Jung Aa Ahn / Interview first draf (REAL ONE) / Thursday 1-3pm

201501855
Jung Aa Ahn

A Dream Made True

     My sister is five years older than me, and currently is in her masters program, studying psycholinguistics. This means that she is always busy. This is not new, however. It may be due to the age difference, but I've always remembered her as a diligent person, always living her life to the fullest. As a matter of a fact, she was on her way to school when I decided to interview her through Facetime.

     "Hey, can I interview you?"

     "What interview"

     "An interview for my class."

     "What's the topic"

     "I have to do an interview with a person who's working in a field I want to work in the future."

     "...What??? No. Absolutely not. Go away!"

     As I expected, she freaked out for a brief moment. She always told me to never go to a graduate school. She always told me to "study hard, but not enough to go to a graduate school."

     After her brief mental breakdown, she calmed down and asked me about the dream. "What dream are you talking about? You want to become a graduate school student?"

     "No, a scholar."

     "??????????"

     She freaked out again, obviously flustered. She stared at me through the screen for a brief moment with a very confused look, seeming She soon told me to proceed, however. I first asked her when she first decided to study in her field.

     "I immediately  I decided to major in psychology when I was in high school –when I was a junior in high school – so when I was applying for college."

     "What about your specific field? I know now that there are many different fields in psychology."

     "I started thinking about choosing my specific field of study when I was a freshmen in college. And I decided firmly when I was about a junior in college."

     "How did you end up choosing it? Like, were there any specific events or anyone influential regarding this decision?"

     She answered without much hesitation. "Well, when I was in high school, I was interested in three majors, nursing, graphic design, and psychology. So I either took classes that were related to them or did volunteer work that were related to it. Then I decided that I was most interested in psychology,"

     "So I went to college and decided to do some, you know, lab work, research assistant work. So I applied to different research labs including language production lab, autism lab, and some other social psychology related labs. But my current advisor, who is a language production lab professor got back to me. So that's how I started in this lab and how I ended up sticking with it."

     She did not stop at that, however. I still remember her striving to try out everything that she had the chance to do. She added, "I also did some work. I took some classes that were related to it like clinical psychology, and social psychology, but I decided that psycholinguistics was what I was most interested in. I also worked in two labs. Two different labs that were related to psycholinguistics and I liked both of them."

     It was interesting to see her talk about her occupation this way. It made me ask the next question.

     "What do you think is the most rewarding part of researching in this field?"

     "I think its most rewarding when we find an operative data that can explain how human mind works," she said, in a slightly exhausted way. It was often very difficult for her to find the right data for her studies. This was especially the case, considering how her field was very special.

     I could see that she was very attached to what she was doing. I still asked whether she would have made any other choices if she was given the chance.

     She answered very quickly again, without  much hesitation. "I don't think I'll ever choose to study in another field. I made my choice extremely deliberately…"

     "Then do you ever regret making this decision?"

     "Sometimes I regret my decision when I feel uncertain about my future. I like doing my research now, but being in the academia is not easy… when I look at my other friends who already have a job and are already settling in, I am not sure if I can do the same," 

     She hesitated a moment, and added, "But if I think about it again, I don't think I will make the same choice again, so that's fine."

     Then I asked her if she had any special memories from the years of research.

     Her face brightened up at the memory as she said, "I joined my lab as a freshman in college, which is pretty unusual but I worked hard and got great experience out of it. My adviser told me few years later that he was accepting another freshman student who was interested in the lab because he was happy with how my precedent turned out. That was very memorable."

     At that point, she arrived at her school. She did not seem euphoric about the fact that she had to go to work, but she did seem very at home to be in her lab, in her usual place, with her typical cup of coffee that she picked up along the way.