Personal Statement

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Background and Inspiration

From an early age, I have a strong aspiration to understand how a human mind works. I was fascinated by how complicated the underlying theories and motivations are in human reasoning and decision-making. I first realized I wanted to study psychology after I took a social psychology course during the last year of my degree in economics. While economics gave me a strong mathematical and statistical foundation, I felt that this subject is insufficient to help me fully understand a human mind. Compared with economics, psychology examines how human cognition and behaviour can be affected by a person’s emotions and thoughts. Psychology provides me with the knowledge to better understand how different internal factors, such as emotions and sensory perception, can influence a person’s cognition. Therefore, I took the initiative to study another program after my first degree, Postgraduate Certificate in Psychology, which is equivalent to an undergraduate degree in psychology at the University of Hong Kong. The program provided me with a solid foundation in psychology, allowed me to further pursue my interest in human cognition and behaviour, and also enhanced my enthusiasm in pursuing Ph.D. studies in psychology.

Over the years, I have been regarded as a strong and hardworking student in my academia. I was placed on the Dean’s Honors List two times in my undergraduate years, graduated with first class honours, and obtained distinction for my certificate studies in psychology. In addition, I learnt a wide range of advanced statistics courses during my post-secondary education, including regression models, experimental design, and SPSS data management and analysis. I strongly believe that I possess a ...

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...oining Professor Werker’s laboratory, not only will I be able to better understand how infants and young children think and learn, and acquire necessary knowledge and skills in pursuing my long-term research goal, but I can also bring my analytical abilities and language skills in Cantonese, Mandarin and English to the laboratory.

After my Ph.D. studies, I wish to stay in the academia and continue to conduct more research. I have chosen the University of British Columbia because of its reputation, strong research support from the UBC Early Development Research Group, and potential opportunities to work with diverse psychology researchers who share similar interests in early human cognitive and language developments. I would embrace the privilege of participating in your program and am enthusiastic about pursuing my goal of becoming a Developmental Psychologist.

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