February 9, 2004
A: FROM MENTOR DENISE HARBERT IN IL
Hi Jae,
Several GEM-SET Students have asked various questions about psychology in the
past that may give you some more information. You can go to the GEM-SET web
site, click Daily Digest, click on the months one at a time and use your mouse
to select Edit/Find on your browser and search for "psych". Here are two of
the questions about psychology that I answered in the past:
1. Q: What is the difference between a psychologist and a psychiatrist? My A
was on Feb 18, 2002 at:
http://www.uic.edu/orgs/gem-set/february.htm
2. Q: How is psychology related to science? My A was on Feb 4, 2003 at:
http://www.uic.edu/orgs/gem-set/archive030204q3.htm

In terms of careers that involve giving advice to people, the 3 career paths
that the other mentors mentioned are the most common:

1. Psychiatry (the longest to prepare for): a Psychiatrist is a medical
doctor with a Bachelor's degree (4-5 years), Medical Doctorate (M.D.) degree
(4-5 years), and residency (4-5 years). These people usually work in a mental
health hospital or a related type of medical facility. They generally focus
on physical (biological) causes of mental health problems. Often, these
doctors spend a lot of time working with people who have severe mental
impairments that require inpatient hospitalization.

2. Psychology: a Clinical Psychologist or Counseling Psychologist is a
philosophical doctor with a Bachelor's degree (4-5 years), and a
Philosophical Doctorate (Ph.D.) degree (5-7 years). Sometimes a Psychological
Doctorate (Psy.D.) degree (5-7 years) can be obtained instead of the Ph.D.
Psy.D. programs are relatively new and not every state has them. The Ph.D. in
Clinical or Counseling Psychology or the Psy.D. degrees usually require some
kind of student counseling, which is a similar but much shorter version of the
M.D. residency mentioned in #1 above. These people often work in private
practices that offer counseling services. They generally focus on the
environmental (home, family, friends, work) causes of mental health problems.
Often, these doctors spend a lot of time working on family issues such as
marital problems, divorce counseling, helping step-families who have problems
getting along, etc.

3. Social Work (the shortest to prepare for): a Social Worker is usually
not a doctor and has a Bachelor's degree (4-5 years), and Master of Social
Work (M.S.W.) degree (often 3 years). M.S.W. degrees usually require some
kind of student counseling, which is a similar but much shorter version of the
M.D. residency mentioned in #1 above. Social Workers might work in private
practice like Ph.D.s or Psy.D.s, but they often do public service work.
Public service work generally means highly stressful and demanding jobs that
do not pay much money, but may be the "last chance" for people who really need
help. Social Workers are most commonly found in government programs like
working with delinquent kids in a school system or juvenile detention center,
kids who are orphans or wards of the state, adults who are victims of domestic
abuse or violent crime, people in jail or prison, homeless people, etc.

Aside from these 3 main "advice givers", there are some less common paths to
specialized advice careers. There are some Master's degrees in Education
programs that train people to be high school guidance counselors. The college
version of a high school guidance counselor generally has a Ph.D. in Academic
Administration or something similar. These people may be University Deans or
Faculty Advisers. There are also English or Journalism majors who give advice
through newspaper, magazine, radio, or television "advice columns" or "talk
shows". However, these people are usually "common sense" advice givers who
are not professionally trained to give advice. This may lead to lawsuits or
worse if their "untrained" advice leads to serious problems for the person who
follows it, which is why I would not recommend that path to anyone. If you
want to work for a media source, I would recommend that you instead pursue one
of the 3 main fields above while taking a few Journalism courses on the side.
That way, you will have the appropriate "counseling" training to give good
advice and you will have the media skills to get a counseling job in the
media.
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February 6, 2004
A: FROM MENTOR SUZAN SONG IN IL
We definitely need more people like you in this world :) I'm a 4th year
medical student (will be a doctor in a few months) and am going into
Psychiatry -- this is one field you may be interested in. There are lots of
these types of jobs, depending on how much schooling you want, and what you're
looking for:

Psychiatry -- you go to medical school (4 years) after college, and then do a
residency (4 years). It's probably the longest amount of training. But
psychiatrists can prescribe medicine and often are more focused on the
biological basis of mental health.

Social work -- these people have great hearts :) They can work in hospitals or
community centers, with children and adults, helping everyone from run-away
teens and foster children to helping patients in hospitals find places to live
or helping underprivileged people find housing/jobs, etc. This requires a
masters degree (I think 2 years?) after college.

Psychology -- this is a major in college, and some people then get a PhD or
masters in psychology. Lots of psychologists do counseling and research. You
could be a school counselor or private therapist, or even work with a group in
the community.

I'm sure there are more, but these are the top 3 that come to mind. Definitely
feel free to email me if you'd like! -- Suzan.
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A: FROM MENTOR MOLLY WILLIAMS IN MI
The following reply is from my brother-in-law, a licensed clinical
psychologist who works in the mental health area in a teaching hospital in
Ohio: "There are several possibilities for people who want to work in the
area of mental health. There are different training paths depending on what
you want to do. For example there are individuals who can evaluate and treat
mental health problems who have a masters degree in psychology, counseling,
and social work. These individuals will have had 4 years of undergraduate
(college) training with a major in psychology preferably but other majors
are ok if you have the basic course requirements in psychology. These
individuals then usually attend a graduate program in either social work,
counseling psychology, or clinical psychology (although a lot of the
clinical programs are moving away from granting terminal masters degrees in
clinical psychology.) There are state boards that license these individuals
to practice, and they must meet minimum standards of training and supervised
experience. In Ohio individuals can be licensed as certified clinical
counselors. Social workers essentially have similar training and are
licensed by state boards, too. Clinical psychologist have an undergraduate
degree in psychology and then they will have three years of graduate
training specifically in clinical psychology and also have to do a
predoctoral internship which lasts a year where they get experience in their
area of interest this lasts a year. Then they also have to write a doctoral
dissertation, usually an experimental designed research project. They then
have to take an exam to be licensed by their state board to practice. They
have to have at least a year of supervision under a psychologist before
taking the exam. There is also a Psy D degree, which is a degree designed
for those individuals who may not want to be doing research or be in an
academic setting but just practice. They attend what is known as
professional school program. Some of these may not require a dissertation,
or if they do it does not have to be an experimental one. The requirements
for licensing are the same and they have to have the predoctoral internship.
Psychiatrists have to attend medical school and then go into a four-year
residence in psychiatry. They also have to be board licensed in psychiatry
in order to practice. Psychologists, social workers, and counselors cannot
prescribe medications. However, psychiatrists can because they have a
medical degree."
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A: FROM MENTOR JOAN LUSK IN RI
"Counselor" is a broad term, and people who give helpful advice can have
different kinds of training. (Natural common sense counts for a lot too -
people can have lots of schooling without being wise, and vice versa.)

Three of the degrees that counselors may have are Master of Social Work
(MSW), Psychologist, and Psychiatrist. Psychologists may have PhD degrees;
psychiatrists have to be medical doctors (MDs). Only the medical doctors
can prescribe drugs, but the others can give good advice and help a person
think through problems. I think that lay people, without degrees but with
some specific training, often staff suicide hot lines. Such people are
trained to recognize when to call in more professional help. But talking
with anyone - a friend, family member - can be very helpful to a person in
trouble.

http://www.apa.org/divisions/div12/aboutcp.html describes the profession of
clinical psychology. I didn't find an equivalent site for social work, but
http://www.socialworksearch.com/ shows a lot of the issues and
sub-specialties with which social workers deal.
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