How many times have you taken the GRE?

[jlloyd87]

Most likely. Faculty in my undergrad department have been telling me that many departments consider percentile to be more important than the score itself. Since the majority of people do worse on verbal and better on quant, your score discrepancy probably isn't as big in percentile terms (I don't know the figures off the top of my head). At any rate, quant is more highly valued in psych anyway, and that's a good quant score so I'd think you're OK.

Yeah my percentiles weren't nearly as far apart as my scaled score. Every school has told me that they don't put any preference on either part, but a few of my undergrad profs have told me that is bs.

[digits2006]

I love how people complain about 1270. I would take that score any day. I am applying to PhD programs wil 1100! So yall shouldnt feel bad. I should.

[jordy]

I love how people complain about 1270. I would take that score any day. I am applying to PhD programs wil 1100! So yall shouldnt feel bad. I should.

I don't have a wonderful score either. But I have other aspects of my application that are very strong, as I'm sure you do too, and I made informed choices about where to apply based on the overall perceived strength of my whole application. I wouldn't worry too much digits, because many programs consider all the information they have on you. Yes, there are ones that weed out everyone under a certain score, and I suppose I kind of understand if it's a department that gets 650 applicants. But there are also plenty that don't do this.

Edited January 18, 2010 by jordy

[electricfan]

Just once. I read the Kaplan book and went through the vocab flash cards that come in the little box. They helped a lot, my score was in the 1500's

[pizzapie]

Wow, this thread is very intimidating. I only ended up taking the GRE once. My quant score was pretty good and my verbal one sucked, but it came out to be 1210, and I didn't think that was bad. I have many complaints about the GRE, and I'm just glad it's over with.

[jlloyd87]

Wow, this thread is very intimidating. I only ended up taking the GRE once. My quant score was pretty good and my verbal one sucked, but it came out to be 1210, and I didn't think that was bad. I have many complaints about the GRE, and I'm just glad it's over with.

Yeah I really hate standardized tests as a whole, but I think the GRE is horrible. The whole "I want you to take this word and loosely relate it to another word" really messed with me.

[juror#1]

I only took the GRE once, I got a 1280 which I think is a decent score (though now that I read this thread I feel otherwise). My plan was to take it again if I got under a 1300, but it was 20 points and I just don't have the money. I also knew that other aspects of my application were really compelling so it would hopefully make my scores not as important.

I have not taken the Psych GRE, though one school requires it so I might take it in April even though they have already invited me out to interview. My undergrad does require the Major Field Test and I scored in the 97th percentile for that so I sent that off to schools in hopes of avoiding the subject test haha.

[pizzapie]

Yeah I really hate standardized tests as a whole, but I think the GRE is horrible. The whole "I want you to take this word and loosely relate it to another word" really messed with me.

Yeah, I'll never understand why knowing the analogy of a certain word without using the dictionary will ever help me in my psychology degree. My boss from my summer internship told me that GREs have been proven to be effective in helping to distinguish those who are able to make it through the first year of a graduate program, but nothing else. This is coming from someone who works at an organization that looks at this sort of stuff.

[waytooold]

I took it once, and I'm a statistical anomaly -- I got a 1390, but that was an 800 verbal (did not study for it) and 590 quant (which I did study for, and given no class ever in geometry and 30 years since algebra, I'll live with), but given that so many science people take the GRE, the 590Q puts me below the 50th percentile. I'm torn if I get rejected this year about what to do, since if I retake it I will no doubt improve my quant, but can I again stumble on to an 800 on the other side?

Oh, and I have 3 undergraduate and two graduate stats courses, all B or better, so I'm not a quant moron. I am hoping, given my age and professional accomplishments that someone will look past the quant score.

[sadiem]

I took it once, and I'm a statistical anomaly -- I got a 1390, but that was an 800 verbal (did not study for it) and 590 quant (which I did study for, and given no class ever in geometry and 30 years since algebra, I'll live with), but given that so many science people take the GRE, the 590Q puts me below the 50th percentile. I'm torn if I get rejected this year about what to do, since if I retake it I will no doubt improve my quant, but can I again stumble on to an 800 on the other side?

Oh, and I have 3 undergraduate and two graduate stats courses, all B or better, so I'm not a quant moron. I am hoping, given my age and professional accomplishments that someone will look past the quant score.

Hehe, I don't know if that's a statistical anomaly for those of us who've been out of school for a while and haven't been practicing quant. I got a 710V without studying, which is not like your impressive 800 but is still 98th percentile. For quant I got a 650 the first time, so I studied for 3 days and got a 760, which is 85th percentile and probably good enough for my goals. My verbal score was the same both times. If you're thinking about retaking it, I wouldn't worry about your verbal score going down. It could drop 100 points and you'd still be in the 97th percentile, and in any case, I'm sure that your 800 will catch their attention even if you get in the 700s the second time.

My reason for taking the GRE for a second time was that the school I'm really interested in attending doesn't look at anything over 10 years old, so none of my undergraduate record (including many stats and other advanced math classes) was going to be considered. I do have one stats class from grad school, but from their policy of ignoring older grades I figured that they don't consider older grades to be indicative of current knowledge, so I wanted to show that, no, I haven't forgotten *everything*. So I guess my advice would be to take the GRE again if you get rejected this year, since it sounds like you can do better on the quant section for sure (probably with minimal effort even, since you obviously have the requisite math ability). A higher score can only help you, and your verbal score is pretty much guaranteed to stay very high since you did so well the first time. That would be my approach, anyway. Hopefully you get in this year though and this decision becomes unnecessary!

[neuroJ]

I took it once, and I'm a statistical anomaly -- I got a 1390, but that was an 800 verbal (did not study for it) and 590 quant (which I did study for, and given no class ever in geometry and 30 years since algebra, I'll live with), but given that so many science people take the GRE, the 590Q puts me below the 50th percentile. I'm torn if I get rejected this year about what to do, since if I retake it I will no doubt improve my quant, but can I again stumble on to an 800 on the other side?

If you don't get in (god forbid), it may be worth it to take it again (one of things I did for my second time applying). It will be hard to maintain that 800, but even if you were to go down 50-100 points in verbal, your score would still be in the phenomenal range. If you could raise your math score enough, you could become competitive for university wide fellowships at some places (typically large public research-oriented schools). Depending on the program, that possibility of university funding could encourage a POI to consider taking you as a student even in situations where they might not have the grant support to take a candidate. This same logic also applies to fellowships like the NSF or Jarvits. If you have your own funding (which, regrettably can be quite influenced by GRE score), you suddenly become a different class of candidate and will probably have some pretty significant success.

Best of luck!

[Crystalizedjade]

Wondering how many times most Psych students have taken the GRE. Do you stop when you get the ideal score, or when it looks weird to take it again...?

Thanks!

I took it twice. The first time was in 2008 and I got a 1330; 740 Q, 590 V, and 5.5 AW. Considering I'm international, I figured if I could raise my english score, that would make me look a lot better. I took it again in 2009 and got a 1410 total; 710 Q, 700 V, and 5.5 AW. Some schools (like Tufts and New School) ask for the highest scores, so that's good. For other schools I'd just report the most recent one. I don't regret taking it again. I also took the subject GRE (got a 780, 97th percentile). Many people with lower scores than myself will get in based on their research experience. I come from Lebanon, and even though I'm currently getting an MA in psych (my BS was in bio) you simply do not have the same opportunities as in the states so I felt I had to score as high as I could on the standardized tests so schools would even bother giving me a chance. So far, so good with 3 phone interviews, but it's no guarantee.