Psychology Career

Students looking to pursue a psychology career, or professionals looking to change their career paths, should be prepared for extensive schooling. Psychologists will generally need a master's degree or higher to be successful. For example, a master's degree is typically the minimum education requirement to work in most educational counseling settings. In some instances, medical school might be required for psychologists specializing in clinical or counseling psychology. A Ph.D. is required for teaching at the university level.

A psychology career begins with the internships completed while in school. This is important for gaining professional experience and the chance to determine if a specific subset of psychology is a good fit. In addition, internships are often a requirement of the state licensing process. After obtaining their degree, professionals in the field of psychology will likely need to do post-graduate work and start accumulating supervised clinical hours.

In order to practice as a psychologist, professionals need to be licensed within a certain specialty by the state in which they are going to practice. Limiting the license to allow only a certain specialty prevents people from practicing in disciplines that they are not qualified to practice. Candidates for licensing will need to pass an examination. This might be multiple-choice, essay based, or both. In addition, they will be required to show proof of their degree, internships and clinical/professional hours logged. The exact requirements differ depending on the state, psychology career and the type of certification desired.

Professionals with the appropriate degree and certifications have a wide variety of psychology careers available to them. The largest area of practice is clinical psychology. Clinical psychologists tend to work at medical facilities such as clinics, hospitals or group counseling centers. Similarly, professionals who go into counseling-considered a subset of psychology- might also work in the same settings. Counselors work with people overcoming grief, addiction, rehabilitation or people looking for advice such as career and academic counseling. A very popular, and growing, field is that of the school counselor/psychologist. A psychology degree is not only helpful in the medical fields; businesses and organizations worldwide employ psychologists to help increase productivity for the company and to advance the quality of life of their employees. Psychologists can apply their education and experience to careers across a broad spectrum.