Looking for programs studying public mental health awareness and utilization?

[xyzpsych]

---

Members don't see this ad.

Dear fellow SDNers,

I'd like your kind help here. I've always been interested in studying psychological help-seeking and especially ways to increase the public's utilization of psychological service. My goal is to become a psychologist to practice and research in the community. I only applied to 6 PhD programs this year and actually got 2.5 interviews (.5 being a telephone interview which didn't lead to an in-person interview), but I'm not admitted into any of them. Of the 6 schools that I applied to, only one of them has a faculty that specializes in help-seeking.

Is anyone here aware of any Counseling or Clinical programs that might match my interest? My current advisor is relatively disconnected from the present affairs in academia and cannot offer me lots of useful advice. I'm moving to CA later this year and will have opportunities to contact and collaborate with faculty there. Anyone aware of such programs in Cali as well as other places?

BTW, I'm taking GRE again as the last time I took it was 5 years ago. I was wondering what's the average amount of time that people spend to prepare for it?

Many thanks in advance!

 

[psychology24]

xyzpsych,

I share similar interests re: psychological help-seeking and service utilization, which I think is a huge problem in our country. I am sure you can approach this from a variety of fields. For me, personally, I have been looking into sociology PhD and Behavioral/Community Health Sciences PhD (housed within Public Health). Now both of these are pure research or scholarly degrees, so if you are interested in some type of clinical practice keep that in mind. I am not too familiar with psychology professors who have this exact interest, but if you can find a couple strong matches on maybe a similar or another topic, you can always enroll in a few courses in another dept. during your future psychology PhD studies. And maybe also look around for fellowships or training opportunities to get some research in this particular area. For example, I know RAND offers graduate student research associate positions for doctoral students over the summer. There are a lot of RAND researchers interested in this area.

Feel free to PM me if you have any more specific questions or want to chat more in detail about this topic. best of luck,

 

[docma]

I'd endorse the idea of looking at Community Psychology programs as well and exploring the Society for Community Research and Action (SCRA) website for ideas and MPH programs. There is a Ph.D. emphasis area on Diversity and Community Mental Health at Pacific Graduate School of Psychology, Palo Alto University that would support your interests, but I'd explore smaller, fully funded programs first

 

[xyzpsych]

xyzpsych,

I share similar interests re: psychological help-seeking and service utilization, which I think is a huge problem in our country. I am sure you can approach this from a variety of fields. For me, personally, I have been looking into sociology PhD and Behavioral/Community Health Sciences PhD (housed within Public Health). Now both of these are pure research or scholarly degrees, so if you are interested in some type of clinical practice keep that in mind. I am not too familiar with psychology professors who have this exact interest, but if you can find a couple strong matches on maybe a similar or another topic, you can always enroll in a few courses in another dept. during your future psychology PhD studies. And maybe also look around for fellowships or training opportunities to get some research in this particular area. For example, I know RAND offers graduate student research associate positions for doctoral students over the summer. There are a lot of RAND researchers interested in this area.

Feel free to PM me if you have any more specific questions or want to chat more in detail about this topic. best of luck,

Thank you for replying. I do want to have the option to do clinical. That's why I didn't apply to those programs you mentioned even though I'm aware that they exist.

This sound very interesting. What is RAND?

Thanks again!

 

[xyzpsych]

I'd endorse the idea of looking at Community Psychology programs as well and exploring the Society for Community Research and Action (SCRA) website for ideas and MPH programs. There is a Ph.D. emphasis area on Diversity and Community Mental Health at Pacific Graduate School of Psychology, Palo Alto University that would support your interests, but I'd explore smaller, fully funded programs first

Thanks for mentioning SCRA to me. I would not have known it.

Best

 

[DynamicDidactic]

It sounds like clinical/community programs may be a great fit for you. There are a few out there if you search. Alaska and Wichita State have two seemingly good programs that don't get a lot of cred.

You may also consider clinical programs and complete an MPH simultaneously. It is not easy but I know of students who have done that. If you have a full tuition waiver through a good funded program then the extra classes are free.

 

[bcliff]

.

 

[xyzpsych]

It sounds like clinical/community programs may be a great fit for you. There are a few out there if you search. Alaska and Wichita State have two seemingly good programs that don't get a lot of cred.

You may also consider clinical programs and complete an MPH simultaneously. It is not easy but I know of students who have done that. If you have a full tuition waiver through a good funded program then the extra classes are free.

Never thought about Alaska--guess they don't get the cred they deserve because of people like me😀 Thank you for mentioning these!

 

[xyzpsych]

Georgia State University has a great Community/Clinical Psych program. I'd look at joint PhD/MPH programs around the country also.

Thank you!