<p>I want to major in something like psychology or neuroscience, but my dad wants me to major in biology or chemistry (for pre-med). I think I would study harder with I major in the fields I want to b/c I would enjoy learning them, but for biology (dont hate or love) or chem (i hate), not so much...</p>
<p>So my questions to you are:</p>
<p>1) Does psychology/ neuroscience overlap with biology/ chemistry a lot? Is there someway I can convince my dad that those two majors are important for med school?</p>
<p>2) If I major in either of the 2 above, and I minor in biology/ chem AND do my pre-med requirements, will that be too much for me to handle? I am also in a sci-tech program where you do research also</p>
<p>Neuroscience most assuredly will overlap. Pick your battles if he’s paying. Coursework shouldn’t be that different the first year or so. You might be able to pull off a Bio/Neuro double .</p>
<p>At my school neuroscience is a track in the bio major. So you’ll be getting a bio major with a concentration in neuroscience. Also, most neuroscience classes should count towards a bio major. You could fill up your bio major with neuroscience classes if you wish. Check out your school’s biology department website and see what the major requirements are and if there’s and anything about neuroscience in there. </p>
<p>As for psychology, that won’t overlap all that much (perhaps not at all), you could get a minor in psych in addition to your major or just take classes for fun. There’ll definitely be room in your schedule.</p>
<p>Here’s a secret: once you start college your parents will not have access to your records or grades–not that I would ever encourage a child to lie to his/her parents. Privacy laws protect you even if parents are paying the bill. You will have to take a fair amount of biology anyway, and by the time you actually have to declare a major, perhaps your dad will have softened up to the idea that you should choose your major.</p>
<p>I am actually doing research on the FERPA rules. One article I read said that a revision to the act following the Virginia Tech tragedy permits parents to be granted access to their child’s educational records if they claim them as a dependent on their tax forms. Not sure if that’s true.</p>
<p>OP, your Dad has it backwards. The only way majoring in biology will help you is if it somehow helps you get better MCAT scores (the medical college admissions test, like SATs for med schools) but you don’t need to be a bio major to do that. Med schools get droves of bio major, psych major, neuroscience majors, you name the science. The choice of major is only distinguishing if its unusual, and whether it is helpful or not then depends on how you say you want to use it. For example majoring in anthro because you are interested in medical anthropology is a nice hook- they don’t see lots of anthro, religion, history etc majors.</p>
<p>What really really matters is not your major, its how well you do in general and in your prereqs in particular. That is the ticket. If you don’t do well in a major you are not interested in you’ve just suffered a self inflicted wound.</p>
<p>Okay, thanks for answering. SO what if I major in Neuroscience (its under the social sciences at my school as well as psychology) and minor in Biology? Is that a good pair? Keep in mind the pre-med requirements and the extra research classes I have to take b/c I’m in the sci-tech honors program…Would that be overwhelming??</p>
<p>And can anyone tell me a bit about Neuroscience? Like is it interesting/ hard, etc.</p>
<p>You don’t need a minor. If you want to add the extra workload do it but if you are not crazy about taking a lot of extra bio classes why do it? Remember you need to keep both your overall GPA and science GPA as high as possible.</p>
<p>Doonerak’s point is important: MCAT’s scores matter. Life science majors (e.g., biology) score lower on the MCAT than do physical science majors or humanities majors. In fact, only health science majors score lower than do life science majors. (See the several threads discussing majors and MCAT scores.)</p>
<p>Suggestion - major in Bio, minor in Psych. they overlap a lot, my D. is doing it, she enjoys them both a lot, and she also has completely unrelated minor in Music Composition. She has fun with all her classes, senior next year.
Best luck, do not fight with dad too much, at the end it does not matter tooo much, you will see it yourself.</p>