How closely should research interests be defined?

[phonotactless]

I’m polishing my SOP, and I’m wondering how to strike a balance between being too vague and too specific with my research interests. I’m worried that being too vague will come off as if I don’t know what I’m talking about and I’m just pulling it out of my ass, and being too specific will scare departments off and make them think I’m not a good match. Does anyone have any good examples/guidelines for a middle ground?

[bloome]

While writing my statements of purpose, I talked about both broad and specific research interests. I have done research with one of my professors regarding prognosis awareness in hospice patients and my ultimate goal is to work in palliative care. I emphasized how I love the palliative care and hospice research, but I also talked about how important research in healthcare in general is. I also think it depends on the program you are applying to. Since im applying for my MSW, they want to know about a social problem that is important to me. I talked about the rising costs of healthcare and how I can help patients in all aspects as a social worker. One of the schools I'm applying to actually has a research field specifically geared towards palliative/hospice so I made sure to include that in my statement. I think looking up various important research that is being done at whatever University you are applying to helps as well as it personalizes your statement and shows that school would be a good fit for you. 

[loffire]

Agreed. I think covering from broad to specific topics helps. They know research interest of applicants arent cast in stone but like you said, you wanna sound like you've done some research and know what you wanna do in their lab. Even if it isn't a perfect fit, the skills or tools you hope to learn from their lab to aid you in the bigger scheme of things.

[PokePsych]

This is such a hard call. I've actually talked a tiny bit with my advisor on it - he also confirmed it really varies per advisor/person. He's not looking for people who recreate what he does and/or make small increments on his research, rather he looks for creative people who push things in new ways and he's somewhat less interested in if it is a 100% fit to what he does (actually a lot of research in his lab is not even directly tied to his main topic, yet he's still very excited about it). However, he also commented on how he comes across a lot of students, especially at top schools who basically extend their advisor's work in a certain direction but not go after the big novel things. 

I think overall you want to show you can talk the talk and know what is going on in the area. You want to be specific enough (e.g., for social psych, saying you want to study how people feel is way too vague), but not set yourself away on a specific topic that is too narrow.