Thinking of a PhD in Psychology?

After this year’s Doctoral School admissions results were announced, I decided to put together some advice for people considering a future in academia. Although the recommendations below are written in the context of the University of Warsaw, some of them may also be useful to those applying to other universities. So, Auntie Good Advice is reporting for duty.

Admission to the Doctoral School consists of three components that are worth knowing about while you are still a student: your academic CV, your research proposal, and the admissions interview. The CV and research proposal are worth a total of 60 points and are assessed during the first stage of recruitment. The second stage is the interview, worth 40 points.

THE RESUME

Let us start with the academic CV. First, start building it early. Ideally, during the final two years of your degree — although if you already know what you want to work on before then, even better. Trying to cram everything into a single year is possible, but uncomfortable — and for a very specific reason. Publications are among the most important elements assessed in an academic CV, preferably publications in journals with an Impact Factor. The cycle from data collection, through writing and submitting a paper, to peer review and acceptance realistically takes around two years (I myself recently submitted a paper based on data collected seven years ago). One year may simply not be enough to publish. The wheels of academia turn slowly.

Second, join an ongoing research project. Researchers carrying out projects funded by the National Science Centre (NCN) and other funding agencies often look for students to work as research assistants. It is worth keeping an eye on these opportunities, both within your own faculty and elsewhere (they can be found, among other places, on the NCN website). If a project you are interested in is not recruiting paid assistants, consider volunteering. Taking part in a research project is an excellent test: if research does not draw you in even when you are working on something you find genuinely fascinating, a PhD may not be for you. If, however, you do remain in academia, you will gain solid theoretical and methodological preparation for developing your own doctoral project. Personally, I greatly value having worked on projects led by different people. Every researcher has their own toolkit and way of thinking. It is worth experiencing several different approaches before investing four years in a PhD.

Third, take an active part in academic conferences, particularly international ones (including those held in Poland). One practical point: if your talk or poster is accepted, you may be able to apply for funding for the trip, for example through the Excellence Initiative – Research University (IDUB). Financial considerations should not be an obstacle. Student and national conferences count as well. Taking part in several of them will certainly strengthen your academic CV.

Fourth, try to publish something. Naturally, a first-author paper in a JCR-indexed journal sits at the top of the hierarchy. But being a co-author on an international publication or publishing an article in a peer-reviewed national journal also counts. The safest route to co-authorship on academic papers is to join a team that will be publishing anyway — publications are one of the main outputs required by most funded projects. International publications then tend to emerge almost as a by-product of your involvement.

A separate category assessed during recruitment is organisational activity. It is therefore worth getting involved in student research societies (and if none of the existing ones seems right for you, you can start your own) or helping to organise conferences. Organising teams welcome volunteers with open arms — after all, someone has to hand out name badges and conference materials to participants.

Sixth, if you have a small research project in mind, look for funding. Many faculties have funds supporting student research initiatives. Competitions aimed specifically at students are also organised under IDUB. This is one of the strongest signals you can have on an academic CV: independently developing a research project and securing funding for it through an open competition clearly demonstrates that you can think like a researcher and act effectively.

Seventh, apply for awards and scholarships. Several competitions for Master’s theses are organised by NGOs (for example, Otwarta Rzeczpospolita) and public institutions. You can also win prizes for posters and presentations at conferences — for instance, it is worth remembering the poster presentations held during the Faculty Day. As for scholarships, the Minister’s Scholarship is an obvious goal, but it is not the only one. There are also IDUB scholarships, City of Warsaw scholarships (for people registered as residents of Warsaw), and other opportunities worth monitoring regularly.

Finally, document absolutely everything. This is a point you cannot afford to neglect. The admissions committee assesses only achievements for which you can provide documentation. Even if your achievements could easily be verified through Google Scholar, only those supported by files uploaded to the IRK application system receive points. Make sure that every achievement listed in your application has supporting evidence: a confirmation letter, certificate, scan of a diploma, abstract acceptance notification, and so on. No document = no points.

RESEARCH PROPOSAL

The next element assessed in the admissions process is the research proposal. The most important point is this: choose a topic you are genuinely interested in. It sounds obvious, but there is a very practical reason for it. During your research journey, you will encounter results that are difficult to interpret, problems with data collection, the need to learn something almost from scratch, and many similar obstacles. To get through all of this, you need strong intrinsic motivation — and that comes from genuine interest. You can still change your topic at a later stage, but why start with something that does not excite you in the first place?

Second, write clearly, but do not oversimplify. The committee includes people representing different departments and specialisms. Avoid highly specialised language — the proposal should be understandable to a psychologist outside your particular niche. At the same time, do not go too far in the other direction and write in vague generalities. Avoiding overly specialised terminology is especially important for applicants whose background is outside psychology, for example neuroscience, linguistics, or computer science. If you use indicators or constructs specific to your field, explain what they mean in the context of psychological theory. The committee will appreciate your ability to build bridges between disciplines.

If you decide to use diagrams in your research proposal, do so thoughtfully. Diagrams and visualisations can of course make information easier to understand — most of the information we process comes through the visual channel, and popular wisdom tells us that a picture can be worth a thousand words. There is, however, a catch: graphics are uploaded to the IRK system separately from the text, and there is no guarantee that reviewers will open them. Everything important must therefore also appear in the written proposal. A diagram should play a supporting role rather than being the sole carrier of key information.

It is also important to emphasise your own contribution. If you are already working on a funded research project and your proposed PhD topic is related to it, one of the first questions you are likely to hear — both from reviewers reading your proposal and during the interview — is: how does your project differ from what is already planned in the grant? Even if your PhD is intended as a planned branch of a larger project, your own contribution needs to be clearly visible at the proposal stage. You need to demonstrate the added value that you bring — not just what your prospective supervisor brings.

One observation I made during this year’s admissions concerns the number of studies applicants planned — quite often, there were too few. One or two simple experimental studies will not provide enough material for an entire PhD. It is worth remembering that a doctoral degree can be awarded on the basis of a series of publications. In that case, you will need several papers, including some on which you are the first author. If you choose this route, you will need enough empirical material to produce those papers. Exceptionally complex, multi-stage studies can generate material for several papers at once, but with simpler research designs you need to plan several studies. On the other hand, do not go too far in the opposite direction either — a proposal that looks like a ten-year research programme will raise doubts about whether it can be completed within the available time. A good rule of thumb is to design your studies so that the resulting material would be sufficient both for a monograph-based thesis and for a publication-based thesis, regardless of which route you ultimately choose.

And finally — consult, consult, consult! Show your proposal to different people, not only to your prospective supervisor. Ask people you trust and whose expertise you value — they do not necessarily need to have a PhD. Sometimes a Master’s student may know a particular area better than someone with a doctorate from the “same field”. It is also useful to give your proposal to people who seem relatively distant from your discipline — this is a good way to identify passages that are unclear. You can also consult language models. I do not mean having an LLM write your proposal for you — rather, you can send it a finished draft and ask what might be missing, where there are gaps in the argument, or which sections need clarification. This is a commonly used practice in academia and there is nothing inappropriate about it.

ADMISSIONS INTERVIEW

Ostatnim i — w moim odczuciu — najmniej przewidywalnym etapem procesu rekrutacji jest rozmowa kwalifikacyjna. Element ten potrafi mocno przetasować kolejność kandydatów ustaloną na podstawie życiorysu i projektu. Warto potraktować ją poważnie i przygotować się do niej z głową.The final and — in my view — least predictable stage of the admissions process is the interview. It can substantially reshuffle the ranking of candidates established on the basis of their CVs and research proposals. It is worth taking seriously and preparing for it strategically.

Start by finding out who is on the admissions committee (this information is available on the Doctoral School website). Check what the people assessing you work on. You do not need to read everything they have published — knowing their research interests is enough. Why? Because it helps you anticipate questions. If someone on the committee specialises in individual differences, they may ask how your research problem relates to that area. Someone with a strong methodological background may ask about the causal assumptions in your project — why you assume causality works in one direction rather than another, and how you intend to test it. A particularly effective move is to answer a question in a way that naturally connects to the research interests of the person asking it. Do not force it — only do this when it genuinely fits. One more thing: if you know someone on the committee personally or have worked with them before, do not expect that relationship to help you. They will most likely recuse themselves from assessing your proposal.

Second, know your tools. If your proposal includes particular analytical methods or tools with which you do not yet have much experience, spend some time learning how they work. You do not need to memorise Python libraries, but you should understand the logic of the analysis and know when it is used. Someone on the committee may know that method inside out and may want to check how well you understand it.

Third, think through potential problems. The committee may ask what you will do if something goes wrong. What happens if you do not secure funding that your project clearly needs? How will you deal with difficulties recruiting a sufficiently large sample? Thinking through these scenarios shows that you not only have a good research idea but also know how to implement it in practice — and these are two different, although equally important, things.

Fourth, think about funding. This is a related issue worth preparing for. There are several possibilities: funding from your prospective supervisor’s grant, funds allocated to doctoral students for their own research (typically several thousand PLN per year), IDUB funding, or an NCN PRELUDIUM grant. It is worth knowing which option is realistic in your case and why.

Fifth, in your answers try to balance expertise with accessibility. Your responses should be understandable to people outside your particular niche, but they cannot be vague. They need enough substantive depth to show that you genuinely understand the topic. A practical rule: instead of saying that something is an “interesting issue”, explain what hypothesis you have about the phenomenon. Use the proper names of constructs rather than everyday expressions. The aim is to sound like a researcher — not like someone who has only just encountered the topic.

If the upcoming interview is not your first attempt, revisit your previous ones. Some committee members serve for many years and have a good memory for candidates. If your answer to a particular question was not especially strong in a previous admissions round, there is a chance that the same question will come up again. It is worth looking at reports from your previous application — the Doctoral School is required to justify the interview score, so the documents may contain information about the issues that raised concerns for the committee. This can be a valuable starting point for your preparation.

It is also worth having an answer to the question “Why our faculty?” ready. You are especially likely to hear this if you come from another discipline, another university, or even another country. The same applies to interdisciplinary projects: if you combine psychology with linguistics, someone may ask why you do not want to pursue your PhD in linguistics instead. Your answer should be specific: the research interests of your prospective supervisor, previous collaboration, or particular infrastructure available at the faculty.

And my final recommendation for today: practise. The more trial runs you do before the real interview, the better. You can ask current doctoral students to run a mock interview with you — they are often happy to help because they remember very well what it is like to be on the other side. Your prospective supervisor will probably also be able to find time for such a practice session. You can also ask a language model to simulate an interview — it can suggest questions and example answers. These answers should be treated critically rather than memorised, but they can be quite useful as a starting point for your own thinking. Good preparation reduces the stress experienced during the actual interview (which, as we know, arises from the perceived discrepancy between one’s resources and environmental demands), so this is something worth investing a relatively large amount of time in.

That is all my advice for now. I have surely forgotten something, but I hope these suggestions will help you avoid at least some of the pitfalls awaiting applicants. Good luck!