- Joined
- Jan 29, 2009
- Messages
- 413
- Reaction score
- 155
(*This is humor, NOT real*)
"We are growing increasingly concerned about the psychological health of our internship applicants after the application process," says one member of APPIC. Every year, APPIC asks for feedback from applicants on the APPIC/internship application process. Last year, some of the feedback was rather disturbing:
"20 Cover letters, four essays, and HEAVENS forbid I have a typo on any of them. This process makes me want to PULL MY HAIR OUT!!!!!!!
Another applicant wrote:
"I would rather JAB A NAIL into my hand than write another cover letter."
Several applicants were so angry, they couldn't seem even formulate words to put in the comment box:
"AAAAAJHHHHHHHHHHHHH!~!!11!!!
"WHAARRRGGGAAARRRBBBLLLEE!!!!!!"
One applicant simply typed the "f-word" 200 times into the comment box. "Several of the comments had 10+ exclamation points at the end. You could really tell that these applicants were angry," says one APPIC member.
To address this issue, the APA formed a task force. As a result of this task force, the APA is now proposing a new disorder, called "Internship Imbalance Adjustment Disorder" to be included in the DSM-V. Criteria include:
- Frequent and persistent feelings of anxiety around buying plane tickets during holiday season on a graduate student stipend
- Obsessive thoughts and compulsive rituals surrounding the order of your ranking list
- Increased resentment towards everything psychology-related
- Irritability around family members who have no idea what you are going through
- Panic attacks induced by the phrases "cover letter" and "how many hours do you have?"
The APA task-force considered several ideas for addressing this disorder. One considered solution was making applicants write a fifth essay, one in which applicants would contract for safety and assure APPIC that they were safe from suicidal, homicidal, and psychotic thoughts. They discarded this idea, fearing that the additional essay would agitate applicants, and are now mandating that grief-counseling is provided for these applicants at the end of the process.
We interviewed several applicants to see what they thought about these changes. The answers we got tended to be brief, yet very telling:
"This whole process sucks!"
"**** my life"
"I have had to complete 50 cognitive behavioral thought records over this whole thing."
After some gentle persuasion, we got one applicant to elaborate:
"Several of my professors asked me how I was doing throughout this process. I wanted to say: How am I doing!? I just wrote 10 cover letters and paid 2000$ in travel costs for a 60% chance of matching at an APA-accredited site, HOW DO YOU THINK I AM DOING!? That's the worst part, you just have to smile and nod and take the whole thing and act like everything is ok."
One psychiatrist, Dr. Jane Smith, was willing to offer pro-bono services to these applicants, stating: "You know, after seeing what these students go through, I decided to offer my services for free to help out." When asked about the treatment that she offers, she stated "I write a lot of valium prescriptions..... Yea, mostly valium."
"We are growing increasingly concerned about the psychological health of our internship applicants after the application process," says one member of APPIC. Every year, APPIC asks for feedback from applicants on the APPIC/internship application process. Last year, some of the feedback was rather disturbing:
"20 Cover letters, four essays, and HEAVENS forbid I have a typo on any of them. This process makes me want to PULL MY HAIR OUT!!!!!!!
Another applicant wrote:
"I would rather JAB A NAIL into my hand than write another cover letter."
Several applicants were so angry, they couldn't seem even formulate words to put in the comment box:
"AAAAAJHHHHHHHHHHHHH!~!!11!!!
"WHAARRRGGGAAARRRBBBLLLEE!!!!!!"
One applicant simply typed the "f-word" 200 times into the comment box. "Several of the comments had 10+ exclamation points at the end. You could really tell that these applicants were angry," says one APPIC member.
To address this issue, the APA formed a task force. As a result of this task force, the APA is now proposing a new disorder, called "Internship Imbalance Adjustment Disorder" to be included in the DSM-V. Criteria include:
- Frequent and persistent feelings of anxiety around buying plane tickets during holiday season on a graduate student stipend
- Obsessive thoughts and compulsive rituals surrounding the order of your ranking list
- Increased resentment towards everything psychology-related
- Irritability around family members who have no idea what you are going through
- Panic attacks induced by the phrases "cover letter" and "how many hours do you have?"
The APA task-force considered several ideas for addressing this disorder. One considered solution was making applicants write a fifth essay, one in which applicants would contract for safety and assure APPIC that they were safe from suicidal, homicidal, and psychotic thoughts. They discarded this idea, fearing that the additional essay would agitate applicants, and are now mandating that grief-counseling is provided for these applicants at the end of the process.
We interviewed several applicants to see what they thought about these changes. The answers we got tended to be brief, yet very telling:
"This whole process sucks!"
"**** my life"
"I have had to complete 50 cognitive behavioral thought records over this whole thing."
After some gentle persuasion, we got one applicant to elaborate:
"Several of my professors asked me how I was doing throughout this process. I wanted to say: How am I doing!? I just wrote 10 cover letters and paid 2000$ in travel costs for a 60% chance of matching at an APA-accredited site, HOW DO YOU THINK I AM DOING!? That's the worst part, you just have to smile and nod and take the whole thing and act like everything is ok."
One psychiatrist, Dr. Jane Smith, was willing to offer pro-bono services to these applicants, stating: "You know, after seeing what these students go through, I decided to offer my services for free to help out." When asked about the treatment that she offers, she stated "I write a lot of valium prescriptions..... Yea, mostly valium."
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