Search Results for careers

Graduate and Postgraduate Students, Undergraduate Students June 4, 2018

Graduating with a degree in psychology? Check out what the data say about careers, workforce demographics, salaries and more!

Did you know that an estimated 3.4 million individuals in the United States hold a bachelor’s degree in psychology and that younger psychologists are more racially/ethnically diverse than older ones? The APA Center for Workforce Studies maintains a series of interactive data tools to answer these and other questions about the psychology workforce and education pipeline. Hold your mouse over the graphs and figures, and a box pops up with additional information.

pencil with a mortar hat and text Is Graduate School in Your Future?

Undergraduate Students, Undergraduate Teachers September 11, 2017

Master’s careers in psychology

For most careers, providing professional services using psychological knowledge requires a doctoral degree in psychology, and these careers are often called professional or health service psychology. However, psychology careers for individuals holding master’s degrees are available in multiple occupational settings and in fields across the discipline. The demand for jobs at this level of training is reflected in the growth of master’s psychology degrees — from slightly below 18,000 in 2003 to nearly 28,000 in 2013. Similarly, the National Science Foundation reports growth during the past decade in research-focused psychology master’s degrees: approximately 15,000 in 2003 and 22,000 in 2011.

Undergraduate Students, Undergraduate Teachers June 12, 2017

Research careers with a bachelor’s degree in psychology

When I was earning my bachelor’s degree in psychology, classmates, professors, family members and guidance counselors would tell me that I needed a graduate degree if I wanted to get a job using my degree. At first, I believed them and planned for graduate school at some point in the future. But, before going to graduate school, I worked for four years in academic research. Below, I’ll describe some different research careers that someone with a bachelor’s degree in psychology could pursue and, most importantly given the difficulty some college graduates encounter finding jobs, what you need to do to prepare for each career.

Public Service Loan Forgiveness PSLF Program documents.

Uncategorized February 24, 2020

Public Service Loan Forgiveness – Success!

There was no way for me to become a psychologist without taking out student loans, so my first day of graduate school was a blend of exhilaration about pursuing my vocational calling and dread over-committing myself to loans that were much larger than any amount of money I had ever earned. Four years later I had a graduate degree, a network of inspiring colleagues, a postdoctoral fellowship, and six-figure debt.

Undergraduate Teachers January 13, 2020

One course, two courses, three courses, more? Providing career support throughout the undergraduate curriculum

Scenario One

When Shannon asked for a letter of recommendation from the department chair to support her applications for graduate school, the chair asked why she was applying to clinical programs. Shannon said she did not know what else she could do with her bachelor’s degree.

Scenario Two

Rafael took a required psychology careers course in the fall of his sophomore year. He knew he wanted to be a sport psychologist, so he did not consider other careers at that time. With each new psychology course, Rafael’s interests evolved. By the time he entered his senior year, Rafael knew he wanted to pursue a career that aligned with his new interests but did not know what the options were.

Undergraduate Students, Undergraduate Teachers December 30, 2019

Increasing community awareness of the value of psychology skills

As one of the most popular college majors, our discipline holds a key role in educating students and the larger community about the vast applications of psychological science. Because of its interdisciplinary nature, we are poised to help inform other disciplines about how to better understand behaviors and mental processes in the work that they do. It is the skills that psychology majors acquire that make them equipped to adapt to the dynamic circumstances of various professions.

Undergraduate Students December 2, 2019

The “good job” you want may not be “good for you”

Your Ability to Understand This Puzzling Statement Could Help You Maximize Your Future Occupational Success

A good way to decide if you should read this blog is to determine how well your beliefs about your future  career and your current education agree with the following quotes from the results of a Gallup poll of more than 30,000 college graduates across the United States who rated both the importance of their future occupations and the importance of the role their college education will play in helping them to achieve their occupational aspirations.

Undergraduate Students November 18, 2019

What psychology majors should expect from your study abroad/international experience

Hey, psychology majors. Are you thinking about or planning on studying abroad, whether for a year, semester, winter term, summer sprint semester, or even just a few days or weeks on a faculty-led workshop? Or, are you an international student who is eager to begin your higher education in the United States? It is going to be awesome, right? Right?!? Yes — hopefully. Or maybe not. Or maybe it will even be great and yet stressful at the same time. The point here is: You cannot control the world or everything that happens in your life. However, some of what you will get out of your international experience is what you put into it. That starts all the way back at your expectations.

Graduate and Postgraduate Students, Graduate and Postgraduate Teachers, Undergraduate Students, Undergraduate Teachers November 11, 2019

5 Challenges to Collecting Data on the Psychology Workforce

Seven years ago, when I first began working at the Center for Workforce Studies (CWS), my colleagues and I were given the task of collecting, mining, analyzing, and disseminating data that would be relevant to the psychology workforce and education pipeline. I naively asked myself, “how hard could this be?”  After all, other disciplines seemed to be doing it just fine.  At the time, I had no idea just how immensely difficult this task would prove to be.