How much does your research experience need to match your advisor's?

[latebloomerca]

Hi there, I am planning on applying this fall to clinical Ph.D programs. My research and clinical experience is in autism and family research. However, I am interested in researching externalizing behaviors, callous-unemotional traits, conduct disorder, especially in family contexts and interventions. 

My question is, does the fact that I don't have experience specifically doing research with individuals with conduct disorder or other similar areas going to hurt me in the application process? I know I can talk up the family aspects of my experience, and of course a lot of the kids I work with clinically and in our research setting exhibit a lot of externalizing behaviors and aggression. I had heard that it wasn't necessarily a problem, but when I look at some of the school's current labs they are filled with people with hyper relevant experience. 

Thanks!

[PsyDuck90]

It's not an absolute that your experience has to match the current lab, but that does depend on a. The specific faculty member and b. How you can tie your experience into what you want to do. Many of the concepts from research are transferable, so if you can explain how doing task A is something you have a lot of experience with, and it is similar too or the foundation for task B, you can be in good shape. 

Also, when you look at lab member bios, they are typically focused on what their research interests and projects currently are and not necessarily experience they had prior to coming to this lab, so it will typically be very relevant to the scope of the lab.