Dissertation Dilemma

[edieb]

I am a 4th year student in a clinical psych program. I started the program in the behavioral medicine track and conducted a thesis on a bxal medicine/health psychology topic. I also helped publish two papers on health psych. topics (one in a so-so journal and one in a really good journal). Anyway, my professor left the program recently and another professor, a BIG, BIG, BIG name in MR and Pervasive Developmental Disorders is chairing my dissertation. He is telling me to do it on autism spectrum disorders and gave me a topic. He is also telling me to join his team because they publish like crazy (and they really do). He is promising me 6 publications in top journals in 9 months (He is a publishing God). However, I have a question - if I write a dissertation on developmental disabilities and have a bunch of publications in this area along with my 2 publications in behavioral medicine, will this hurt my chances of getting a good internship? He is telling me that if I want to teach at a medical school, I need to publish and moving into this new, other area will not hurt. I checked on the APPIC web site and a lot of really good internships have bxal medicine and developmental disorder rotations; however, it seems odd that one graduate student would have publications in both. Help!

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[clinpsychgirl]

I am a 4th year student in a clinical psych program. I started the program in the behavioral medicine track and conducted a thesis on a bxal medicine/health psychology topic. I also helped publish two papers on health psych. topics (one in a so-so journal and one in a really good journal). Anyway, my professor left the program recently and another professor, a BIG, BIG, BIG name in MR and Pervasive Developmental Disorders is chairing my dissertation. He is telling me to do it on autism spectrum disorders and gave me a topic. He is also telling me to join his team because they publish like crazy (and they really do). He is promising me 6 publications in top journals in 9 months (He is a publishing God). However, I have a question - if I write a dissertation on developmental disabilities and have a bunch of publications in this area along with my 2 publications in behavioral medicine, will this hurt my chances of getting a good internship? He is telling me that if I want to teach at a medical school, I need to publish and moving into this new, other area will not hurt. I checked on the APPIC web site and a lot of really good internships have bxal medicine and developmental disorder rotations; however, it seems odd that one graduate student would have publications in both. Help!

Assuming you are interested in PDDs, I honestly think you will be fine. If you get in good with that "big name," it is possible that you will have a much easier time come internships!

Another thought, is there any way you can link an aspect of your Masters thesis into the PDD dissertation?

 

[edieb]

Thanks for the response -- I really can't link my thesis with my dissertation. He just picked my disseratation topic and emailed it to me

I looked on the APPIC website and there are very few programs that I will now be a good fit for (i.e., very few have health psychology and PDD specialties). Does anyone know the impact of having the dissertation completed before going on interviews -- does it trump not being a perfect fit for the program. I can definitely have it finished before interviews... Thanks in advance for any help, I am very anxious about my fragmented research topics....

Assuming you are interested in PDDs, I honestly think you will be fine. If you get in good with that "big name," it is possible that you will have a much easier time come internships!

Another thought, is there any way you can link an aspect of your Masters thesis into the PDD dissertation?

 

[edieb]

Why aren't you picking your own topic?[/QUOT

He doesn't let his students do that

 

[SaraL124]

^^ I think that's a huge problem.

 

[clinpsychgirl]

oops, wrong post!

 

[psy86]

^^ I think that's a huge problem.

I agree. In my opinion, the purpose of the dissertation is to demonstrate your ability to make a unique contribution to the field. A skilled undergrad can conduct a research project and write it up; being able to synthesize the existing literature and then develop your own idea for a research direction is, I think, the major task in grad school. Having your advisor do this for you pretty much defeats the purpose.

 

[edieb]

Thanks for the feedback -- however, I wasn't looking to be lambasted regarding not being allowed to pick my own dissertation topic. Rather, I was wondering about the potential impact two disparate research papers would have on my career.