs over all others, but my own experience helping out with research in these area has let me down a little bit. There is just SO much that needs to be discovered and cleaned up before we can even have a solid account of the neuroscience of behaviour that, again, I’m not sure if we’ll ever see direct applications of this in our lifetimes in the form of a well thought-out body of knowledge capable of overarching and encompassing predictions. I do think it is a somewhat archaic way of thinking but I also don’t think the way psychodynamic theories are taught and applied today have a lot of the original ways in which Freud thought about behaviour. I mean, they do have changed in the light of evidence and I’d like to believe that most clinicians, regardless of their theoretical bent, keep up with their research and re willing to change their practice depending on the evidence they see published. Not so sure what programming ability and computer skills have to do with actual clinical practice in this setting though. I mean, I guess it’s cool if therapists also know how to program but as far as whether this type of training is relevant to their therapeutic experience… well…

Hello! Sure, I would be happy to help. I am a 3rd-year PhD student (graduating within a few months, actually) and I work both in a Quant Psych lab and an Educational Measurement one, so I tend to see how things are done in both types of programs. Honestly believe you may benefit by looking a little into Educational Measurement programs as well. Lemme address each one of your questions one-by-one and I’ll post everything in the forum so other people can benefit from them. I kind of feel like Quant Psych is “psychology’s best public secret” because, although it is a very interesting and fun area to be in (with lots of opportunities for growth and employment both inside and outside academia) there is little info about this area out there and its number of PhD graduates still remains quite low (at least per stats in North American programs). The Crisis of Replicability has been shining the spotlight on us a little bit (particularly because we, as methodologists/statisticians, have been forecasting this crisis for about 30yrs or more) so let’s see how things change in the future. In any case…. My big question to you, is what can I do to improve my application beyond the basic have a good GRE, good GPA, etc.? I am not applying for programs until the Fall of 2017. For this question the advice is somewhat standard. Find a lab where you can gain research experience and volunteer. Ideally, a Quant Psych lab would be the best one so you can directly look into what goes in the daily research life of people in these types of programs. Quantitative Psychology can also be very mathematical so it wouldn’t hurt if you have taken Mathematics/Statistics classes outside of Psychology. I place emphasis on outside because, in my experience, courses in research methods/statistics for social scientists are a tad bit skimpy on the theory behind the methods and you want to learn how to do these things beyond the “cookbook” level. I mean, it’s not super necessary but it’s gonna look good on your application. I spoke with a Quantitative professor that offered to teach me R in an independent study. Is that a good idea? It’s more than a good idea… I’d say you’re probably gonna be expected to know some R, SAS, STATA or some other programming environment by the time to apply. But R is very powerful and popular so I would place the bulk of my efforts on learning R. I mean, you can apply without knowing any of this but then you’re gonna be stuck with both having to learn how to program while taking classes, undergoing research, etc. You’re also not going to look as good on your application package when compared with people who already know R. At this level, SPSS is just not gonna cut it anymore so don’t forget everything you know but be prepared to rarely use SPSS ever again. I think I haven’t used SPSS in more like 2 or 3 years? Everything I do is in R. So yes, the faster you can learn R, the better. The other software I would recommend you to become familiar with is MPLUS because that is the default now on latent variable modeling. R can do a lot of what MPLUS can, but people just use it a lot so knowing MPLUS syntax will let you communicate with other people who don’t use R. It wouldn’t hurt you to learn about other programming languages and have some idea of how to do database management (SQL) or data-visualization (Tableau), but this is really not as necessary. The one thing that you *should* start becoming familiar with is how to code Monte Carlo simulations. Your research as a Quant Psych person happens primarily inside the computer and simulations are our bread and butter. You are gonna end up running A LOT of those so try to become familiar with the basic structure of for() and while() loops, how to optimize computer time and (if you use R) the family of apply() functions. A book I recommend first year students to get themselves started with is this one: https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/monte-carlo-simulation-and-resampling-methods-for-social-science/book241131 so if you can at least start going through some of the chapters and try to reproduce some of the examples it would place you ahead of most people by the time you begin. I’ll admit I don’t have a calculus background beyond Calc I, but I do have a course on multivariate statistics. Do you think this will be a problem? Not really, but then again it depends on what your ultimate goal is. Most people (like yourself) find this field by accident so almost everyone who applies starts off without a strong base of Mathematics/Statistics. You will learn most of what you need as you go but the downside is that (a) you will only know things at an “intuitive” level that does not necessarily generalize to the wider types of data you will encounter and (b) you may not be able to read and use the literature produced by and for Quantitative Psychologists. The primary journal of our field is Psychometrika. It is the most prestigious place to publish and what most people aim for. But, to be honest, without at least some notions of calculus, linear algebra and mathematical statistics most people can’t make it past the first two pages or so of any given article. So, would this be a problem to get in? No, I don’t think so. But it can end up becoming a problem in the future. As a curious side-note, I did my BSc in Mathematics with some hints of Psychology and I found it somewhat peculiar that, when I was having my interview, my advisor had highlighted all the Math courses I took and basically ignored anything related to Psychology. The interview also went into that direction and I feel the reason for that is because very few people with background in Math/Stats/CompSci etc. wander into Quant Psych so whenever that happens, advisors are very happy to snatch you from the get-go. Your application does stand over other people’s if you can palpably demonstrate some sort of technical expertise (where technical means theoretical math or an ability to code). Is there anything that applicants say/do that is specifically a deal breaker in quant programs? Uhm… not that I’m aware of? Just make sure you don’t show your preference for Bayesian statistics in front of a frequentist professor (<--- HOHOHOHO I’m so clever… Am I not? Anyone? OK, I’ll let myself out now… :D). Although this may tie in with another question of yours which is… I am not particularly interested in creating new statistical methods myself. I am more interested in tackling other people's data and looking into multi-level modeling. Is that a problem? For the most part, yes. This will become a problem for you sooner or later. And the reason it will become a problem is because you’re aiming at doing the most basic implementation (i.e. data analysis) of what Quantitative Psychology has to offer. It is also a problem because, in reality, any skilled social/ clinical/personality/insert-your-area-of-choice psychologist can do the same thing. As a Quant Psych your selling point is something like “not only can I do data analysis. I can do data analysis, I can create new methods for data analysis and I can evaluate data analysis methods”. If you stop at the “I just want to do data analysis” well, that’s not gonna get you very far. And that is something that in my opinion (and from talking to other people in my area in conferences and whatnot) would be a deal-breaker if you’re trying to get into a program. I mean, think about it… from the get-go, you’re already signalling that you’re not interested in doing what most of us in the field are doing so the immediate question that pops up is “is this person even supposed to be here?”. If you’re mostly focused on data analysis over research on statistic and theoretical psychometrics then I would encourage you to apply into a more substantive program (social/clinical/personality/etc.) and just either do a minor in Quant Psych or take as many statistics/methods courses as you can. The fact of the matter is that a Quant Psych PhD program looks more like a watered-down Statistics PhD program (with a few exceptions, Ohio State comes to mind) than a Psychology program. You’ll find out soon enough that most of your research happens inside the digital bowels of a computer and not so much going out in the field and talking to real people. I mean, you do some of that but that’s definitely not what your training as a Quant Psych will do for you. Is a Quantitative psychology PhD program a good place for someone particularly interested in measurement of personality and psychological disorders? You can do that but if what you are really looking for is the measurement aspect of things and not necessarily the statistical aspect, a program in Educational Measurement might be a better fit for you. In my assessment, Quantitative Psychology programs are more programs in Statistics with some Psychometrics thrown into them, whereas Educational Measurement programs are more programs in Psychometrics with some Statistics thrown into the mix. I do find that Educational Measurement programs tackle some interesting aspects of scale construction and development (like how to create norms, psychometrically-sound ways to score tests, etc.) that do not necessarily make it into Quant Psych. And the reason behind this is Item Response Theory, IRT. Educational Measurement programs have been, for the most part, the bastion of IRT because the sample sizes you need to run these models accurately can easily go into the 1000s. And, at least form my experience, your standard Psychology research sample size is somewhere in the low 100s. Plus Educational Measurement programs place heavy emphasis on what happens outside the context of data analysis (The Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing will become your new go-to book for everything) whereas I feel like Quant Psych programs place a lot more emphasis on the data analysis part itself. Now, again, this is just a wide scope, generalization of how Quant Psych and Educational Measurement works. I’m sure if you look hard enough, you may find the one program with that one faculty member that does exactly what you want to do. But from the type of questions that you’re asking, I’m wondering whether Quant Psych is actually the right fit for you and if you may be better off in another program and just being very studious with your methods. Or perhaps an Educational Measurement program, have you looked into those? I feel the faculty in those programs is a little bit more diverse as far as research interests go. Another thing I would recommend you to do is to grab maybe some of the high impact journals in the field and have a look at what kind of research they publish. When you have the time, look into these 3 journals: Psychometrika, Multivariate Behavioural Research and the British Journal of Mathematical and Statistical Psychology. Go through the most recent issues, see the kind of stuff that gets published there and ask yourself: “is this the kind of research I would like to do for the rest of my professional career?” if your answer is “yes”, then Quant Psych is definitely your field. If your answer is “no” then… well, I think looking at other options might be worthwhile.

Thank you. It's just that I was chatting with a few friends from when I used to intern at ETS (and who now work there full-time) and they were telling me about all the expansions ETS is undergoing within the U.S. next year. Like they're opening more test centres and hiring more staff at the existing ones to accommodate greater demand for their products, particularly the TOEFL and the GRE. I found it curious that as standardized testing draws more and more criticism, the demand for these same standardized tests also grows more and more. When I read your post I thought "well, maybe this is specific to Astronomy and that's why they're reaching a happy compromise of getting rid of the subject test but still asking scores for their other "base tests". But it seems like they're aiming to just scratch the whole thing, at least from what you said.

So... does this pertain solely to the Physics GRE or to both the subject-specific (Physics, in this case) GRE and the general GRE (you know, verbal + quant + analytic)?

Thanks everyone for your great recommendations. Now my proposal is ready and, with some luck, I'll get to defend it before the end of September so I can officially become a PhD candidate. OMG! Everything is moving so fast!

I do this too! But do you do anything to keep track of your citations/references? One of my biggest issues once I start "free-styling" is that I need to go back, re-read what I wrote and write the proper reference/citation where I took it from. Sometimes I spend hours looking through articles trying to find which one had that one idea that I'm using in X or Y paragraph. Yeah, it's the whole "tell me the big picture part" that freaks me out. Like I feel I'm a very good... I'm not sure how to phrase it... like "single-issue" writer as if "ok, so we have problem X let's say everything we need to say about X". But if I need to link X to Y to Z I'm like " aww c'mon peepz. Just read the papers yourselves and get the gist of it!" Maybe I'm just lazy, I dunno. Oh, and thanks! It's gonna be weird being on a payroll and whatnot after so many years of freelancin'. I guess no more "I can wear my PJs while I work" for me

So... yeah, basically what the title says. The place where I work part-time doing data analytics/modeling wants to hire me full-time now (yay!), but my boss did ask me to make sure I had, at the very least, finished my PhD dissertation or, ideally, have my PhD before April 2017. "No problem!" - I thought - "I only need one more chapter to go up for publication and the rest is just writing an intro and a conclusion". That was back in May. Fast-forward today and I only have 1 paragraph sitting on a mostly-empty Words document. I feel like I have the most massive writer's block in history and I dunno what to do :/ Help? How did people start writing their dissertation?

Well... can you tell us what you did exactly and what's the issue that your committee is pointing out?

THIS advice is golden: which was the first thing that came to mind. I mean, if you were let go of your program (regardless of whether it was you or your profs or whoever) this is something that, sooner or later, will come to light during your new applications and I'm not sure how it could be addressed without things getting a little awkward. I mean, academia is a very small world and it's not unusual for profs to cross-check references with one another regarding potential new students if they see a name they know in the LORs you get or if they see which department you're coming from and they know X or Y professor from said department. At the risk of sounding a little bit like "glass-half-empty" person... have you considered maybe just cutting your losses, going back to your home country and finishing a graduate degree over there?

Uhm... never heard of it. But it kinda sounds like Mathematical Psychology 2.0!

plz! don't forget the computer AND printer perk people, that should seal the deal! (plot twist: you need to pay for your own ink! :D)

I dunno, but I’ve always been a little bit reticent to jump into the OMG-the-GRE-so-unfair bandwagon. I feel it is really more of a symptom rather than a cause of a much wider issue which is simply the fact that graduate school applications in programs like Psychology (which I think always rank consistently on the top 5 most popular major in North America? ß could be wrong here) have skyrocketed in the past decade and there really is no system (at least not until that I’m aware of) to place all students on a common standard for evaluation. Back when I was intering at ETS (and it seems like I will be heading there next year) we would have a few research talks on the type of validity evidence that’s out there in the literature for the GRE (and other standardized tests) and if a discussion broke out (which it often did) regarding the downfalls of score use and interpretation, we almost always ended up circling back to the same conclusion: the GRE (or your standardized test of choice) is definitely not ideal, but it is the only solution that makes sense given the time/budget limitations of the world we live in. I honestly don’t think a prestigious Psych program would discard a stellar candidate (where by “stellar” I mean publications in peer-reviewed journals, conference presentations, strong LORs from prestigious labs, etc.) just because his or her GRE scores do not match X or Y cut-offs. But I do think that if you’re an “average” candidate with average scores then, yes, the GRE will impact you positively or negatively. The key issue is to recognize that is not because of the score itself, it is because there are 100s applicants who look just like you on paper. And if among the 100s of applicants it just so happens that a few look better on the GRE than you, then your chances of ending up on the “no” pile as opposed to the “yes” increase. I guess in an ideal world there would be a way to have some sort of “holistic” evaluation of candidates, but unless someone can figure out how to obtain and administer the resources in terms of time, money, labour, etc. to implement said system the GRE is here to stay. PS - I think it's funny how we started with a thread about strategies to improve GRE scores and we're now back to the old-age debate of whether or not the use of GRE scores for admission purposes is valid.

I've always kinda secretly perceived grad school like random_grad. Like this is my extended stay in some nerdy, Disneyland for grown-ups where the work is interesting, the people are smart and (at least in my case) I think I get paid a lot more than what I deserve But borrowing a quote from a favourite movie of mine, Silent Hill 1: I think that applies to a lot of graduate students out there.... ESPECIALLY the 30 years part

Well, congratulations in the meantime because they're all great schools with very good programs. I would be happy in any one of them... although I think ASU would be a really good one because of the prestige it carries. Any data analysis job within the realm of the social sciences works well. If you happen to be specifically interested in Psychometrics, working for testing companies (ETS, Pearson, etc.) has the double-benefited of both being well-paid (within reason, I mean, it's still an intro-level position) and directly relevant to your field of study. Or you could freelance. Lots of flexible work and interesting projects. Anyhoo, my 0.02 right there.

does anyone around here consider....you know.... from time to time...maybe... non-academic positions as viable employment options (**gasp** yes, i said it!)???? i got a little bit turned off from the academic job market after witnessing first-hand how brutal the hiring process is (we were hiring for a tenure-track position in my program) and how many qualified applicants' CVs just get thrown on the NO pile because of the smallest, most asinine of things. but then i started looking around non-academic options (like research institutes even within the university) and the job prospects seemed pretty solid with good pay. even i ended applying (and getting) one.

i know this sounds awful but... have you considered the option that... well... maybe they just don't really care to include you in their conversations and that's it? i had a similar experience in my undergrad (i went to a small university so my cohort was super small). it was 7 of us (all int'l students, curiously enough) but 6 came from the same background/culture + me. throughout my last semester i was only able to talk to them about some class stuff during class time so i asked a friend of mine from a different major (who shared the same background/language) if i was doing something wrong and she just said "oh, don't take it personally. it's not that they don't like you, they really just don't care about being inclusive." i realized then that this idea of "being inclusive" in conversations, social interactions, etc. can sometimes be a cultural trait that not everybody shares. you may think it's rude, but for other people it's perfectly normal. i just gave up on them and started hanging around with other people. maybe just take this as a 'self-growth' moment? you know, getting a little out of your "small town girl from a very conservative background" persona and connect with other people outside your program in different ways?

I submitted to Modern Modelling Methods (M3) in Connecticut! Which probably no one has heard about! But it's super kewl, I promise!

when it comes to taking on debt i feel you have to think about it from an investor/business person perspective... as in "once i go out, will be making enough $$$ to pay this within a reasonable amount of time?" where "enough $$$" and "reasonable amount of time" are entirely dependent on the person's situation. i feel like sometimes people just have to be honest with themselves and see whether or not their academic life goals are financially feasible at this point in life. for instance, i knew that going into an MA for me was going to be financial suicide unless i paid off some debt i had so i took on a job (which i didn't like very much at first but oh well) and paid the thing off before moving on. i feel like only you can answer that question after you've done some homework in terms of starting salaries, job opportunities close to you, etc... and be flexible. sometimes you're just gonna have to bite the bullet and take on jobs you're not interested in/way below your ability to make ends meet. it always comes down to whether or not you can balance what you want to do in life with what society in general is willing to pay for.

my Erdos number (as per http://www.ams.org/mathscinet/collaborationDistance.html) is 5. i thought it would be less but i'm much closer to other statisticians that i admire so that's OK but i always thought this whole "academic lineage" thingy was more of a Physics/Math thingy. i didn't know now all the sciences are jumping into the bandwagon. now the real question is... WHAT IF PEOPLE END UP DATING THEIR ACADEMIC RELATIVES WITHOUT KNOWING?!?!?

my uni (University of British Columbia, UBC) has a handy-dandy list of awards/fellowships/funding opportunities. although many of them are exclusive to UBC students, there's a sizable bunch that come from independent institutions and anyone can apply. the fact that they went through the trouble of compiling a list of all of these has saved me quite some time. maybe you'll find it useful as well? https://www.grad.ubc.ca/scholarships-awards-funding/award-opportunities

i do kinda second what fuzzylogician said about this happening in Humanities (a few Social Science programs?), at least from my experience with other grad students in the U.S./Canada. my assumption has always been that maybe there is less funding to go around for programs/depts like this so they need to be rational in how they allocate their resources. like, in this case, you're "taken care of" by your prestigious outside fellowship so they can use the money they offered you to help out other students who might be struggling.

Well, for personal reasons (my husband’s job and the home we purchased is in the city where I reside) I really had no other option but to stay here for graduate school. And I probably won’t have any other option but to look for a job within the area as well. I agonized a little bit about this situation because I realized that my unmarried friends were a lot freer to move around, do program exchanges in other universities, etc. whereas I had to stay here. And as soon as my friends from older cohorts started graduating, I very quickly noticed that unless I am willing to relocate and go where the jobs are, my academic job options are somewhere in the range between “none” and “very limited”. You’re aiming for the Bay Area so your range of options is probably wider than mine, but there were a few things that I thought about which helped me realized that even if I don’t get an academic position, it’s not all lost. (1) Research not only happens in universities. If you like research, there’s probably someone out there willing to pay you for it. In my case, there are plenty of research institutions associated with my university (where I currently work while I finish my PhD) and I’ll probably end up working full-time for them once I’m done. But that means I’ll also be close to my lab, my advisor and I’ll still be able to do more independent research with them whenever I find the time/need for it. (2) If teaching is your passion, you can always be an adjunct/sessional instructor without depending on their barely-above-poverty-line wages. I am personally finicky about teaching. I love teaching when my classes are engaged and willing to contribute to the class discussion. I loathe teaching when all I get are blank stares and it’s basically me monologuing my way through 1.5 hours of class twice per week (which happens A LOT when you’re in my area, i.e. teaching statistics/research methods to social science/psychology students). But if you really like teaching having an outside job that “pays the bills” so to speak allows you the flexibility of going into teaching and getting some experience that you can definitely put in your CV if your family situation changes and you’re suddenly free to cast a wider net in terms of a job search. (3) There’s always time to do whatever you want to do. You (like me) may end up discovering that you actually like doing research outside an academic institution more than in one. It’s weird how we can be sometimes, developing plans and goals and then freaking out about not reaching them. When the realization started sinking in that I may never end up getting a tenure track position I became somewhat depressed and even wanted to quit my PhD. But once I started working where I am now I thought “hey… this is actually better than I expected. I’m doing all the research I want minus having to submit grants, deal with admin, etc. and still getting paid for it!” I do realize this may be a peculiarity of my specialization (data analysis for the social sciences) and other people’s areas of study might not be as flexible as mine. But the one thing I feel you need to keep in mind is that you have to be flexible. If you restrict it like “I want a teaching-only position that has to be within the Bay area and in my field” then you’re gonna have a much more difficult time finding a job than if you’re willing to give yourself some wiggle room here and there. Remember, we’re all either newly minted PhDs or PhDs-in-the-works in a hurting economy that characterizes itself for high rates of un-/underemployment among people entering the workforce. We need to be more willing to adapt than the people who preceded us if we want to get somewhere.

or this!! Social sciences and humanities faculties to close in Japan after ministerial decree this is the end folks!!! THE END!!!! the signs are all around us! repent! repent! (sorry, i just wanted to add fuel to teh firez!)

also please do keep in mind that it is a lot more expensive to fund an international student than a domestic one. and we're in a time where more and more students are applying for graduate school and the pools of money used to fund students are constantly being reduced. i know for a fact, for instance, that my school (University of British Columbia, UBC in Vancouver, Canada) is going through some tough financial times (long story) so the first thing they cut was funding for virtually anything. sometimes it's not your "apparent" lack of ability/credentials what's hindering you. it could just be the money... (unless you have funding of your own in which case then i have no clue why you got all those rejections)