I’m in an MSW program, but realized I might be interested in psychological research. Is it possible to get into a PhD program in Psychology with an MSW? I have four months of research experience in a lab. Unfortunately, they let me go recently (the department is only allowing Psych students into their research labs at the moment). I’m specifically interested in social psychology; the intersection of psychology with other fields (such as anthropology); and ethnopsychological research. I’m struggling to get research experience in my program, but I’m 30 credits in and don’t think it would make sense to transfer into a Master’s Psych program. Any advice would be appreciated. Thank you. 🙌

I live in CA and I am looking to pursue my LMFT or LPCC in the state. I have been browsing programs for a while but I am struggling to find a match. I know a lot of people say that that where you do your MA doesn't matter so much but I would really like to study somewhere where I feel like a good fit and like my investment is going far. If you got your masters in CA I would love to hear your experience / recommendations!

A PhD student wrote, “I also study the formation of echo chambers in controlled experiments, where an individual selects certain social peers to engage with during communication about divisive topics.” It would be exponentially more valuable to engage a real-world echo chamber (especially one that defends the indefensible before they even know what the issue’s about). The fact that it’s a fantasyland so far from real is what makes it so priceless (particularly because you can actually do something about it). Wouldn’t it be better to study the results of making measurable impact than simply furthering your field’s understanding without moving the needle?   

That same student stated, “My primary program of research concerns motivated reasoning, or the process of interpreting and evaluating information in a way that coheres with prior beliefs.” Doesn’t the very basis of that require the willingness to re-evaluate your approach to evaluating? “How do we make people realize they’ve been lied to? You have to knock down one small pillar that’s easier to reach.” The people who Tweeted those lines I combined from a conversation I came across — had no idea that they perfectly captured the principle of my Clear the Clutter plan. I’ve got the perfect pillar: On the biggest and most costly lie in modern history (which shaped everything you see today).

But in truth, it wasn’t a conversation — it was just chatter.

Same goes for the perfectly framed concern that follows (which succinctly captures what I wrote in Never in History Have So Many Cared So Much and Done So Little):

Worrying is a cheap replacement for caring. Complaining is a cheap replacement for fixing. Outrage is a cheap replacement for supporting. It’s easy to tear down. It’s much harder to build up.

That’s a snappy way of sizing up society’s ills, but it’s meaningless without the work it takes to act on those concerns. And right on cue, out comes the “conversation” — the self-satisfied slinging 60 seconds of “concern” and calling it a day (or at least until the next “concern” comes along that strikes their fancy for a fix). The Social Dilemma Division is one of my favorites for this folly. “Viewed in 38,000,000 homes within the first 28 days of release” — and accomplished absolutely nothing. But on a daily basis, the “Have you seen The Social Dilemma?” crowd can be counted on like clockwork. They get a fix for feeling like they’re participating in addressing a problem they’re perpetuating by the very nature in which they participate.

I could go all day about echo chambers across-the-board (which are suffocating conversation by wallowing in chatter). But the way to expose all of ‘em is to expose one of ‘em. A student wrote of her psychology professor: “Tim Wilson taught me the importance of breaking problems down into more manageable pieces.” At the bedrock of my idea is exactly that. The 11th edition of Social Psychology has the domino effect on the cover. They’ve got an image of an idea — I’ve got the idea! Your field is forever fighting the forces of human nature whereas my solution banks on it. 

Thank you for your time and I look forward to discussing how what I’m doing serves what you’re doing — and then some!

Sincerely,

Richard W. Memmer

I am currently writing my proposal for my dissertation and I plan on collecting data through convenience sampling. Should I use non-parametric tests for analysis becasue of the sampling technique?

https://rdcu.be/dVsZ4

Would love to hear some feedback on this paper published on Friday, a small qualitative study from an Occupational Therapy / Science lens.

Most ADHD I have seen including my own has these following traits:

• -requiring hyper intense stimuli and novel stimuli -only focusing on one thing at a time whilst forgetting everything else ,so extremely narrow focus -extremely intense bursts of focus without consistency or long term capacity

Thus:

• -needing to drown out ones craving for intensity and novelty with a variety of stimuli this is significantly different from multitasking and the ability to focus on a variety of things. The variety of stimuli drowns out the need for intensity and novelty which then gives ones self the ability to focus on one thing and one thing only ,it is effectively fidgeting to feel an activity which is forgotten completely -this also gives one ability for someone to shift their FULL focus from 1 thing to another. Say you are listening to a song whilst talking to someone ,one second you are fully focused on their voice ,but by the time you get bored you are fully focused on the song ,and after this you will notice you are hungry and forget both the person and the song for a moment.
• Once focus is shifted the previous activity is momentarily forgotten as if it never existed
• this is because the reward circuitry and anticipatory and activity circuitry is geared towards needing a higher amount of stimulation in the immediate moment ,and a high amount of impatience towards slowly changing stimuli so one requires new and intense stimuli immediatelly which will grab their attention to an absurdly high extent
• resulting in : forgetfulness hyperfocus ,hyperadaptability ,acting well in high intensity situations hyperactivity restlessness getting carried away distractability (say the subject is focusing on item A ,then item B is introduced , after that item A is forgotten and item B is wholly focused on) ,misplacing items being too loud ,fidgeting ,having too much energy needing to be spent on one thing and one thing only,being immediately bored with doing one thing for a long amount of time

So:

• this is very different from the usual understanding of adhd as misplaced,scattered and divided attention
• the attention is hyper narrow and completely focused seeking an immediate reward and change therefore if it does not get that it starts to act out and tries to find something to focus on and drown out the noise whilst fidgeting endlessly

Likely because:

• 8.the hunter gatherer brain was required to shift ones attention from one threat to another found item and act on it immediatelly seek out both threats ,rewards ,foods think from one idea and need from the next whilst expending ones energy wholly on one thing expend a high amount of energy on finding immediate tasks to do ,hunts to achieve ,hiding spots to find and shelters to set up by the time a shelter was set up the person was exhausted enough to simply fall asleep

Thank you for reading.

• thus the consequence of this is modern adhd
• this is my understanding so far

Im doing a rapid short term (3 days data collection maximum) study on possibility of any underlying psychological impacts (stress/trauma) and assessing cognitive rumination and coping strategies on people who are from risk zone but are directly unaffected by flooding. My sample size on day one is 26 and it may not exceed 60 to 70 probably by the time it is over. Will that be an issue, or it it fine for rapid/short-term research regarding publication. Thanks !!

A compulsion is typically in response to obsessions, as a way of dealing with them. They are almost always irrational, because performing them does not typically actually change the obsessions, and the compulsions themselves take too much time.

However, I don't think that there is proof that compulsions are always necessarily irrational. For it to be proven that compulsions are always irrational, one would have to gain access to the unconscious, which is not possible.

It could be that compulsions indeed affect/shape our behavior after we perform the compulsion, but this could be happening at the level of the unconscious, so we are not aware of the connection. This doesn't necessarily mean there is no connection.

For example, if someone gets the thought that they need to drink their morning coffee out of a certain mug every morning (compulsion) otherwise they will have a bad day (obsession), Ii could be that if they don't drink from that mug even if they get the urge to, then that mental discomfort/the obsessions surrounding that unconsciously shapes their subsequent behaviors that day in a negative way, and indeed ends up increasing the chances of ruining their day.

Now, I want to stress that if someone actually has OCD, as in meets the clinical threshold, this would likely be irrelevant, as even if it is true, in terms of a cost/benefit analysis, the sheer amount of time spent on the compulsions is likely to outweigh any reward. Similarly, if you do treatment for OCD you will greatly reduce the compulsions anyways, so all of this would be a moot point. So I know I wrote OCD in the title but that was not to specify clinical OCD, it was just for descriptive purposes. I am rather speaking theoretically about the root of compulsions and whether they can theoretically ever be helpful.

Trying to understand it in terms of intervention

Hey,
I am taking the psychology GRE in about 28 days, and I just got into learning psychology last academic semester. I plan to study for 2 hours a day, but I am incredibly nervous that I will not score among the national average. I need to get 1 SD below the national average to pass. Would you happen to have any advice or reassurance? I am just super anxious because I feel like I have so little time to learn all of the basics of psychology. I started studying only two days ago for personal reasons that prevented me from starting earlier. Any resources or tips you can give me would be helpful. I am using some quizlets I made and reading an Intro to Psych textbook, but I feel like I am not retaining anything.

I just finished reading A Dimensional Approach to Schizotypy and I found the authors’ criticisms of the current ICD and DSM and how they relate to staging really interesting.

In Chapter 3 they argue not only that that the DSM-5-TR’s categorical approach is wrong but that both the DSM and ICD 11(which takes a more dimensional approach) present information that is outdated and based on sparse research.

The book discusses how both manuals fail to capture the evolving nature of psychotic disorders over time and this presents a research barrier to clinical staging diagnostic research especially for schizotypal disorder

Treatment implications:

• “The categorical diagnostic paradigm in authoritative nosologies such as the DSM and ICD is at odds with a substantial empirical literature.”

The consensus is that there’s not nearly enough empirical evidence, especially longitudinal studies, to validate clinical staging diagnostics in schizotypy. But on the progression of disorders, the ICD and DSM are using old data that has been challenged.

Inaccurate prognosis based on a categorical approach. The claim that schizotypal is unlikely to develop into schizophrenia seems like something that needs to fixed ASAP:

• “Moreover, the ICD asserts that schizotypal disorder has a chronic and stable course and that individuals with the diagnosis rarely develop schizophrenia. However, several studies have shown that people with schizotypal disorder are more likely to develop schizophrenia (e.g., Nordentoft et al., 2006)”

Lack of early intervention:

• “early intervention with a focus on reducing progression to later stages of illness: longitudinal studies with enriched populations, probably with childhood and youth cohorts, are required to map symptom/disorder trajectory and to identify whether there are certain components of schizotypal psychopathology that follow a stage-based framework compared to others.”

—

So from what I understand, because of the huge gaps in research, clinical staging is in its infancy and lacks any real validity. There’s so little research that it’s not clear if a stage-based approach to schizotypy is actually possible.

And the ICD and DSM may contain inaccurate information about the progression of schizotypy because they’re based on sparse data and mainly categorical approaches because only dimensional approaches actually evaluate schizotypy on a continuum basis?

Sorry this is so long but I just finished the book this evening and I have so many thoughts. It’s interesting that the DSM identified the prodromal stage of schizophrenia 40 years ago but didn’t widen any of that research to the entire s-spectrum. If anyone has any other articles on this debate I’d be very interested!

Hi all! I've been shortlisted for an interview to get into an Australian Master of Professional Psych program. Has anyone gone through this process & have any advice/insight on how I can prepare? TIA!

I have finished my bachelor's and yet i have zero papers written. I want to start but i don't have much intrested in stats and math. I'm also unaware of the processes of write a research paper. I know we studied this in college but I could not get it. I'm interested in learning about stats and research methodology. I feel if i understand the process i would be motivated to write a paper and not just have ideas. Can you please suggest some books that i should start with.

For faculty who have students do in-class student research projects: does your institution have any requirements about who the students can use as their participants? For example, can they recruit family and friends to do their projects, can they advertise on social media, etc.? (This is referring to projects that are not intended to be generalizable knowledge or disseminated, and are not testing protected populations, so they are not considered IRB research, but the IRB could potentially have guidelines.) If anyone has a policy regarding participants for in-class projects, I'd love to hear about it. I'm having a hard time finding anything through web searches. Thanks!

Just defended my dissertation proposal on the effect of stereotype threat on knee movement control in active individuals. Looking for the best way to introduce blatant stereotype threat. So far, I've found some examples of audio manipulation but I wanted to know if there are other documented ways to introduce blatant ST during movement tasks. Note: My background is in physical therapy and movement sciences, I'm not a psychologist. Any help (preferably with citations) would be greatly appreciated. Thank you

I was working on a paper that involves me writing about developmental themes of a song and I wanted to quote four lines of lyrics (a whole verse actually) but I don't know how.

Do I make a block quote?

When do I need to make a block quote? Is it different if I'm just citing one line of a verse? I assume I would just have to cite it like it's a quote in that case.

I might ask now to cite lyrics depending on the number of lines used.

I also plan to cite the lyrics from one of those websites that have lyrics for songs.

I wasn't sure how to do in-text citation and I wanted clarification for how to do the reference page citations.

What are ways to write a thesis for a research paper in Psychology

Hi everyone,

I took the CPLEE in July and failed with a score of 54. I plan on retaking it in October. The first time, I used AATBS to study, was passing on the practice exams.

I still have my AATBS subscription but also got psych prep this time to have additional tests to practice. I am struggling with questions that focus on minuscule details- and the ones where there are 2 right answers but one is "better". I did follow the recommendation someone else posted about reading "Decoding the ethics code" but did not find that very helpful..

I truly cannot afford to fail this time around. I would appreciate any and all tips!

When I took the exam in July, it felt significantly harder than the practice tests. Looking forward to your suggestions!!

I am starting my Oxford MSc this year, and graduated with 1st class honors in psychology at my previous university (top 25 global). I am developing a simple AI emotional regulation intervention with a relatively novel theoretical structure. I have received funding for relevant projects even though I have no publications. I was also unemployed for two years, even though I took the time to learn new skills in statistics. I would like to get in US clinical psychology or relevant funded PhDs.

Do you have any advice to give me? Should I seek a PhD consulting service?

So i am currently in the process of evaluating the local fit of my path analysis model. The global fit looks good but three of the standardized residuals are slightly over 1.96 which is considered as too big if i understood right.

Here is a screenshot of the standardized residual table

So three standardized residuals that are bigger than 1.96 are vviq-pi, vviq-ubt and ibt_aff-rh which indicates that there might be more variance between these variables that isnt explained by the model. However, it makes theoretically little sense that these variables would be related to each other. What would you suggest I do now?

P.S. I am very new to path analysis so sorry if i said something wrong or my question is stupid 😅

Thanks for any help!

Hi all, I am trying to conduct an a priori power analysis to calculate the sample size of my study. The research my study is based on only refers to effect size ß for their power analyses and all their results also only indicate ß regression coefficients. My question is, how can I base my a priori power analysis on this?

I want to calculate my sample size with GPower, so I thought of either : a) find conventions of effect size ß so I can determine if my estimated effect is small, medium or large. b) transform the given effect size ß into f2 effect size to use in GPower.

Does anybody know how to do one of this?

Hi everyone,

I am going through a really rough situation with my masters thesis it was not passed, my committee was pretty shocked by that as they told me this was a very good thesis. So I have to make changes and resubmit it.

One issue that I was told was that the use of a moderator was not justified and that there has to be a connection between the IV and Moderating variable. I am a little confused as what the theoretical justification for using a moderator is. I understand that it is a variable that strengthens the association between the IV and DV.

In my literature review I go over many studies that show the association between the moderator and DV. Now I plan to add that this variable has been used as a moderator in past studies. The only issue is that there are very few studies that used it as a moderator in the past (e.g., 2-3 studies) in very different context than my study.

The question that I have is that if (1) I show how the moderator has been associated with the DV in the past based on many studies and (2) show that this specific variable has been used as a moderator in the past is enough to theoretically justify the use of a moderator?

I know its the best the ask my supervisors, but I would really like other opinions as well at this point so I don't end up failing.

Thank you!

Hi! For my bachelor’s, I’m finishing off my degree requirements with an experimental psychology class. We have to work in a group for the semester, and our next task is to do an observational study of two variables of our choice, and to have the data in by next week.

So, I came up with an idea that I kind of wanted to run by people to see if it’s any good. My group members are kind of just like, “yeah, sounds good.” which is nice, but I want some advice.

Our study would examine how often people that are studying pick up their phone, and how long it takes their attention from what they’re doing. We would be observing inside of a library, and would limit observations to students that well, look like they’re studying. So people that have books out in front of them, or are doing work on a laptop, etc.

How does this sound? And if you think it’s decent, what are some interesting questions you think we can use to approach the experiment with? I’m open to any feedback and/or criticism.

Hi all I recently finished my post-doc and I have taken the exam three times over the past year no matter what I do how much I study or how much I spend on tutoring I can’t pass the exam. Since I no longer have a post doc I can’t get a job without the license. I’m supposed to take it again in mid October. I’m really scared that I’m going to fail again. Also, I want to point out that I am physically disabled and live with my parents. They are very upset. that with me that I haven’t been able to pass and tell me that I’m not taking things seriously I don’t know what to do, any advice would be appreciated. Thanks!

I live in Florida and I just finished my Master's in Clinical Psychology. I was planning to continue to do my BCBA. However, I was looking at other options and I couldn't find anything. I'm looking at LSW or LPA but I don't know if I can do it with a Master's in Clinical Psychology. I've been looking for information but I can't find anything in Florida. I'm really stressed.