Profile Evaluation! Where should I go for?

[Ellenapply]

Hello!
I'm a first-year master student, planning to apply for PhD in 2022fall. I would like to hear from you about where I should look at, which areas I should work on, etc.

Research interests: trauma psychology (focus on the parent-children relationship and family influences)/cross-cultural study (immigrants, identity crisis)

Undergrad: T70 LAC
Major: Psychology and sociology
GPA: 3.3
Research
- An independent project focusing on how social media influenced college students' communication with their parents, and how social media caused a gap between generations.
- A field research about how to help get adapt to college-level education after they graduated from high school.
- A study about the students' study abroad experience, and the discriminations/challenges they have faced. The result has been writing into a guide for the college to use in the future.
[not related to my majors]-A project about how romantics contributed to ecological writing.
* I have no publication or poster presenting
Internship/Volunteer: I have on-campus work as a writing center tutor and also work for our alumni office to do some networks. For off-campus internships, I worked for a non-profit origination that aims to support homeless families. The other works were related to marketing (data analysis), and admission.

Graduate program: counseling psychology ( the program is not a top one, but the school itself is ranking high
Research
- A field study in a school siting. Tracking students' individual growth and also the team dynamics. Just get started so don't know how things will be...
Internship/Volunteer
- Writing articles (mainly about mental health) for a non-profit organization which provide supports to international students
- A peer counseling program

GPA and GRE are my two main weaknesses I guess, but I don't know how strong they will affect my PhD applications.

I am interested in social psychology, developmental psychology, educational psychology, and maybe interdisciplinary studies. I'm kind of confused about which way I should choose. 

Thank you for reading this piece! I'm looking for advice on how to improve my background, please feel free to share your thoughts with me!

[justacigar]

Hey! I have similar research interests as you - how trauma impacts parent-child interaction/functioning and the various intersectional contexts that might influence this. I'm wondering why you aren't interested in clinical psychology? 

I actually considered a developmental degree but had a hard time finding folks that were doing trauma research. I'm interested to hear if others have different experiences, but most of the trauma research I've been able to find tends to be housed in clinical psychology programs. Ideally, I was hoping to go to a developmental-clinical dual program, but those are tough to find as well especially for parent-child research. 

[Dazen]

Honestly, I think the most important thing for you is to decide a) which area of psychology you want to focus in and b) what specific research questions interest you in that area. Your interests seem incredibly broad, and professors are generally looking for research fit as one of the most important aspects of admission. This doesn't mean that you need research experience in this exact area - it's fine to have broader experience that you can connect to what you want to do through content/skills - but you should be able to concisely describe what you want to spend 5-6 years of your life studying.

[Rerun]

I think one way to decide is to read articles that you like and find the people who are working on those issues. You still have time to browse any psych programs across those themes to decide. I know that sounds manual but that's the hard yet rewarding way because you can make an informed decision to choose one over another. Other than that, choosing a PhD is also about choosing the location and resources you would want to have. I would say Chicago, Florida, San Diego, and sometimes Boston would have professors working on those studies, geographically speaking. 

[SocDevMum]

7 hours ago, Ellenapply said:

GPA and GRE are my two main weaknesses I guess, but I don't know how strong they will affect my PhD applications.

Hmmm... I disagree here.  While your GPA isn't great, I assume that is from your undergrad? No one will look at your undergrad GPA if you are coming from a Masters, so make sure you are getting the best possible grades in your current program to eliminate that issue. I didn't see your GRE score listed, but again, you are already in a Masters program so most schools won't really worry about that as much. Some grad schools will use GRE as a weed-out, but if the rest of your application is strong that is a lot less of a possibility.

Your biggest weaknesses by far are the lack of research presentations, and the over broadness of your interests. Since you're in a grad program now, you are hopefully remedying the lack of presentations and publications, right? You should be spending the next year networking, attending conferences (including virtual), and knocking out a couple of solid presentations. AND narrowing down your possible research focus. 

Most of the trauma studies happening are in Clinical or Counseling psych, but there are a handful of developmental programs, as well as school psych programs.  And a couple that are specific to trauma - I don't know if the MidWest is on your radar, but the University of Missouri - St Louis has a Trauma Psychology program, for instance. I believe there is some good work in trauma coming out of Colorado as well. There is a LOT of work going on in trauma, you'll just have to narrow down which universities are looking at the kind of trauma you want to study