Advice Desperately Needed

[PonderingSoc]

Hi everyone, 

 

Because I am going into my third year of undergrad, I certainly need to figure out what I want to do my honours in because I do not want to do an extra year (or more) simply because I did not know what I was doing. I am quite certain I want to go into academia, but I just have no clue whether I want to go into sociology or psychology (or perhaps even anthropology?). I live in Canada, and at my university they offer a joint honours degree where one can complete your honours in two subjects (e.g., psych and soc) and although this seems like the obvious choice, I have one small issue with it. If I only did psychology, I would be able to get a really high GPA because at my school an A+ in a psychology course is 90-100%. As such, I have received mostly A+'s so far.  However, an A+ in sociology at my school is a 97-100% (with an A being 90-95%). So, If i did end up wanting to go to graduate school for psychology, all of the sociology courses I would take in the joint honours program would really bring down my GPA (thus making me appear to be a worse student than I am). What do you guys think? Should I just choose either psychology or sociology, or should I do the joint honours program to keep grad school open as an option for both subjects (but also surely receive a lower GPA at the same time) ?

 

Thanks everyone  

 

 

 

 Also, my interests in psychology are dream/sleep research, whereas my sociology interests are social inequality/homelessness. 

 

 

Edited June 13, 2017 by PonderingSoc

[3dender]

You should make the decision based on your interests and not on how easy the grades will be.  It sounds like you may be leaning psychology despite being less interested in it, but decisions like that often don't pay off in the long run (mostly in terms of mental health).  If your grades suffer in the joint program you can always get some field experience to bolster your PhD app.

[lanalingam]

I agree with 3dender. You sound like you are a pretty good student anyway, so your overall G.P.A would be good anyway, even if it is not as good as it would be if you did just psychology. To me, college is all about exploring and discovering interests and learning in detail about things which interest me. Sure, grad schools do like students with high G.P.A's. But, they are also interested in what motivates you, and how dedicated you are to pursuing your interests. As 3dender said, you can always get field experience to boost your phD app., but not using this opportunity will probably just screw with your head later on. 

[Oshawott]

If you're applying to Canadian grad schools, I'm pretty sure most of them converted my grades to their own scale anyway, so if both percent and letter grades appear on your transcript, you should be fine.

Edited June 14, 2017 by Oshawott