Few Questions for Child Psychologist?

Question by Ptlomee: few questions for child psychologist?
Interview with a Child Psychologist

Questions:

-What influenced you to work with high-risk (psychological distress via substance abuse, promiscuity, antisocial behaviors, and physical violence) children? Were you interested in psychology as an adolescent?

-For how many years have you worked in this field?

-Would you mind sharing where you obtained your degree? Was there any other schooling or jobs that helped you on your way to becoming a psychologist?

What types of disorders do you work with? What do you see most often?

-How well do most of their patients do over the long term? Do most patients respond well to treatment? Have things improved over the years in mental health treatment? What things have gotten worse?

-Has anything potentially life threatening ever happened to you while analyzing a patient?

-It used to be said that most kids’ behavior problems could be traced to problems in the parents’ marriage. That’s an old style type of thinking. What do you think of that now

Best answer:

Answer by Larkspur
Well, because no one else is answering this, I thought I would share some of my thoughts.

Firstly, you might do better to direct your questions (which are excellent, by the way) to a clinical psychologist who specializes in child populations. I think the term ‘child psychologist’ is too broad, because not all child psychologists work with disordered children.

I am a Ph.D student in cognitive (experimental) psychology, so I will answer those questions that I feel I can (because no one else is). I have taken graduate courses in both clinical psychology and developmental psychology. Please disregard my answers if they’re not what you are looking for.

-Were you interested in psychology as an adolescent?

Yes, I became interested in psychology around age 14.

-For how many years have you worked in this field?

I have been studying psychology for eight years.

-Would you mind sharing where you obtained your degree? Was there any other schooling or jobs that helped you on your way to becoming a psychologist?

The University of South Florida is where I am currently enrolled. I believe an internship is an extremely important part of the degree for a clinical psychologist. Personally, I did two years of psychology research in college, and found that extremely helpful for graduate school. Research experience is vital for ANYONE in a psychology Ph.D program, including Clinical psychology.

-It used to be said that most kids’ behavior problems could be traced to problems in the parents’ marriage. That’s an old style type of thinking. What do you think of that now

I think that the parents’ relationship could affect the child if it affects the behavior of the parents toward the child. In no way would I say that “most” behavior problems could be traced to problems in the marriage. However, it’s obvious that a marriage on the rocks can have negative repercussions for the children- in the lack of a stable, supportive home environment. However, behavioral problems can be due to a myriad number of other things, including parental style, experiences at school (bullying, etc.), ADHD, infant attachment style to the mother and father, and others.

If you are asking these questions because you are considering a career in clinical psychology, I strongly recommend that you speak to the dean of a psychology program you are interested in. He or she would be more than willing to put you in contact with a faculty member who has likely had clinical (practitioner) experience and could answer these kinds of questions.

What do you think? Answer below!