grad school and PhD in psychology

If you know that you want to get a PhD in clinical psychology, I don’t necessarily recommend getting a master’s first. PhD programs are usually funded - meaning your tuition and fees are covered and you get a stipend to support living expenses. Master’s programs will cause you to incur debt.

So I’d only get a master’s degree if you need one to prepare you for a PhD program, and I’d say you only probably need that if you want to show that you are capable of higher performance as a graduate student and/or if you need research experience and have no other way of getting it. (You could also practice as a therapist with a master’s, but you sound interested in research.)

Based on your interests, you’ll probably want to look at PhD programs in clinical psychology at places where there are also have strong neuroscience programs (either in that department or across other departments at the university).

Craniotomy is unlikely to be a big research area for psychologists since they are not surgeons, but clinicians may study psychological effects of craniotomies, and neuroscientists would certainly study this area.