Research Assistant role in a field I have no interest in or wait for a role in a lab that I am interested in?

[Wilted]

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I'm in a weird spot regarding research. I have been accepted as a research assistant in a social psychology lab for the upcoming semester. I don't really want to accept this position though because it is not a field I am interested in. I also applied for a lab in the spring semester with a Neuroscience (my major, much more knowledge and personal interest) professor I am very close with, and I could see him being a strong LOR writer in the future. I only got the position with the social psych lab because a different professor recommended me for it. This lab also expects at least 9 hours of work in the lab per week and I think that time would be better spent studying since my last semester was not as successful as I would have liked it to be. I might just be overthinking this but I'm also worried I am a little behind because I am going into my junior year with no research yet. Let me know any thoughts or advice!

 

[Mr.Smile12]

If you didn't want to do the work for that RA position, why did you apply? Give it up and hopefully the lab will find someone else who would find the work more intellectually fulfilling. But it's your call to not have a research position lined up with the horrible restrictions on funding that are happening.

 

[princeofmediocrity]

I'm in a weird spot regarding research. I have been accepted as a research assistant in a social psychology lab for the upcoming semester. I don't really want to accept this position though because it is not a field I am interested in. I also applied for a lab in the spring semester with a Neuroscience (my major, much more knowledge and personal interest) professor I am very close with, and I could see him being a strong LOR writer in the future. I only got the position with the social psych lab because a different professor recommended me for it. This lab also expects at least 9 hours of work in the lab per week and I think that time would be better spent studying since my last semester was not as successful as I would have liked it to be. I might just be overthinking this but I'm also worried I am a little behind because I am going into my junior year with no research yet. Let me know any thoughts or advice!

I would talk to the neuroscience prof ASAP and see if you can get into the lab next semester! If you're close with him, this should be a quick "yes" or "no" answer. If yes, bail on the psych lab and work for him. If no, look around for other options you find more interesting before settling on the psych one. You ideally want to do something you won't be miserable doing (at least most of the time).

 

[Anthodite]

I'm in a weird spot regarding research. I have been accepted as a research assistant in a social psychology lab for the upcoming semester. I don't really want to accept this position though because it is not a field I am interested in. I also applied for a lab in the spring semester with a Neuroscience (my major, much more knowledge and personal interest) professor I am very close with, and I could see him being a strong LOR writer in the future. I only got the position with the social psych lab because a different professor recommended me for it. This lab also expects at least 9 hours of work in the lab per week and I think that time would be better spent studying since my last semester was not as successful as I would have liked it to be. I might just be overthinking this but I'm also worried I am a little behind because I am going into my junior year with no research yet. Let me know any thoughts or advice!

Please don’t do anything you find boring, your coworkers can tell and so can adcoms. You will be worse at learning the concepts around you and won’t be motivated enough to contribute anything meaningful. I’ve seen it too many times in my lab, you’ll get excluded by more than one person for not caring about the project beyond a means to publish/poster.

Best way for you to set something up is to email your professor asking to meet to discuss for guidance on exploring your research interests then toward the end of it causally ask if they can connect you to anyone who could get you involved with the research. Your prof will either offer you a position right there or highly rec you to a coworker who will likely take you.

 

[LunaOri]

Your grades are MUCH more important than research. Since you have been struggling with grades, forget the research for now.

 

[Wilted]

If you didn't want to do the work for that RA position, why did you apply? Give it up and hopefully the lab will find someone else who would find the work more intellectually fulfilling. But it's your call to not have a research position lined up with the horrible restrictions on funding that are happening.

I was recommended this lab by one of my neuro profs. I just sent an email saying I was interested and he put me on the team, so no real application process. I spoke to some of my friends who major in psych and they recommended I try for a neuro lab instead because social psych research is a bit boring. My school does research assistant positions like classes we can enroll in so students can get credit for them. I saw that the professor I'm close with had an opening so I dropped the psych lab and added his. He then emailed me and said his lab was actually full and I could apply for the spring semester, which I have, along with other neuro professors who's work I found interesting.

 

[Wilted]

I would talk to the neuroscience prof ASAP and see if you can get into the lab next semester! If you're close with him, this should be a quick "yes" or "no" answer. If yes, bail on the psych lab and work for him. If no, look around for other options you find more interesting before settling on the psych one. You ideally want to do something you won't be miserable doing (at least most of the time).

Its not that easy unfortunately but I did send in an application and he said he would interview me. In which case I like my chances. As of right now I have dropped the psych lab and replaced it with a class I needed. I have orgo 2 this fall and I did not do as good as I should have in orgo 1. I have already emailed other neuro profs with interesting research so I have some connections together. I think the plan for the upcoming semester is to study harder and try to find meaningful research for the spring.

 

[Wilted]

Please don’t do anything you find boring, your coworkers can tell and so can adcoms. You will be worse at learning the concepts around you and won’t be motivated enough to contribute anything meaningful. I’ve seen it too many times in my lab, you’ll get excluded by more than one person for not caring about the project beyond a means to publish/poster.

Best way for you to set something up is to email your professor asking to meet to discuss for guidance on exploring your research interests then toward the end of it causally ask if they can connect you to anyone who could get you involved with the research. Your prof will either offer you a position right there or highly rec you to a coworker who will likely take you.

I already did this actually. In the correspondence with the neuro prof I am close with he recommended about 10 other faculty members who I could work with in the lab. I sent an email to all of them but none of my emails went to their inboxes lmao. After I figure out what caused that issue I'll try to resend them.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

If you get credit for doing research, then you should pick something you can do well in to maximize your chances for a positive evaluation (whether for a grade or an LOR). Wait for something that really interests you; otherwise, you'd perform as well as the disinterested teenagers I see working in fast-food places with earbuds on and no sense of helping customers because they feel this is something they have to do (for money).

 

[Anthodite]

I already did this actually. In the correspondence with the neuro prof I am close with he recommended about 10 other faculty members who I could work with in the lab. I sent an email to all of them but none of my emails went to their inboxes lmao. After I figure out what caused that issue I'll try to resend them.

Truthfully most PIs ignore the life out of the “I want to work in your lab” emails since they get several a week. Cold emailing hardly ever works, works even less if you use ChatGPT to write a generic one.

You need to send a different kind of email rather than a “hire me” email. You can message me on here if you need help writing a few “I wanna learn about the field” emails. (I do this for free don’t worry)