psych vs. physics vs. music

<p>I know I want to do a double major.</p>

<p>I LOVE physics, but only so-so in it. I LOVE LOVE LOVE music, but I'm barely mediocre in that too. I'm actually more interested in neuroscience, but that isn't offered at UVM. So, psych (my major declared right now) is the closest I could think of.</p>

<p>I'd like some opinions, especially from those who are majors in the fields mentioned above.</p>

<p>and those who aren't majors in those fields, what do you think of them? and basically, I need some advice and direction.</p>

<p>Wow,
My pre-med D. has 2 minors: (1) Music Composition, (2) Neuroscience. Her classes for both are easy. Music classes are basically R&R and she absolutely loves them. She had to declare Minor in Neuroscience because Psychology Minor is not available at her school. Anyway, most of Neuroscience classes are part of her major (Zoology) anyway.<br>
Why don’t you declare minors and see what happen? If you have more time, maybe you can declare major. D is extremely busy, she would not be able to do double major. Her major is extremely challenging, pre-meds need to maintain very high GPA, she is working, volunteering, reserch, sorority board… and you will discover, surprize, you will need few hours of sleep also. So, do not overload yourself.</p>

<p>A music and physic double major would be enormously time consuming. Not only is there no overlap, but both have high course loads. Unless you want to take a 5th year, I would take minors in two of them.</p>

<p>thank you for your responses. another question, would you consider it unwise to graduate in 5 years?</p>

<p>Well it depends what specialty you going to go eventually. Some of them will put you into 30s when you are done with all your medical education / internships and so forths. I assume you are going to Med. School if you are posting here, correct? Unless you are engineering major (5 years is normal), I would advise against making it artificially longer than absolutely necessary.</p>

<p>yes. the reason why i want to do a double major (a shallow one actually) is a friend of my mom who’s in med school it would make my application stand out. If I were to have a 4.0 GPA, a great MCAT score, experience, would it matter to be a double major to the adcoms?</p>

<p>Double majors don’t matter.</p>

<p>ok. thanks you guys. i feel a little less stressed now. i’ll just weigh out on my own which major i like better.</p>

<p>“would make my application stand out”</p>

<p>Very wrong reason to do anything in life, let alone taking college classes. D. is actually extremely interested in both music and psychology, immensely enjoying her classes and that makes it easy for her and successful in terms of GPA. Music has been point of discussion on her interview for intern position at Med. Research lab. If you do not enjoy it, why make yourself suffer thru? It is your life, do not make it miserable.</p>

<p>Agree with Miami. Also, double majors don’t matter to adcoms, 4.0s do.</p>

<p>yepp</p>

<p>.</p>

<p>One thought: at many schools, a music minor is about the same amount of work as your average major in anything else. I was a music/psych double-degree/double-major and managed it in 4 years but I came in a semester ahead (really a year but one semester didn’t transfer), took 18 units every semester (suicide for most music majors due to so many courses being 3 units of work but counting for only 1, .5, or even 0 units), and and was a full-time student (3-9 units) every summer along w/ working full-time. So what I will say is that it is possible, but I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it. Remember that for med school you also need volunteer, clinical, leadership, and research experience. I got those with that load but it generally req’d finding creative ways of integrating my interests and sometimes getting multiple layers of experience out of one giant project. I also had an astonishingly supportive faculty, which is why we’ve had several students (that I know of) start (and complete or are near completing) similar psych-music combos in the years since I did it.</p>

<p>apumic,
You probably were performance major. D. decided not have Music Performance minor becuase of limited time in her schedule. Music Composition so far has been very easy and not time consuming (after 2 years), and so are psychology classes. She has been having 18 - 19 hours with some labs that give only 1 hour but actually taking many more, which she does not understand how it works, but that is another discussion. Her major classes have been very challenging and time consuming. Maybe Music will be more challenging next couple years, though.</p>

<p>I started as performance and then changed to another emphasis. It was a BA program designed for fulfill BM requirements ('though they offered a BM as well for those intending on grad school). Even with a non-performance emphasis, though, a good music program takes an enormous amount of effort to complete. If she’s doing psych, she should be getting plenty of research experience along the way, since that’s really what psych has to contribute is strong scholars when it comes to knowing their research methods (as well as more obvious contributions in such areas as well-developed people skills and an understanding of the human psyche – or at least a perceived understanding of it…). Most psych research labs require a good 10+ hours/wk.</p>