Dear r/psychiatry, I am writing this as a relatively junior psych resident outside of the US (Germany). In my program at a university hospital, you are expected to connect with a research group and participate in their work within your first year of working at the hospital. Before starting my psych residency there in April of this year, I completed my thesis and published a paper as first author that investigates connectivity aberrations in first-episode schizophrenia and high-risk individuals at a different university hospital affiliated with my medical school. I am interested in continuing to work with imaging/EEG and connectivity measures in a psychiatric population.

Initially, I was interested in shifting towards working with a strong research group that investigates neuromodulation, specifically rTMS in chronic depression using fMRI at my new institution. However, a different attending who noticed my previous work has offered to work together with me and mentor me to establish an imaging-focussed research group in addiction psychiatry, as he is an addiction expert himself but has limited experience in working with neuroimaging. I am now trying to decide whether it is better to establish a new research area and pivot into addiction research or work with a more established and already organised group investigating neuromodulation in chronic depression. I can see myself being interested in both and my experience working with different programming languages and doing fMRI connectivity could be useful in both as well. Do you have any general pointers to help me decide? Is it better to be a “bigger fish in a smaller pond” by working in a previously under-researched area at my institution or should I follow the more established route? I’m thankful for any advice or pointers.