Contribution of the publication to application

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Next year I'll be completing my bachelor degree and planning to apply for master degree.

 

GPA, reference letters and other criteria besides, is there a prominent effect of the papers I have my name on them ? 

[fuzzylogician]

Yes. 

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Yes. 

Thanks for that straight answer

 

So, is the weight of the contribution of having a paper depends on the institutes or do you think it is much more important criterion has to be considered over, lets say, GPA ?

 

Thank you.

[fuzzylogician]

Having a publication can make your application strong because it shows proven ability to conduct research and take from idea stage to published state, or at least (and likelier, though I'm guessing without knowing your field) that you have made a substantial contribution to some PI's ongoing research that is sufficient to add you as a middle author on a publication. Either way, it shows experience doing actual research and it shows dedication. It should also mean that you could have a strong LOR through this experience, and that's another huge advantage.

 

How much good it will do you depends on how well you write your SOP; you should be able to use this experience to have a more realistic view of your field and to therefore construct more viable and focused research interests, and to show that you have the background necessary to study them. So this experience can be the backbone of your SOP, where you explain the interests that you developed while on the project, what you did on the project (and what the outcomes were), and how your future interests relate to what you already have some experience doing. I wouldn't advise using the paper as a writing sample, unless you wrote it yourself, but again, you should still get a LOR out of it. 

 

Generally, a publication will be given much greater weight than your GPA; this is not to say that the GPA is not at all important, but you can think of things like the GPA and GRE as getting your foot in the door (=passing cutoffs for admissions and for funding) and the "intangibles" - strong SOP, LOR, writing sample and publications as getting you noticed ahead of the pack and eventually admitted.