The Stresses involved in Applying for a PhD Programme

A PhD programme, generally considered to be the height of academic success, can involve a lot of stress, particularly when being applied for. This is something which everybody should be made aware of when they first start to consider taking their education that far, as the difficulties involved include a number of things they might not expect.

One of the least expected things involved with applying for a PhD course is how easily your options can quickly fall through. Applying isn’t simply like getting a job, or applying for a university placement, as often you’ll end up applying to a research position, only to find out that the money funding that research programme has fell through, and that opportunity is no longer available. In most subjects this happens to an extent, but it is particularly prevalent within the social and hard sciences.

Besides the potential for the funding falling through, applying for a PhD programme can be quite similar to applying for a job; you have an interview, and a CV, and then the one in charge judges how useful you would be to the programme. This in itself can also be quite stressful.