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Anyone wish they'd become a psychologist?


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I was on the psychologist track for about 2-3 years in college. I have mixed feelings about it. I worked with a lot of psychologists over the years and they seem to envy me more than the other way. I have a psychologist on staff and share a suite with another one. They have the same insurance struggles as I do, but probably more. They see patients getting better at a much slower rate than us, with many relapses. I do enjoy talking with patients about their lives. So in sum, I think I made the right choice.

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My Bachelor's is a Psych degree with a concentration in Bio (if I had time to take Physics and just one more math course, I would have had a Bio minor, arrr). I did that for two reasons. One was that I love Psychology and felt it would be useful learning more of that aspect with medical application in mind (which has definitely proven to be true). The other was for backup in case I didn't get into a PA program ... people will hire you if you have a Psych degree ... one of my friends graduated with Psych and a minor in Business and he jumped straight into a high-level admin position making 80K out of undergrad. I figured it would either be that or else only be eligible for Lab Tech positions with a Bio degree. In hindsight, I'd probably have chosen straight Bio and been JUST fine with Lab Tech work lol ... I actually dream about it some days! There's something to be said for wanting to learn absolutely everything, but ... either way, a major or even a minor or concentration in Psych will ultimately serve you well ... people like knowing they're bringing someone on who gets that drift.

 

In answer to your main question, no. Being a Psychologist is not for me, but I have a great friend who decided to take that path and is now moving towards their Doctorate. Personally, I'm way too much into science and medicine to be involved full-time with anything else but the extra insight through my Psych undergrad coursework continues to definitely prove invaluable to this day.

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Fascinating question. Feel free to PM me; I am both a clinical psychologist and a family medicine PA.

 

Just one very significant distinction to make: Being a psychologist is not at all equivalent to being a psychiatric PA. The PA model is inherently medically based; the conceptual models of human behavior, psychopathology, and therapeutic intervention in the discipline of psychology bear little to no resemblance to medicine. It is a completely different way of approaching both the understanding of behavior (overt and covert) and of altering maladaptive behavior (both overt and covert). If you complete a psychiatric residency, you will still be basing your assessment, diagnosis, and intervention on a medical/biochemical conceptualization of behavior, and you will not be well versed in non-medical models of assessment and intervention.

 

And a word of caution about on-line doctoral degrees. Your goal as a psychologist is to earn a state license to practice psychology. This generally requires a doctoral degree (exceptions are made for school psychologists at the master's level) from a program that is approved by the American Psychological Association. I am not aware of APA extending approval to any on-line programs, but I could be wrong.

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