Public Health Research Experience

[The Cinnabon]

So yes I am aware of a few other threads similar to this one, but I wanted more personal advice and I'll make it quick.

The TL;DR is I was a pre-med and started shadowing physicians, I ****ing hated just about everything I shadowed except psychiatry. In which case I still loathed the med management portion but found the therapy exceptionally fascinating. After talking to some Clinical Psychology faculty it seems like this would be a great fit as I enjoy both research and the clinical aspects of the profession. The degree I will be receiving is a BS in Public Health (giant mistake in retrospect) and a minor in Psychology (focusing on Psychopathology). Anyways I have a current publication in behavioral health resources and a few other public health projects going at the moment. I plan on taking gap years in research regardless of what I'm doing but I'm trying to gauge how well my Public Health research, even if it is behavioral health, will help or if I should just ignore its existence for the purpose of gauging my competitiveness. I naturally plan on my gap RA years (since I'm graduating early I plan on 2.5 RA years) to be in Clinical Psychology research.

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[Ollie123]

Not sure why a BS in public health was a big mistake. There is tremendous overlap between the fields with many public health folks focusing on psychopathology, psychologists doing research falling within the domain of public health research, etc. I know many, many clinical psychologists employed in public health settings. The lines are super-blurry and from a given research project you might be hard-pressed to tell if it was done by a psychologist or a public health.

In short, don't worry about it even a little bit. I'd prioritize the quality of the research experience in your gap year over whether it was "officially" clinical psychology or public health as long as the latter is somewhat relevant and not developing new cardiac enzyme assays or something like that.

 

[The Cinnabon]

Not sure why a BS in public health was a big mistake. There is tremendous overlap between the fields with many public health folks focusing on psychopathology, psychologists doing research falling within the domain of public health research, etc. I know many, many clinical psychologists employed in public health settings. The lines are super-blurry and from a given research project you might be hard-pressed to tell if it was done by a psychologist or a public health.

In short, don't worry about it even a little bit. I'd prioritize the quality of the research experience in your gap year over whether it was "officially" clinical psychology or public health as long as the latter is somewhat relevant and not developing new cardiac enzyme assays or something like that.

Thank you, stranger, and I may have too hastily disparaged public health. Still, it's relieving to know that such an experience may be looked highly upon.

 

[Cam_Chai19]

I agree with Ollie123, I think your public health degree and psychology research as an RA could set you up well for PhD programs. However, I would suggest checking that you meet the psychology course requirements for the types of programs you plan to apply to since you may need a few more courses depending on how extensive your minor was. You could probably take these online (ideally from a brick and mortar university) or through a community college while working as an RA during your gap years.

 

[The Cinnabon]

I agree with Ollie123, I think your public health degree and psychology research as an RA could set you up well for PhD programs. However, I would suggest checking that you meet the psychology course requirements for the types of programs you plan to apply to since you may need a few more courses depending on how extensive your minor was. You could probably take these online (ideally from a brick and mortar university) or through a community college while working as an RA during your gap years.

Of course, I'm going to graduate with 21-course credits in Psychology specifically and I tried to hit up all the relevant courses that Clin Psych. PhDs will look for such as Research Methods in Psych, PsychoPathology, etc. Obviously, if I need more courses I would not be averse to taking them during my gap years.