Computer Science student applying to Psychology / Cognitive Neuro?

[iwanttobelieve]

Hi everyone,

I am a Master student in Computer Science in a top 20 US school, and my undergrad is in a non-US university, with two degrees in Computer Science and Japanese. I am very interested in research areas that take computational approaches to psychology or neuroscience. I have interned and worked in research labs extensively, and it seems that my computational background did help. But I am not sure whether it can be an advantage or disadvantage when I apply to PhD programs in Psychology and CogNeuro, since I am not a canonical Psych or Neuro major. I know my background might be of some help when applying to Computational Neuroscience, but it seems only a few schools offer exactly such programs, while most universities put those labs inside a vague category.

I am really concerned about the validity of my applying to PhD programs in Psy and Neuro, but research in these areas really interest me and I am sure I want a PhD in these fields.

Your input is highly appreciated!

All the best,

iwanttobelieve

[kaister]

I think it definitely could be an advantage. Though, I'd recommend taking the psych gre subject test to prove your knowledge in psych and perhaps if you have a few solid courses in psychology or think about taking some to have on your transcripts to show your interests in psych aren't unfounded. It says you have research experience in labs, is that in psych? If so, even better. I don't see anything strange about you wanting to get into psych, as long as you can spin it to match your interests in your SoP, I think you'll be fine. As long as you've shown you have "some" experience in psych and can back up (or creatively spin) your experiences towards a specific interest area, I think you're good!

[lewin]

It probably depends on who you work with and their program of research. At my university there is an interdisciplinary cognitive science program involving psychology, philosophy, computer science, and neuroscience.... they are trying to build computer models that can replicate/explain/predict various cognitive priming findings. It seems pretty awesome. They would definitely like somebody with your expertise. (PM if you want more details, though I don't know much about it... I'm in Canada.)

[iwanttobelieve]

Thank you guys. These are really encouraging remarks!

[Edugy]

One of the cognitive research labs I did research in as an undergrad had a grad student who got his bachelors in CS from Georgia Tech. His knowledge of programming and MATLAB was incredibly to everyone in our lab. Having a CS background definitely gives you an advantage.