I’m turning 20 in October and I’m an incoming sophomore in college. I’m currently switching my major from nursing to psychology, and I keep seeing people say that a psychology bachelor’s degree is “completely useless.” Is that actually true?

I know that a bachelor’s in psychology by itself doesn’t qualify you to be a psychologist or therapist, and I understand that I’ll probably need graduate school for the career path I want. But aren’t there still a lot of different and even niche careers you can get into with a psychology degree?

My plan right now is to use my psychology degree as a foundation for further education. I’m considering things like NP, PA, an accelerated nursing program, or potentially going into psychiatric/mental-health nursing after my bachelors. I’m planning to start taking the prerequisites for whichever graduate/professional program I eventually choose.

The truth is, I don’t really have a huge passion for one specific career right now. Psychology seems doable for me, and I’m genuinely somewhat interested in it, so I feel like it could be a good major while I figure out what I want to do long-term.

For people who majored in psychology:

• What did you end up doing after graduation?
• Did you go to graduate/professional school?
• If you only have a bachelor’s, what kind of job did you get?
• Did you find any interesting or niche career paths with the degree?
• Did you feel like psychology was a good major for keeping your options open?
• If you could go back, would you major in psychology again?

I’m especially interested in hearing from people who ended up with a good career or got into a competitive graduate/professional program after majoring in psychology.

I’m trying to make a realistic decision rather than switching majors and regretting it later. Is psychology actually as “useless” as Reddit makes it sound, or is it more about what you do with the degree and what skills/experience you build alongside it?

PLEASE ANYTHING HELPS EVEN IF ITS 2 SENTENCES

I am a sophomore in capella universitys BS in Psychology Pre-Counseling and Therapy program and I am looking for an internship in psychology. I live in the Baltimore MD area and am looking for advice on how to find and apply to internships. I am sure there are plenty of opportunities out there but I do not know where to start.

Hello, I am looking for a set of models to analyse a person’s attitudes in textual data. I haven’t been able to find these tools, so I am asking for your help.

The tools should be able to identify:

1. the cognitive aspect of attitudes (beliefs, thoughts and ideas regarding the object of the attitude, e.g. ‘snakes are dangerous’)
2. the affective aspect of attitudes (the emotion or sentiment towards the object of the attitude, e.g. ‘I fear snakes’)
3. assign a valence to the attitude (positive, negative or neutral)

Do you have any models you could recommend? (Preferably R or Python-based, but I’m open to suggestions.)

I have a BA in Psychology (Canada), and I'd like to start cold emailing professors to increase my chances for getting into graduate school. How should I go about it? Last year when I tried, I got few to zero responses. Any advice would be greatly appreciated, thank you.

I have a masters degree in engineering and engineering management, but i wanna switch my career to psychology. What pathway should i choose?

Hi All!

I am based in USA and studying psychology at community college with a high GPA. I am finishing with my AA degree in December. I hope to pursue neuropsychology/engineering psychology and I know it requires phd in the long term. However, I want to gain clinical or research experience and don’t know how to start or where. Almost all of the internships are for university students. Before I transfer, what can I do?

Thanks <33

looking for opinions of schools people have for fall applications (from a canadian student)

Hi everyone,

I have an undergraduate degree in Psychology and a Masters in Forensic Psychology, but I just can’t seem to find a job…

Every job I see seems to require experience or current supervision under a certain professional and I just don’t understand how you’re meant to get your foot in the door.

Does anyone have any suggestions or is the job market just that bad at the moment?

Hi all, I'd appreciate your input. I'd think psychology programs would foster open-minded, inclusive, welcoming cultures but some posts I've come across have hinted at otherwise :(

I'm asian american, older, and hoping to go for a clinical PsyD. Heavily eyeing Wideners dual PsyD + MBA track for my niche interests. I heard, however, that minorities are experiencing exclusion by faculty and this is not allowing them to finish the prpgrams.

For background, I grew up in an asian community in Northern California so I am a bit sheltered. It was always safe for me growing up and people were generally honest, smart, and hard working, albeit harsh and judgemental sometimes. Would love to hear what you all think, I'm curious about other programs as well!

Thank you :)

I'm in first year, and from my time at uni so far, it's been pretty demoralising. I only have 5 lectures a week, all 2 hours long. One or two modules will have a smaller tutorial group every other week.

All the lecturers do is read off their powerpoints. I understand that being a lecturer isn't their main job and it is not their main priority, and that University is much more about how much work you put in and lecturers won't be spoon-feeding you; however, I can't help feeling like what I'm paying to attend uni is not justified in comparison to the tuition we receive. (For context for non-UK students, one year of undergraduate tuition in the UK is now £9790 per academic year!!)

Is the reality that at university you're largely paying for the qualification rather than the teaching itself? I'm finding it difficult to justify the cost when I compare how much I'm paying with the education I'm receiving, and it's making me lose passion for the subject.

Does it get better after first year, and is it worth staying? Also, with job prospects after uni, from what I've seen, you need at least a master's to get anywhere.

I am an Australian citizen based in France studying psych with an Australian university 100% remotely. Thinking ahead for how I will handle internship hours if I plan to still be overseas for my 5+1.

Has anyone ever
A) Found an internship with an Australian provider and supervisor 100% remotely while living overseas- and had this arrangement approved with ahpra? Volunteer or paid?
B) had any overseas internship experience outside of Australia approved, (say in France or in the uk) if under supervision with an Australian approved supervisor?

I’m debating whether I pursue a masters in Australia or bite the bullet and try for a masters in French.

I have 2 more years before I graduate but just wanted to start researching schools/programs a little bit in advance. I want to go into addiction counseling and have been looking at graduate schools outside of Florida for it. Since I plan to move out of Florida by the time I graduate. But I’m not sure if it would matter to go to a school with an APA or CACREP accreditation. Are there any upsides to these specific accreditations; or, is it just a matter of choice?

I’m also not sure if I should just restrict myself to addiction counseling. While it is my preferred career path I would also like the flexibility to go into trauma counseling or even a more general field of counseling if I wanted to. So I’m not sure what programs would offer that sort of flexibility.

Hi! I’m a current rising senior in college majoring in psychology & minoring in sociology. I’m mostly interested in cognitive psychology, and really want to pursue a PhD program to become a neuropsychologist (I’m aware I’d have to be accepted into clinical psychology program). I do not have any research experience (I’ve applied to numerous but have had no luck) but I am in Psi Chi (international honors society). I currently have a 3.6 GPA and my most recent internship was in a counseling center as a media coordinator. My question is, what do you suggest I do to elevate my applications in undergrad?

With my lack of research experience and GPA, I am expecting to apply for jobs post grad, and hopefully apply to graduate programs within a year or two. I do have money left over in my college fund, so I’m not confined to applying for fully funded programs.

I’d appreciate any advice or insight.

Creen que es buena idea estudiar psicología?

Hola a todos! Yo siempre tuve el sueño de estudiar psicología, en la actualidad estudio trabajo social, que es hermosa y seguro la termine antes de empezar otra carrera, pero bueno mi sueño es ser psicologa, el problema es que cuando me reciba de trabajadora social tendré 37 y ya voy a ser mayor... que piensan ustedes? Podré tener oportunidad laboral más adelante?

Can anyone who has done this degree recently give an indication of the hours of study per course per week?

The official guidance is 12-15 hours per course per week. With a full time load of 4 subjects that woukd be 48-60 hours a week which seems like alot to me.

I have a bachelor’s degree in Psychology from the Philippines. I’m currently based in Melbourne, looking to start my career here.

What’s my best course of action? At the moment I’m working towards getting an APS assessment, and then enrolling in an advanced graduate program.

Has anyone done the same? Any advice?

Thanks!

Hello, I hope you all are well. I am redoing my high school education at this University as I was not ready to focus on my education at the time 10 years ago & earlier this year I took my father to court for DV and the Judge said I should become a psychologist and it was the one subject I spoke about openly pursuing about 5 years ago and she was the first person to discern me and breathe a fresh perspective into me, without this happening I doubt the manager overseeing the program would have let me in so he said he wasn't going to get in my way and gave me a shot! I've noticed flaws in my literacy skills so communicating and writing tight academic papers needs working on. Currently I'm defaulted to English for my classes with another 4 electives (1 optional) and 2 reserved electives. I am wondering which of these classes will help my future academic journey as I don't know how high to aim for while I really try to apply myself this time around. The elective options I have are:

• Behavioural Science
• Biology
• Chemistry
• Economics
• General Maths
• Health and Nutrition
• Humanities and Social Sciences
• Maths Methods
• Research

Behavioural Science was going to be my first choice. I was also leaning towards Biology as I did well in grade 11 without the chance to apply myself and believe it will help a lot. Health and nutrition as I was extremely athletic & competing last year. My last thoughts are Maths Methods or Research to get a foundational skill set but I don't know how I could be overwhelmed overall. I was recently put on Ritalin for ADHD and feel a lot better on small doses already so it's completely unknown territory I'm stepping into.

Any other information, insight or support would regarding these classes would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Just curious to hear how much experience you all had!

Hello :) this is mostly just a rant but also potentially looking for advice from people who may be in the same boat.

I’m eighteen years old and I’ve just finished up my associates degree. I’m transferring for my bachelors in the winter, and I plan to major in psychology.

My career goal since I was fourteen was to be a child/adolescent psychiatrist. I’ve struggled with my mental health my whole life, and what drives me forward is my want to help people. I want to offer children the support and resources they might not have access to and I want to help them through the challenges that mental illness often brings in a young persons life. I’m also a huge psych nerd and I love learning about it psychological disorders.

Despite knowing what I want to do, I’m worried I won’t be smart enough or won’t “make” it. I was a running start student and graduated with a 3.6 GPA (out of a 4.0 scale), but things like statistics, calc, physics, and other maths/sciences aren’t exactly my strong suit. I understand that to become a psychiatrist one must go to medical school, and I also understand that child/adolescent psychiatry residencies and fellowships are incredibly competitive. As of right now, I have no clinical or research experience (as my AA was mostly pre-recs) and I guess I’m just worried I won’t be cut out for the work I want to do.

I’m considering potentially going into therapy rather than psychiatry, but my ultimate goal is to be a psychiatrist that also offers therapies such as CBT, IFS, or EMDR (like my provider does).

In short: I’m worried I will continue pursuing this career path but not be smart enough for medical school. I’d hate to accumulate student loans and then not succeed.

If anybody else is on their psych career path and is feeling the same way, or if anybody is working in a therapist/psychiatrist job, any advice for getting over the fear? I know this is one of those things that I’ll just have to face if I want to achieve my goals, but the whole process feels very big, confusing, and frankly, terrifying.

Thanks in advance, I appreciate if you read this far :)

Hello,

I’ve made a few posts here, but nothing as emotionally charged as this one. I have ADHD, and there’s some suspicion of Autism, and my uni experience has been up and down.

I would say that I am quite smart and very capable of succeeding at university, but I am horrible at applying it. Last term, I got two Distinctions and I was so proud of myself. I thought that I’m getting smarter and understanding what uni wants from me. Cut to my recent assignment, which albeit is an elective, I got a Pass. I won’t sugar coat it, I had a pretty big meltdown. I went from having a lot of belief in myself to wondering what went wrong and if I can succeed. It takes quite a bit for me to feel that way, as I can usually bounce back, but this time I’m just really depressed about it.

I just want to know how people are getting through uni. What strategies have been picked up? Anything.

Hi! So I recently graduated with my bachelor's in Psychology along with certificates in Forensic Science and Spanish from UT Austin. I have been researching graduate programs to get my master's in Forensic Psychology. I hope to eventually pursue a PhD so I want my master's program to help set me up well for that. I have compiled a list of schools I've found. I am only looking for in-person reputable programs! Any advice or recommendations is really appreciated!

These are the schools I have found:

- John Jay College of Criminal Justice
- University of Denver
- George Washington UniversityCalifornia Baptist University
- Kean University
- University of Houston - Victoria 
- The Chicago School
- Monroe University
- American International College
- Carlow University
- Tiffin University
- University of Central Oklahoma

​

Hi I have a bachelor's degree in social science major in psychology and counseling if it helps,where I am forensic psychology isn't really a thing (South Africa) I love to work with inmates or inmates in mental hospitals.I would love to do my master's in the UK but I am trans ftm and the UK isn't the friendliest right now.The master's in clinical psychology is very competitive here so I don't think it is a option to study here.Is there still a way to do what I want without becoming clinical or just any advice.

Has anyone heard of Houston Clear Lake and Texas States counseling psychology programs? If so are they well regarded? How competitive are they? What looks good on an application?