Clinical Psychologist

Webpage by Niju Philip

A clinical psychologist works with other people to assess and gain knowledge about their individual mental problems. Besides assessment, some clinical psychologists do many other things including:

· Conduct interview with individuals with mental disorders

· Creating treatment programs and utilizing them for mental disorders for individuals

· Plans and conducts research in psychological related matters

· Help private firms to set up mental health plans or help individual cases

· Conduct large group assessment and treatment

· Train and direct new staff and new interns

These are just a few of the many tasks a clinical psychologist goes through. A clinical psychologist spends a lot of time with mentally disturbed individuals. They need to know how to help and treat all age groups from young to old. Not only would a clinical psychologist be working with the individuals, they must also be able to with the families of those individuals to set up appropriate treatment plans. A clinical psychologist has to have the ability to work with others and also be able to help individual needs. A clinical psychologist needs analytic skills, problem solving skills, and creativity in order to design methods for treatment. The clinical psychologist should be able to fashion the treatment in order to fit a particular individual. The clinical psychologist needs to be open-minded and understanding of other people’s needs. All these skills are important when dealing with people in general and those with mental disorders.

The work environment for a clinical psychologist is mostly indoors. There will be a lot of contact with people that are mentally disturbed and others including other psychologists and family members. There will be a lot of one on one face time with patients, but there will also be a good deal of working with other members of teams.

Degrees and Licensure needed:

· Bachelors degree in psychology: With only a bachelor’s a person can assist other professionals and psychologists in mental hospitals, clinical settings, or correctional facilities

· Masters degree: With this degree you can also work as an assistant to a psychologists and aid in conducting research. A Masters thesis is usually required with the design of an experiment.

· Doctorate degree: With this degree you can become a clinical psychologist. It takes about 5-7 years to receive a doctorate and you have to write a dissertation and conduct research.

· Licensure is required for all psychologists who plan to work with individual patients in mental health treatment. The APA accredits doctoral training programs in clinical psychology. Licensure requirements differ from state to state.

Research experience is usually required upon applying for an upper level degree. The degree I want to get is the Doctorate. With a Doctorate I can work directly as a clinical psychologists and participate in treating mental illness and designing treatment programs. With a Ph.D. I could also spend some time teaching clinical psychology or doing research. A Masters degree would also be sufficient for me. I would like to work as clinical psychologist, but I could work as an assistant to clinical psychologists as well.

Wage and salary

In the United States a clinical psychologist can earn anywhere from a starting salary of $30,100 (10% of people) to a salary of $87,000 (90% of people) annually. An average number of people in the United States make $51,200 as a clinical psychologist. The salary differs from state to state. I looked the salary for people in Washington D.C. because I have considered moving there. There one can upwards of $83,200. It also appears that the field will grow 24% by the year 2012.

*This graph shows earnings in thousands of dollars for the United States (pink) and Washington D.C (Blue).

(All data on wage and salary gathered from O*Net Online)

What I Learned From All This

This project allowed me to learn a lot about the field of clinical psychology and what it takes to get into that field. For one thing I learned how difficult it is to become a clinical psychologist. I learned that it would take five to seven more years to get my Doctorate, and that is a long time. This project also showed me what it means to be a clinical psychologist. It’s not all sitting in an office interviewing patients. There is a lot more administrative and group orientated work involved when taking on the role of clinical psychologist. It seems to me that the life of clinical psychologist would be quite hectic, and there does not seem to be much available in terms of free time. In taking all this into account, I may consider not going the whole way into Ph.D. level psychology. This project showed that I could still be involved in assessment and clinical work with a Masters degree. My position would hold less autonomy, however. But perhaps working as an assistant helping more professional psychologists is something I could do better. The information I gathered on projected salary and job growth are also reassuring. The field is growing and pay is not bad at all. All this definitely makes me feel good about going into clinical psychology when I graduate.

Some Interesting Statistics on Graduate School

Because am I considering graduate school I thought that it would be wise to look into just what it take to get into a graduate psychology program. (All of the following averages are compiled using data presented on this webpage: http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Flats/5353/classes/acceptstats.html. All Doctorate averages come from the averages provided for eight different schools.)

For Doctorate Degree:

· Average GPA: 3.67

· Average GRE Verbal: 609

· Average GRE Quantitative: 580

· Average Acceptance percentage: 6.5%

For Masters Degree (Averages compiled from data from six different schools):

· Average GPA: 3.37

· Average GRE Verbal: 509

· Average GRE Quantitative: 564

· Average Acceptance Percentage: 44%

Relevant Resources Used for this Webpage: