Internship Question

[clinicalpsyapp]

OK, I am currently in the process of applying to 10 schools. 8 are Clinical Psychology with a health psych focus, and 2 are social psychology with a health psych emphasis. I will be performing similar research in all 10 programs, they just happen to be different program types. And to explain the social psych, my master's degree is in Clinical Mental Health Counseling which was strictly practice-based, so I don't necessarily need the clinical training of a clinical psych program and am now just interested in research and specialization of my knowledge of the population I want to work with.

I know that you can still become a licensed psychologist with a social psych degree, but you are only licensed to work with the population that your area of expertise is in (which is fine with me). But I was wondering if anyone knows about internship and post-doc opportunities for social psych degrees. Can I still apply for clinical APA-accredited internships?

Should I get accepted to two programs I really like and one is a clinical program and the other is social (removing the clinical training piece out of the equation) would I be doing myself a disservice by doing the social psych program as far as opportunities post-graduation?

Any advice you can give would be great!

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[erg923]

I know that you can still become a licensed psychologist with a social psych degree, but you are only licensed to work with the population that your area of expertise is in

Licensed in what? Its a research degree. What service would you be qualified to get licenced for?

There is no internships for the experimental branches of doctoral level psychology. Post-docs would be research based obviously.

T4C has a good point though. You could concievably do some limited clinical activity (minor counseling) if your masters degree prepared you for state licensing at the masters level. The doctorate oin social provides no clincial trianing therefore you could not become a licensed "psychologist." Only counseling and clinical and school psych (the applied areas) prepare one for APA clincial internships.

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

...my master's degree is in Clinical Mental Health Counseling which was strictly practice-based, so I don't necessarily need the clinical training of a clinical psych program and am now just interested in research and specialization of my knowledge of the population I want to work with.

I know that you can still become a licensed psychologist with a social psych degree, but you are only licensed to work with the population that your area of expertise is in (which is fine with me).

If I am understanding your situation, you should be able to get licensed and practice at the master's level with a degree in MHC, but your doctorate would be in a non-licensable area, as you would not the required training and supervision. You would not be able to be licensed as a psychologist, as that requires training and supervision at the doctoral level. You still should be able to bill insurance, but it'd only at the MA/MS level. It'd be akin to someone who is an LCSW and happens to have a Ph.D. in engineering.

But I was wondering if anyone knows about internship and post-doc opportunities for social psych degrees. Can I still apply for clinical APA-accredited internships?

No. You would not have the requiste training to be elligible for the APPIC Match system.

Should I get accepted to two programs I really like and one is a clinical program and the other is social (removing the clinical training piece out of the equation) would I be doing myself a disservice by doing the social psych program as far as opportunities post-graduation?

Any advice you can give would be great!

It depends on the type of opportunities. You would not be able to do anything that requires licensure (clinical supervision, therapy, etc).

 

[clinicalpsyapp]

If I am understanding your situation, you should be able to get licensed and practice at the master's level with a degree in MHC, but your doctorate would be in a non-licensable area, as you would not the required training and supervision. You would not be able to be licensed as a psychologist, as that requires training and supervision at the doctoral level. You still should be able to bill insurance, but it'd only at the MA/MS level. It'd be akin to someone who is an LCSW and happens to have a Ph.D. in engineering.



No. You would not have the requiste training to be elligible for the APPIC Match system.



It depends on the type of opportunities. You would not be able to do anything that requires licensure (clinical supervision, therapy, etc).

Thank you for your responses. I know that you can get licensed without a clinical degree, because my advisor and the supervising psychologist I work for at a brain injury rehab both have research (not clinical) degrees and are licensed as a doctoral level psychologist to provide clinical services, but only to the population they specialized in while obtaining their degrees. I know that it is obviously more difficult to go this route, and there are some caveats (most insurances will pay for my TBI non-clinical psychologist, but not medicaid), but it is possible.

But from what I gather, it would be impossible for me to get an APA clinical internship with my clinical training from my master's combined with my research training from my doctorate?

 

[erg923]

I know that you can get licensed without a clinical degree, because my advisor and the supervising psychologist I work for at a brain injury rehab both have research (not clinical) degrees and are licensed as a doctoral level psychologist to provide clinical services, but only to the population they specialized in while obtaining their degrees.

I think your missing a piece here. This makes no sense and would violate numerous ethics and state licensing laws. I wouold ask again and get the full story

 

[thewesternsky]

I know that you can get licensed without a clinical degree, because my advisor and the supervising psychologist I work for at a brain injury rehab both have research (not clinical) degrees and are licensed as a doctoral level psychologist to provide clinical services, but only to the population they specialized in while obtaining their degrees. I know that it is obviously more difficult to go this route, and there are some caveats (most insurances will pay for my TBI non-clinical psychologist, but not medicaid), but it is possible.

Which state/province are you in? This is very, very unlikely. It's possible they did research degrees followed by a clinical re-specialization program, I suppose... But the re-specialization *is* a clinical program. I'd ask them for more information about their programs and their licensure (which body? what level of licensure?), if I were you.

 

[clinicalpsyapp]

I think your missing a piece here. This makes no sense and would violate numerous ethics and state licensing laws. I wouold ask again and get the full story

I do know the whole story.

-The psychologist I work for at the TBI rehab has a degree in Experimental Psychology. He was fully trained in neuropsych assessments and worked under Ralph Reitan in developing neuropsych batteries. He is now a licensed clinician, but is only allowed to administer and interpret neuropsych testing, but not to provide any other clinical services (e.g. counseling).

-My advisor also has a degree in Experimental Psychology. His focus was behavioral medicine, and while he was at Duke during his post-doc was provided with clinical supervision and became licensed to only provide clinical services to patients dealing with medical issues.

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

Thank you for your responses. I know that you can get licensed without a clinical degree, because my advisor and the supervising psychologist I work for at a brain injury rehab both have research (not clinical) degrees and are licensed as a doctoral level psychologist to provide clinical services, but only to the population they specialized in while obtaining their degrees.

This is the part that doesn't make sense. Being licensed at the doctoral level as a psychologist doesn't have this restriction, as you either meet the requirements or you don't.

Here is a listing of all of the licensing boards for the USA and Canada. You may want to check out the requirements for your state, as I am pretty sure they all require a certain amount of clinical training and supervised internship time: http://www.kspope.com/licensing/index.php

But from what I gather, it would be impossible for me to get an APA clinical internship with my clinical training from my master's combined with my research training from my doctorate?

Correct. Here is what APPIC says about eligibility.

Applicants: APPIC policy states that internship applicants must (a) be enrolled in a doctoral program in professional psychology that requires internship training, and (b) expect to complete practicum experience by the start of internship. Applicants who do not satisfy these requirements may not register for the Match or apply to APPIC-member internship programs. In addition to these requirements, an applicant's academic program has the authority to determine the applicant's eligibility for participation in the Match.

You wouldn't be able to fullfill (a) or (b), in addition to not being able to substitute your training at the MS level, as it is not equitable to doctoral practicum hours.

 

[clinicalpsyapp]

OK, I'll clarify that with them. Maybe they were licensed as a full psychologist, but ethically could only practice within their specialty. What I'm saying is that they did not have a Clinical Psychology degree, but through a backdoor kind of way got the practicum and internship experience they needed to qualify for licensure. Most licensure laws don't stipulate the name of the degree, just that you have taken the general psychology courses (usually in social, cognitive, bio bases, etc.) and have had practicum and internship with supervision.

 

[erg923]

I can buy the part about a student of Ralphs not being clinically trained but still doing clinical npsych type stuff. This was very common up until the 80s. Im surprised one of these people is still around though. How you can practice comptent npsych without understanding psychological/psychiatric issues and mental illness is beyond me. You have to have a pretty indepth understanding of it to intepret an MMPI appopriately, which is part of the HRB. Anyway, there is no state license that resticts him from doing anything except npsych, ill tell you that. It doesnt work that way. A license is a generic license to practice psychology. There is no seprerate one for npsych, except in Louisana I think.

The part I'm not buying is that any of these people went from experimental degrees straight into clinical work or did formal clinical work during their degree in social psych. There is thing called "clinical respecialization" that are specifcically designed for people with ph.ds in other areas of psych who want to switch to clinical work. This is typically 2 years of formal clinical training. One year of didactic classwork and one year of practicum, and then an internship year of course. You can then apply to take the licensing exam and practice. If these people are licensed psychologists, but orginal had degrees in social psych or whatever, this is what they did.

 

[LM02]

I was thinking the same thing as erg. I bet they did a "clinical respecialization" that allowed them to apply for licensure.

For your purposes, I think this approach would make little sense. Because you already have a masters in counseling, you would need to complete your PhD in social psychology only to "respecialize" at the tail end of your training. I imagine that respecialization would feel redundant when you already completed a masters in counseling. If I were you, I'd just take the next step directly into the clinical psychology PhD.

Going into social psychology when your long-term plan is to get licensed is just going to prolong things for you unnecessarily.

 

[clinicalpsyapp]

Thanks for the advice everyone! I'm not really sure if it matters to me to be licensed or not... My plans are really to be a professor or full-time researcher and do clinical work on the side, just a few patients a week. I know I can just see them as a LMHC, which means less money. Just wanted to figure everything out now so when decision time (I hope I have a decision to make anyway!) comes, I can know what each path will lead to. If I'm more interested in a research career, providing clinical services on the side for extra income (and am OK getting reimbursed as a LMHC), and I am doing the same research in the programs, is there anything else I should keep in mind if it comes down to that decision?

 

[Ollie123]

Depending on their age, its also possible that licensure laws have changed and perhaps there was a time when one could be license-eligible with a non-clinical degree. I don't know if that is the case, but licensure laws in general tend to be moving targets.

 

[clinicalpsyapp]

Depending on their age, its also possible that licensure laws have changed and perhaps there was a time when one could be license-eligible with a non-clinical degree. I don't know if that is the case, but licensure laws in general tend to be moving targets.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking. Both of them finished their degree in the 70s or 80s. My advisor is not currently licensed, but the psychologist I work for at the TBI rehab is, and I know for a fact he didn't go through clinical respecialization. So maybe he got licensed before the laws changed to the way they are now and was grandfathered in. I'll have to ask him.

 

[Ollie123]

Please drop by to let us know the answer once you've find out because I'm sure I'm not the only one who is now curious I know there are limited situations where a person can "practice" without a license (i.e. exemptions for research), but I've never heard of someone in an experimental branch being licensed.

Though I actually think IO psychologists can be/need to be licensed under certain circumstances. I have no idea how that process works and if it is a separate license or not.

 

[aagman01]

I have never heard about experimental psychs getting licensed, but I have heard that there is a path for I/O psychologists to get licensured. Does anyone know about this?

EDIT: I see someone asked the question about I/O psychs path to licensure. Am curious about that one if anyone knows

I can buy the part about a student of Ralphs not being clinically trained but still doing clinical npsych type stuff. This was very common up until the 80s. Im surprised one of these people is still around though. How you can practice comptent npsych without understanding psychological/psychiatric issues and mental illness is beyond me. You have to have a pretty indepth understanding of it to intepret an MMPI appopriately, which is part of the HRB. Anyway, there is no state license that resticts him from doing anything except npsych, ill tell you that. It doesnt work that way. A license is a generic license to practice psychology. There is no seprerate one for npsych, except in Louisana I think.

The part I'm not buying is that any of these people went from experimental degrees straight into clinical work or did formal clinical work during their degree in social psych. There is thing called "clinical respecialization" that are specifcically designed for people with ph.ds in other areas of psych who want to switch to clinical work. This is typically 2 years of formal clinical training. One year of didactic classwork and one year of practicum, and then an internship year of course. You can then apply to take the licensing exam and practice. If these people are licensed psychologists, but orginal had degrees in social psych or whatever, this is what they did.

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

It is my understanding there is not a licensure for I/O work, since it falls under "consulting".