[LoneReaction]

I'm really confused on which to take for university.

In my country, males are made to serve the army for 2 years. After I got my diploma in Infocomm, I enlisted. I will finish half a year later and will be able to get into this year's intake in university.

My plan was to attend the open house of 2 of my local universities, but they are after the closing dates for applicants with a diploma.

Is there any future in computer science? I've helped out at a company (A*star) for a few months during my diploma days, and the permstaff there seem to always be rushing for datelines. I don't want such a stressful job. On the other hand, I like psychology but know nothing more than the next layman. And I don't know anyone who have any experience in it.

[eagleseven]

There is a future in computer science, but it can be stressful.

There isn't a future in psychology, unless you continue on to graduate education.

[t3hrubikscube]

Interesting. I'm currently pursuing a BS in Computer Science and am considering also pursuing a BS in Psychology.

There's definitely a future in Computer Science. It's still a relatively young, new field, and I see it having a long future ahead of it. There will be many good jobs you can get with just a Bachelor's in CS.

Psychology is a very interesting field, but you won't be able to get any good jobs with just a Bachelor's. You'll definitely need to go to grad school if you want a good and/or interesting job. That shouldn't discourage you if you're interested though.

Personally, my plan is to get a BS in Computer Science, start working right out of college, and then going back to grad school for Psychology. That way I can have options in the future. If Computer Science changes or turns out to be something I get sick of, I can do something interesting with Psychology.

[MartinH]

There's a lot of theology pretending to be theory in both - I'd go for a hard science or maths as a major, learn to analyse and theorise about tangible things and you're useful, it's also a good basis for playing with intangibles like software and minds later on.

There's work in IT in all sorts of areas, and yes it can be stressful, but it isn't always. If you're set on one of those two, I'd concur with the others - compsci is more useful for getting a job/career that pays quite well, psych in interesting. Either can be done in your spare time if you choose the other...

[admittedheretic]

My time at the university was a hybrid of engineering, computer science, and management, but within the next decade I would like to pursue a degree in psychology. There are many great authors that present layman understandings of psychology and the public has access to many published articles for free. If you don't have a clue where you'd like to focus in psychology you could always begin as a computer science major until you find an inspiration like I have. Having a good mathematical background behind a psychology degree looks good for research careers I would imagine.

What interests you about both fields most?

[LoneReaction]

I know computer science isn't only about computers, but what made me interested in it in the first place, many years ago, was to learn how computers work. And the whole efficiency thing with INTJs makes data structure/manipulation etc very interesting too.

Psychology seems to be more interesting job wise, and less about rushing for deadlines. The idea of studying comp sci first, then psychology as a hobby, didn't occur to me.. it is a great compromise!

[vertigoh]

	Originally Posted by MartinH To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	There's a lot of theology pretending to be theory in both - I'd go for a hard science or maths as a major, learn to analyse and theorise about tangible things and you're useful, it's also a good basis for playing with intangibles like software and minds later on.

I'd agree that learning to learn is probably more/as important than/as the subject matter. Having failed to get into the uni I wanted to study psychology (something I'm now incredibly glad about) I studied archaeology instead. It's a huge subject with equal scope for much hard science (though more applied than theoretical), philosophy (and of course academic "social science" waffle) and everything in between.

Now I write biochemistry software and dabble in other techy things for work.

The greatest benefit from my bachelors degree was improved critical thinking rather than any particular knowledge. It's my impression of CS courses (here in the UK at least) that they can be weighted towards turning out blue collar java coders (out of work because jobs outsourced to India?) so I would urge you check out in great detail the course content and ensure it's geared towards where you want to take your CS, the really interesting, satisfying bits may be inaccessible without further study, but whatever floats your boat! Disclosure: I never took a CS course, but I know a few of them. For me, both CS and psychology hold a similar type of appeal. So I suppose it depends on your immediate career goals/prospects with either, neither of which I can help you with :-)

Oh and do some research into the suitability of psychology degree courses for your envisaged career within psychology (yes I said that about CS as well, top tip!). If you want to get into the "dealing with real people outside experimental settings" side of it then a psychology bachelors may not be the best use of money (in the UK, anyway, again unsure internationally). Oh and if it's any help, the joke-that-everyone-outside-the-profession-makes-but-they-actually-really-hate is that "psychologists can read minds". They don't like that one any more than I the Indiana Jones/dinosaurs/Time Team etc. I get!

I finished my MSc last year and if I were to do it all again I'd not be afraid to start studying without an end in sight and just to follow the most interesting and rewarding path through academia. This all said my experiences, while positive, were sort of an accident. Further top tip: specialisms of particular departments/institutions can have a much greater impact on the core teaching and learning that you might otherwise quite fairly assume was standard fare.

Edit: P.S. Don't study psychology if you hate statistics :-)

[Nemesis]

Originally Posted by LoneReaction To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

I know computer science isn't only about computers, but what made me interested in it in the first place, many years ago, was to learn how computers work. And the whole efficiency thing with INTJs makes data structure/manipulation etc very interesting too. Psychology seems to be more interesting job wise, and less about rushing for deadlines. The idea of studying comp sci first, then psychology as a hobby, didn't occur to me.. it is a great compromise!

Let's go a step further in this compromise;

Aim for computational neuroscience. You could even get a pretty well-paid tech job in computational neuroscience with a com sci undergraduate. Both a psych degree (focusing on biopsych) and com sci degree, if pursued past the undergraduate level, could get you there if you start to develop a focus early on in your education.

Check it out!
To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.



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[t3hrubikscube]

Originally Posted by LoneReaction To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

I know computer science isn't only about computers, but what made me interested in it in the first place, many years ago, was to learn how computers work. And the whole efficiency thing with INTJs makes data structure/manipulation etc very interesting too. Psychology seems to be more interesting job wise, and less about rushing for deadlines. The idea of studying comp sci first, then psychology as a hobby, didn't occur to me.. it is a great compromise!

That's what I think too!
When I came up with my idea of getting both degrees and starting in the CS field before going back to grad school for Psych, I felt so thrilled!

[rwm4768]

I'm actually not in either field, though psychology seems more interesting to me. It sometimes seems as if I'm the only INTJ that doesn't understand a computer inside and out.

If you really enjoy the computer science, you should go with that because it pays well. Then, you can pursue other interests, such as psychology. If you do pursue psychology, I would suggest the research aspect rather than the helping people aspect. That is more the domain of feelers.

[Nemesis]

	Originally Posted by rwm4768 To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	If you do pursue psychology, I would suggest the research aspect rather than the helping people aspect. That is more the domain of feelers.

Depends. Counseling Psychology can be very touchy-feely and focus on "spiritual" growth and bull-shit like that. Very much centered on being warm and caring towards clients. Clinical Psychology and Psychiatry, on the other hand, require practitioners to be very cold and impersonal.

[Ben1220]

I'm doing a bachelor of computer science majoring in computer science, and I was (I think) the ONLY person at my university (a very large university) to take both first year computer science and first year psychology, so its great for me to see that I'm not the only person who is interested in both computer science and psychology.

I actually think the two might be related in a way. Computer Science is not just about computers. In the words of Edgar Dijkstra: "Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes." Computer Science, at a high level at least, is the science of Information, much like Chemistry is the science of matter. For example the concept of an algorithm does not rely on the notion of an actual program, or even a programming language. Computer Science existed before computers did, oh and it requires a lot of mathematics.

Psychology is also interested in studying the intangible scientifically, and where as computer science is more concerned with studying the abstract concept of information, and processes on this information, psychology is concerned with studying the mind.

I find both very interesting, and I would suggest doing what I did, just do a Bachelor of Science and take both Computer Science and Psychology classes in your early years. Later on you can choose which one you want to major in, or you could even major in one and then do postgraduate work in the other if you really wanted to. You would also probably have to take some maths to complement the computer science.