Psychology PhD: Harvard vs Stanford

Graduate School
1

I’m a future international student looking to do PhD in clinical psychology at Harvard or Stanford (the one with Palo Alto). Wanting to hear some thoughts about people who have studied or are studying in either of these universities in psychology. I’m trying to gauge the social environment/culture and if you could share your scores and overall “profile” (not sure if that’s the right word) you got in with like GRE/research experiences/etc, that could be really great.

It doesn’t have to be just for people in clinical psychology pathways, research pathways will also be helpful.

Here are some of my information

Undergrad GPA:

  • 3.69 (lesser known BSc Psyche uni in Thailand)
  • 6.5/7 (BA Psyche at the University of Queensland, Australia)

Research Experience

  • Undergrad 3 years
  • After-Bachelors 1 year and ongoing

Clinical Experience

  • Short-term internships at hospitals during undergrad
  • Currently employed as psychology associate/paid intern at a school and looking to apply for the 2020 or later applications

Publications

  • Two as second and third authors, possibly two more by next year (but no first author – would having a paper with me as first author be good with improving my chances?)

Test Scores & References

  • TOEFL 111/120
  • GRE not yet taken, I’m a bit worried about this because some stats I’ve found online seems to be towards 166+ V/Q. So if you could share some of the scores you got, it would give me an even better idea
  • 1 definite glowing reference, 2 other good ones (trying to see if I can get others that I can almost guarantee an amazing recommendation)

Personality and Others

  • Academic: I’m highly self-driven and can study on my own/juggle studies with activities

I like being among other peers and colleagues who are also very motivated to succeed but aren’t cut-throat or trying to sabotage others/see peers as competition, if that makes sense? I would preferably want to be in an environment where people are autonomous but can help each other out on the occasion and aren’t social recluses.

  • Social: I'm generally pretty social and enjoy dressing up for night outs. Or simple get-togethers with potlucks or card games. I'm curious if that is possible. I've also heard that students at Harvard have dorms and housings, I would love to hear people's experiences in these.
  • Faculty/Support: I'm hoping the professors/researchers would be involved with grad students (e.g. doesn't mind mentoring and advising).

I’m curious about student support as well. Say, are there good aids/advice for international students? Does the school take seriously and take actions on issues raised by students (e.g. sexual harassments, potential discrimination)?

I’ve seen other questions about these two universities on forums before but didn’t find ones that are specific to psychology schools, so sorry if this happens to be redundant.

2

You might want to start with the respective University web sites. Stanford University does not offer a degree in Clinical. (There is a Uni in Palo Alto, named Palo Alto University, which does offer Clinical Psych programs, but that is unrelated to Stanford University.) Let me google that for you:

https://psychology.stanford.edu/admissions/phd/phd-admission-faq

But for other basics, check out the Grad Cafe website.

3

Yeah, this was what I came to say. Stanford doesn’t have a PhD program in clinical psychology. Harvard does, but it is a clinical science program - while you will get clinical training and be licensed to practice psychology, the focus is on doing research first and foremost, with an eye towards preparing people who will enter the professoriate (aka, will become faculty members in a psychology department somewhere), or at the very least some research-intensive position. I call that out because you said

And you need to understand up front that the clinical psychology pathway at Harvard is a research pathway.

I didn’t attend either - I went to Columbia, for social psych - so I can’t answer questions about the atmosphere of the students and how competitive vs. collaborative they are. But some of the answers are more general.

In general for top psychology PhD program, your GRE scores do need to be pretty high. My program used to say 155 on each section as a general floor, but I would say that 160+ on each section is far more desirable. With an otherwise outstanding application, I don’t think you HAVE to get to a 166 in each section, although that’d be nice. You have a pretty good application otherwise, especially with the papers, so I’d say just try to aim for the 160 range.

As for the social…well, you can make either of those types of things happen (going out or simple potlucks). This is especially true if you attend a program in a big city like Boston. You’re not limited to being friends with other PhD students, and either way, this is the type of things PhD students tend to do. Almost all universities have graduate housing, but most of it is not set up dormitory-style - usually they’re structured like apartments, where you have a room to yourself but share common areas with 1-3 other people. There are some graduate dorms but usually you have a single and then share a common bathroom and kitchen on a corridor.

Faculty support, you’ll want to talk directly to students about that. I would recommend contacting the department and asking if there are some students who are willing to chat with you about the program, but honestly, you can hold off on this until after you are accepted to the program. Many clinical psych programs (and psych programs in general) have interview weekends, which is also an excellent time to ask these questions.

Most doctoral programs treat international students the same as domestic students. The only difference tends to be support for applying for prestigious fellowships (many - potentially most - are not open to internationals). The differences may come in job placement, particularly if you are interested in non-academic employment after graduation.

While wondering about whether the university takes issues seriously is a good thing to wonder, I’m going to be honest and say that those probably aren’t questions you want to ask students or faculty in your department. There are other ways to find that out, though - news coverage, looking at what resources there are, the student handbook. You can contact the office of the university ombuds and they may be able to help you learn about this as well, if you are concerned.

4

@bluebayou That’s what I thought at first as well but it seems to be more of a joint program with Stanford and Palo Alto University, but is a PsyD instead of a PhD?

https://med.stanford.edu/psychiatry/education/pgsp.html

5

@juillet Alrighty, thanks for the information! I guess I’ll have to decide if I want to pursue clinical or research track, there isn’t too much of a difference back in my home country yet because the liscensure doesn’t take this into account.

6

Not sure what your ultimate goal is, but if you want the ability to practice and do research you might want to look at some other programs as well. I know Harvard and Stanford have name recognition, but as others said they don’t really have psych programs that seem to be in alignment with what you are probably looking for. If you pursue a PhD in Clinical Psychology at an accredited university, you will be engaged in both research and clinical practice study. For what it’s worth, here is the US News ranking of Clinical Psych programs in the US https://www.usnews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-health-schools/clinical-psychology-rankings. You have the UC schools in the top rank, UCLA and UC Berkeley. If I were you, I’d get a PhD that has the clinical emphasis in addition to research so that you can practice and seek a license if you so choose. It’s the gold standard for psych PhDs in the US if you ask me.

7

If you’re primarily interested in clinical practice, than that PsyD program could work out for you - although it is offered jointly by Palo Alto University and Stanford.

If you, as BackNSchool83 recommends, want to get a PhD rather than a PsyD, look for programs that call themselves scientist-practitioner programs. These will be programs that balance training in consuming and conducting research with training in practicing clinical psychology as a talk therapist.

If a program identifies itself as “clinical science” or features the phrase prominently in its description, that is a clinical science program, which is a clinical psychology program heavily focused on research and training future academics and researchers. You will still get the minimum clinical training required to gain licensure to practice as a clinical psychologist in the United States, and you can still go on to practice as a clinical psychologist. In fact, it’s really not a bad idea to do that, because going to a clinical science program ironically gives you some flexibility.

But the focus is really heavily going to be research and science. How much emphasis they put on clinical training will vary by program: I imagine that Harvard does the bare minimum necessary to qualify you for the clinician role, whereas other clinical science programs may be a bit closer to a balance (or at least less lopsided). If you plan to be a practicing talk therapist, the imbalance may frustrate you. I’d think about these programs as like the analog of an MD/PhD for physician scientists.

UCLA’s program, for example, is a clinical science program:

UC-Berkeley’s program is also a clinical science program:

One other way to identify these programs as a group, if you want to, is to look at the list of doctoral programs in the Academy of Psychological Clinical Science: https://www.acadpsychclinicalscience.org/doctoral-programs.html. But do be judicious, because I’ve noticed that the list has gotten longer and a lot of those programs aren’t strict clinical science. For example, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee is on there, and that’s definitely a scientist-practitioner program (they say it on the front page). So I’d take that list to be MOSTLY clinical science programs, but not exclusively.

8

I had an acquaintance who was in the PsyD program at Palo Alto U/Stanford. I can’t say anything about the quality of the program, only that it is very administered out of Palo Alto University (which is basically across the street from Stanford). The students in the program are not considered Stanford students - they are Stanford affiliates, and don’t get access to all the same things that Stanford students get (ie. graduate housing, courses that aren’t for the PsyD). It looks like a lot of the Stanford Med School professors are actively involved in the PsyD program though through teaching and research supervision.

9

@BackNSchool83 Great, will check those out! Thanks for the advice

10

@juillet Ah yeah, that makes a lot of sense! Thanks for taking the time to explain this, the term clinical science really tripped me up for a while.

11

@geraniol Hey, thanks! That’s exactly the kind of info I was hoping to know.