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One of my papers has been accepted to a reputable conference's Poster Session part. Currently, the only financial support I can take is from my school which partially finances my travel to the conference abroad. I have just finished my masters (the field is Economics fyi), and in two-years time, I may apply for a PhD as well. The papers that will be presented in usual ways are probably much ahead of mine, so that mine was just selected for the Poster Session. Do you think I, as a young researcher who just finished a MA degree and work at the same time (at a Research Dept. of a bank), should attend it? The concerns I have in mind are that:

  1. I may not get as much feedback in a Poster Session, if I am to present it to an audience
  2. This is just a Poster Session and that's it. Is it worthy during graduate applications etc.?

I need your advice about it.

P.S.: The school finance around half of the expenses btw. And I can more or less afford the rest.

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  • Doesn't the conference require that an author attend in order to publish there? – Ray Aug 10 at 7:27
  • If I understood you correctly, Yes, it should be so @Ray. If I can’t attend then I wouldn’t probably neither publish there nor see any my name. ( If this is what you meant) – usergrad Aug 10 at 7:43
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    The one great advice I got when I started my PhD was to go to conferences early and often. You meet people, see what's the hot topics and get up to speed about what people talk about. – Captain Emacs Aug 10 at 7:59
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I may not get as much feedback in a Poster Session, if I am to present it to an audience

If anything, you may have a better chance for feedback. If you give a talk, you only have time to answer a couple of questions, whereas if you are standing beside your poster, you will probably have the opportunity to have more detailed discussions with people who stop by.

This is just a Poster Session and that's it. Is it worthy during graduate applications etc.?

Your C.V. will presumably list your publications, and the name of the journals or conferences they were published in, but would probably not specify whether they were presented in a poster session or a talk. Of course, if you don't get to publish in the conference because you didn't attend, then you wouldn't be able to list it at all. (This does assume that there exists a full paper that is published in the proceedings; some of the other questions I've seen here suggest that not all fields do it that way.)

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    I'd add that in my experience at talks at conferences, the questions are often asked by the worst, least helpful people (the totally confused and those theoretically opposed to the work who are grandstanding). At posters they are asked by the most helpful people who are legitimately interested in the work. – Bryan Krause Aug 10 at 12:46

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