Combining law and psych

[PizzaButt]

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Hi there,

I have a JD and I'm thinking about applying to clinical psych PhD programs. I've read about forensic psych, and I don't think that interests me, but does anyone know of any other ways to combine law and psych? Or any resources that discuss this?

Thanks.

 

[Ollie123]

Not sure what you would be looking for, you'd actually probably be in a better position to answer this question than most anyone else here since we don't know what you learned in law school😉

My only other thoughts are:
1) Not sure if you only looked at forensics in the sense of "Working with prisoners" as it is typically thought of. You can consult on civil cases to apparently, which is what I hope to do.

2)Law degrees can set you up nicely to get involved in administration. You could probably get a government job or something similar looking at things like health care policy, and things like that.

Not sure if anyone else has ideas but those are the only things I can think of.

 

[danzgymn86]

There are a lot of areas where Psych overlaps with Law. However, you have stated in previous posts that you are interested more in counselling people in a practice. I'm not so sure where law would come into that.
I also know that you said that you are more interested in actual disorders and such...
If you wanted to go the research route, there would be more areas which you could explore, using your previous law knowledge, such as:
Judgement and Decision Making (and Judgement Heuristics)
Reconstructive Memory (which I think is fascinating)/recovered memories/false memories
Testimonies
Polygraphs and how to fake them
etc etc

However, these are all very research-oriented Social routes, not Clinical. And certianly not for a practice.