What can you do with a bachelor’s degree in psychology? A Resource for Educators.

As faculty members, most of us “feel” the popularity of the psychology major, whether in an increase in our class sizes, the number of advisees we are assigned or an increase in the number of adjunct faculty hires. We know psychology is one of the most popular undergraduate majors in the U.S.; in the last year the data are available (2014-2015), 117,557 bachelor’s degrees in psychology were awarded (National Center for Education Statistics, 2017).

We know the question, “What can you do with a bachelor’s degree in psychology?” is relevant to many people, including prospective students (and their parents), undecided students, psychology majors (and their parents), faculty members, administrators, legislators and occasionally those running for elected office. Let’s be clear that if someone provides the quick, tidy answer of “nothing,” that answer is patently false. The actual answer is complicated and nuanced, and it goes like this — the psychology bachelor’s degree qualifies a person for a large number of jobs, but the degree does not uniquely qualify a person for any particular job. And, we could do a better job of telling the story of the accomplishments of our psychology graduates, but it appears that our efforts are disjointed at best.

There are a number of good lists of potential jobs for an individual with a bachelor’s degree in psychology; Drew Appleby has been generative at curating such lists, and there is a list in the “APA Guidelines for Undergraduate Education in Psychology: Version 2.0” (American Psychological Association, 2013) and also in my recent (related) Psychology Student Network (PSN) article. After that PSN article, my Boise State colleague Brian Stone, PhD, shared with me (shared here with permission) three more occupations that he hoped could make the “list:”

• Registered Behavior Technician (RBT): This is an applied behavioral analysis job, doing the 1-on-1 work (not personally designing the treatment plans), supervised by a board-certified behavior analyst or a Board Certified Assistant Behavior Analyst. Credentialing technically requires only high school diploma but many/most have bachelor’s degree. Does require 40 hours of training and an exam to get the credential.
• Board Certified Assistant Behavior Analyst: This position requires a bachelor’s in any discipline, but specific coursework requirements are likely to be filled only by those in psychology, special education or similar fields.
• Habilitative Interventionist: Certification in Idaho (to work with ages 3-17) is a bachelor’s degree in a human services field, including specific courses (learning, child development and applied behavior analysis) or being an RBT; plus some supervised experience.

To say that a bachelor’s degree in psychology prepares you for no job is simply ludicrous. But let’s think about the more nuanced part — a bachelor’s degree in psychology does not exclusively qualify a person for any of the jobs on the typical lists. Using O*NET from the U.S. Department of Labor (2017) for the following bulleted data, allow me to explain what I mean by psychology’s lack of exclusivity.

• Nearly 70 percent of claims supervisors (claims examiners) for insurance companies have a bachelor’s degree. This type of position can be filled by individuals from many different majors.
• Eighty-nine percent of individuals serving as a corrections officer have a high school diploma or equivalent. Psychology majors can do well in this area, but as you can probably understand, so do criminal justice majors, sociology majors and others.
• Thirty percent of labor relations specialists hold bachelor’s degrees, and 25 percent hold master’s degrees — a psychology major could certainly attain this job, but will sometimes be competing with others with higher educational attainment.
• Technical writers typically require some college experience (35 percent associate’s degree and 33 percent bachelor’s degree), but as you can imagine, a psychology major competing for this position would also be competing with individuals who were English majors in college.

It is my hope these examples illustrate the nuance and complexity of discussing career options for psychology graduates. There are many job possibilities, but there is also much competition awaiting in the workplace due to the lack of exclusivity. In 2018, the first issue of Teaching of Psychology was a special issue devoted to career issues and the undergraduate psychology major. Those of us who advise psychology majors will find this special issue replete with a plethora of helpful, current resources.

References

American Psychological Association. (2013). APA guidelines for the undergraduate psychology major: Version 2.0. Washington, D.C.: Author. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/ed/precollege/undergrad/index.aspx.

National Center for Education Statistics. (2017). Degrees in psychology conferred by postsecondary institutions, by level of degree and sex of student: Selected years, 1945-50 through 2014-15 [Table 325.80]. Retrieved from https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d16/tables/dt16_325.80.asp?current=yes.

U.S. Department of Labor. (2017). O*NET Online. Retrieved from https://www.onetonline.org/.

Re-posted with permission from the American Psychological Association’s Psychology Teacher Network