Observation

[Therapist4Chnge]

I'd wager that personality has a lot to do with the quality of therapists - maybe even more so than general intelligence. Should they give personality tests to wanna-be-psychologists? The problem is how do you decide who is or is not a good therapist. Until you can rate the quality of therapy across different therapists and different professions etc. then no one can really win this argument. Therapists don't want to be rated - they're too invested into their careers to risk learning that they are an average or sub-par therapist. Maybe there should be more research on what makes a good therapist. In general more intelligent / academically gifted people are better therapists but not always. I'm sure there's plenty of professors that are horrible therapists, and I'm sure there's a ton of masters people who are great therapists. Why? I just think there needs to be more research.

I'm sure Ellis wouldn't have the 'typical' make up for a therapist.

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[myelin]

Ive heard the response to this question a million times. The answer is yes and no. The argument is:
1.) Licensing exam scores are, on average, higher for Boulder model programs than those from professional schools and Psy.D model programs. 2.) The training in a Ph.D. is more in-depth in terms of exploring and understanding underlying theories and dynamics of treatment and assessment 3.) the quality of students in Ph.D programs is, on average, likely to be higher than those in professional schools. Primarily because many of these students go to these school because they can not get into other Ph.D. programs. 4.) Market flooding, and debt that is a mismatch for the expected salary. I'm sure Jon will elaborate and articulate these points.

I am not on the bashing band wagon, but many of these arguments do hold some water. I have noticed number 2 in my experiences. Someone once told me that Ph.D= lets learn about, learn about the underlying theory, research it, dissect it, scrutinize it, then do it. Psy.D= lets jump in and learn as we go. I don't really agree with that, but it did give me a chuckle. But, I have worked with alot of Psy.D and prof school people and never been able to tell a real difference myself (clinically).

I can see your points, but I've yet to see data showing that "PhD programs produce better psychologists than PsyD programs." Whatever "better" may be.

I'm not sure how debt factors into this, as that decision is personal and has nothing to do with how good a clinician one is.

 

[psy86]

In general more intelligent / academically gifted people are better therapists but not always.

I've heard this statement from multiple sources before, but I went looking for a reference to back it up the other day and couldn't find anything. Anyone know of any studies demonstrating that therapist intelligence/ IQ/ GPA/ etc. is associated with being a 'better' therapist?

 

[erg923]

I can see your points, but I've yet to see data showing that "PhD programs produce better psychologists than PsyD programs." Whatever "better" may be.

I'm not sure how debt factors into this, as that decision is personal and has nothing to do with how good a clinician one is.

Well, I'm not exactly sure what you are looking for here? What kind of study would satisfy the question? How would you operationalize definitions? What paradigm would you use? How would you control for individual variables (experience, intelligence)? I think any study attempting this could be picked apart until the conclusions were uninterpretable. I think the observed differences in the scores on the licensing exam are about as good as you are going to get on this.

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

I think the observed differences in the scores on the licensing exam are about as good as you are going to get on this.

Listed HERE for anyone curious.

 

[Steph124]

Hi, I was getting irritated so I did not read all the posts.

I take offense to the comment that "anyone with a pulse" can be accepted to professional psych schools. Yes a lot of professional psych programs as well as nonprofessional psych programs invite people to apply who have low GPAs or GRE scores, but these individuals are expected to be socioeconomically disadvantaged or experienced major hardship. I have close to a 4.0 in psych and got a 1310 on my GREs (which is not phenomenal, but not horrible either). I am by no means stupid, I just want something different from a graduate program than competencies in research. I will be attending Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology in the fall. People with similar GPA and GRE scores did not get in to the school, which negates the claim that anyone can enter into these schools. Further, if they were purely out to make money, schools like MSPP would have a whole heck of a lot more than 50 students in their first year class.

For me, deciding on a professional school came after interviewing at nonprofessional schools. I interviewed at Denver and did not find the program enticing, nor did I find the people to be very friendly. Conversely, the people at MSPP were warm and interested in what I had to say. Unlike Denver, they do place emphasis on social policy, so at the very least, it was a better fit for me. Everyone is looking for something different and to completely disregard a number of quality schools merely because they do not have the resources to completely fund every students education does not seem fair.

 

[myelin]

Well, I'm not exactly sure what you are looking for here? What kind of study would satisfy the question? How would you operationalize definitions? What paradigm would you use? How would you control for individual variables (experience, intelligence)? I think any study attempting this could be picked apart until the conclusions were uninterpretable. I think the observed differences in the scores on the licensing exam are about as good as you are going to get on this.

Indeed, it would be a daunting task to conduct such an analysis. I assumed that with the sweeping generalizaton made by the OP that there must be some research I missed out on regarding the differences in quality of training among PsyD and PhD programs.

 

[KellienComplex]

denver is a professional school, is it not?

Either our irritated poster was grossly misinformed or referring to the clinical health psychology Ph.D. program offered through the department of psychology at the University of Colorado-Denver or even the child clinical psychology Ph.D. program offered through the department of psychology at the University of Denver.

 

[parto123]

As for the second paragraph, I'm not going to reiterate my previous arguments since you've heard before about how I think trying to compare across professions is a big mistake and I've given up trying to convince you otherwise.

To be honest, im of the belief that in virtually (there may be exceptions) all professions actual schooling is almost irrelevant. It just so happens that more qualified candidates, in any profession, go to the best schools, so that’s where top employers do most of their hiring. There is validity to the old idea of “I learned everything on the job because nothing taught in school was relevant”


You ever wonder why top law firms want to hire Harvard and yale graduates, even though those schools hardly teach a single practical or useful course? Or why banks will hire a graduate from Princeton college who had not taken a single finance course?

In almost all cases colleges and graduate schools are used as nothing more than a sorting tool to see who the smartest candidates are. You think anyone cares about the specific courses you took? In fact, its usually the lower ranked schools that teach practical useful knowledge while top schools focus on more obscure topics with little real world value. But at the end, its still usually the folks from top schools who are better on the job.

 

[erg923]

To be honest, im of the belief that in virtually (there may be exceptions) all professions actual schooling is almost irrelevant. It just so happens that more qualified candidates, in any profession, go to the best schools, so that's where top employers do most of their hiring. There is validity to the old idea of "I learned everything on the job because nothing taught in school was relevant"


You ever wonder why top law firms want to hire Harvard and yale graduates, even though those schools hardly teach a single practical or useful course? Or why banks will hire a graduate from Princeton college who had not taken a single finance course?

In almost all cases colleges and graduate schools are used as nothing more than a sorting tool to see who the smartest candidates are. You think anyone cares about the specific courses you took? In fact, its usually the lower ranked schools that teach practical useful knowledge while top schools focus on more obscure topics with little real world value. But at the end, its still usually the folks from top schools who are better on the job.

Well this is a psychology forum and we are talking about graduate training in psychology. All doctoral level programs in clinical psychology have to conform to a base of core didactic training. This forms the foundation of clinical science that one builds upon in their future research and clinical training. These are important courses, and are offered under one name or the other in every clinical psychology doctoral program. Leaning on the job certainly occurs in psychology, but if that is where all the leaning takes place, you are learning the how, but not necessarily the "why" behind it. Grad school stresses the importance of understanding your job from a "bottom up" approach. What is the driving theory behind this? How does it work? why does it work? When might it not work? Only after you understand these important underlying aspects should you be practicing it. This allows one to have a deeper understanding of what they do and why they do it practice. It also prevent practitioners from making logical fallacies about treatments that are likely to occur when only having a superficial understanding of them. Besides teaching the necessary theory base and knowledge one must know, one of the biggest things grad schooling does, especially the research end, is to teach critical thinking skills. Like medicine, none of these things are subject matter to be learned on the job with out an appropriate knowledge base. This would be unethical and dangerous to patients. Didactics themselves also serve a purpose beyond grad school. For example, if one ones to become a neuropsychologist, internships positions will look to see if you had formal coursework in neuroanatomy, behavioral neurology, etc. Top schools in psychology are hardly in the realm of "more obscure topics with little real world value." If anything, top schools in psychology (i.e., Minnesota, Florida Wisconsin, Yale, etc) are rigorous and empirical, and produce cutting edge research in the field. These people are likely to be top dogs in the research world, but not necessarily the best clinicians.

Also, the most qualified applicants aren't necessarily going to Ivy League schools (i.e.,the top schools) for graduate training in psychology. Research interests match plays a huge role in choosing a program. You can get just as good training at Bowling Green State as you can at Yale if your research interest match well.

Further, prestige play a small role in job offers in psychology. Your accomplishments, clinical experiences, and research play a much more influential role in matching for internships and attainment of a position. Psychology is unlike law school in this realm.

PS: Harvard law hardly teaches useless courses. In fact, the program is very course heavy, I know someone who goes there.

 

[KillerDiller]

Therapists don't want to be rated - they're too invested into their careers to risk learning that they are an average or sub-par therapist.

Which is exactly why running an evidence-based practice dictates that therapists, despite the discomfort, look at the data to make sure that their clients are improving from the treatment they are providing. Not only should practicing psychologists evaluate their mode of treatment by looking the rate of improvement across clients, they should also use their research skills when deciding whether the course they originally set for individual clients is proving effective. This should be done in as objective a manner as possible (e.g. response inventories) and not simply by getting a general feel from a client. Research training comes in handy when it comes to selecting appropriate measures for this and interpreting improvement in the light of the reliability of the measures used.

 

[Cosmo75]

I'm sure Ellis wouldn't have the 'typical' make up for a therapist.

How true

KillerDiller: Great avatar

Boy, we're on this topic again? All these threads ever seem to be is one side attacking, one side defending, and no real progress ever being made. A lot of suggestions for improvement are offered, but who actually takes them outside of the safety of this forum? I've also asked supervisors (including those with PhDs) about some of these issues and they all have roughly the same response: Find your niche and you'll do fine.

Jon, do you practice? I thought you were more of a researcher/academic? Just curious what your experience has been with your livelihood being threatened?

I like the suggestion to move on beyond this debate. This is along the same lines as discussing religion and politics. We're never going to agree.

 

[KellienComplex]

no, i was referring to the u of denver psyd program that charges huge sums of money

I was referring to Steph124's mention of an interview with "Denver"; ostensibly, a "non-professional" school.

 

[KellienComplex]

Right, which is a psyd program that doesn't offer financial assistance and charges just as much as other professional schools.

I meant to impy that our poster might have referred to one of the two Ph.D. programs offered at UD or CUD.

 

[MaddieMay]

To clarify, you're saying The Denver University School of Professional Psychology doesn't offer financial aid? (PhD and PsyD)

"Graduate and professional students are considered for the following additional aid programs:

Federal College Work Study
Federal Perkins Loan
Colorado Graduate Grant*"

http://www.uchsc.edu/finaid/financial_aid_sources.php



Or The University of Colorado at Denver (PhD only)?

"Financial Aid Programs: Federal Pell Grant
Campus Based Aid (grants, work-study, Federal Perkins Loan)
Federal Loan Programs
Alternative Student Loans"

http://www.cudenver.edu/Admissions/...ams-Policies and Resources/Pages/default.aspx

 

[MaddieMay]

what does that bring the total cost of the program to?

What percentage of students are supported?.

No idea, that's not the claim you made that I was trying to understand.

A loan and workstudy doesn't count in my opinion.

In that case, neither program offers real financial aid? I'm just trying to understand your statements.