Psychology Applicants (2012 entry)

Hi, did your survey and discovered I'm in a dreadful state! (only joking.....self-defeating humour eh!) Anyway, very interesting. Do you publish the results overall as it would be nice to hear what the conclusions were.

My son is thinking of firming the Exeter clinical psychology course he has an offer for. It does sound a brilliant course and he's really keen on it. My only small and nagging doubt is whether it is too early to have plumbed for an applied direction in psychology. He does seem very clear and certain though that it is what he wants. Its just some psychology students said that they all thought they'd want to do clinical but had changed their minds while studying. What do you think as someone who has already been through a degree?

Lol thanks I don't publish them overall but if anyone wanted the overall results I could share them once I'm done with my write up?

That's great that he knows what he wants to do so early, so if he starts working on experience now it'll greatly boost his application and also help him deicide if he wants to do it as a career for definite. I'm not familiar with Exeter's course but is it actually titled clinical psychology? If so he still has to take certain core modules which everyone has to do to gain a psychology degree. This means that if he changes his mind he may be able to switch to forensic/occupational/applied if he wishes and if the uni offers it.

For example I went to uni on the applied psychology route but I am now just doing straight psychology (personal choice I didn't like the occupational modules). But at the end of first year I could have changed and went into any other route that my uni offered. It's better to start specific then you can go to general if he wishes to change his mind. The only problem is if he goes specific then wants to change to another specific course this might be hard as certain topics are usually needed before hand that he may not have studied the specific elements for.

It does all depend on the uni though so you'll have to look into if Exeter offers other routes and if so I can imagine it would be pretty flexible. Best of luck to him

Thanks that's great. Yes it is BPS credited and has all the usual units but they do more units on clinical, role play and an external placement. Its a new course this year as they've built a mood disorders centre on the site and have a tie up with the NHS etc. You also train as a 'well being counsellor' during the course which is a new position being developed in the NHS. Anyway, I'm sure there would be some flexibility as you say but |I'll check. Yes, I'd like to read the results if you have time later to post me a link!

Yeah I got the fake Bristol rejection, then an offer. Definitely not accepting it now!!

Is anyone else applying to Nottingham for Psychology and Cognitive Neuroscience? I just wondered if it'll be popular, preferably with nice people on the course... Pretty sure it'll be my firm, though I got really tempting offers from Sussex because I hear it's pretty (for straight Psychology) and Leicester ( Psy and Cogneuroscience) mainly because Leicester's closer...

Hmm same. I guess I don't mind them making me wait as long as I get an offer in the end. But aahh, the wait is killing me.

well thats depressing D:

Unfortunately that's not true. Check out unistats for example, you can see where the psych graduates from x uni end up. It's not pretty compared to most subjects, even when at a russell group uni for instance.

http://www.thecompleteuniversityguide.co.uk/careers/what-do-graduates-earn/

also, look at this^^

I have recieved the questionnaire now! Have you ? But the questions make me feel like I am repeating myself from my personal statement and I don't just want to tell them what they already know....

I wonder if this means I will be invited to the open dayy ...??

The only thing I would say looking at the chart is that these are entry level salaries for grads and life is long and careers complicated. I have a friend with an archeology degree who now earns a substantial amount working with governments worldwide advising them on developing archeology projects for tourism purposes. If you just looked at 'archeology' you might not want to do it on the stats. Look at the success of that Oxford Psychology company who developed all the psychometric tests for business... that was two people originally and they must be millionaires by now!

There are degrees with extremly clear pathways and earnings such as medicine. Apart from those though most of the rest can be as useful as you make them in life

Yeah but from just doing a psych degree (which too many people have in all honesty) you're not going to stand out to general employers, unless maybe you went to a really good uni and had great work experience. Employers have loads and loads of psych grads to choose from.
Plus if you want to start a psych business then you need to do postgrad anyway, and there's always a massive supply of people wanting to do postgrad in psych, so it's difficult to get a place.

The archaeology story is anecdotal, and that degree is far less popular and oversubscribed than psych.

True anedoctal is all I have... I'm just using a real life example to say that stats do not tell the whole story. The degree you do can be less important in some ways than the person you are. People with drive, imagination and ambition can generally achieve highly whatever degree they took. Others, relying on 'stats', the 'good' university and tables that tell them that they are bound to get employment can often fall by the wayside. Just my experience to date. Obviously I'm with you though on the fact that doing some background research into all this is important and may even lead you to discover some degree you've overlooked which may be perfect.

No, I agree with what you're saying, and it's true in some ways, but you could not do a degree at all and go far with hard work.
But in these economic conditions, and times where a degree is something many have, a psychology degree is not the degree that's most likely to take you where you want to be.

It's sad-it really, really is, I love areas in the subject, but what's more sad is people who do the degree (choosing it frivolously or because they want a career in it) and don't get anywhere, and end up working in retail even if they have it from a good uni with a good result;and they're paying now £9000 a year for it. It can be like this for anyone who does any degree, however, especially for the massively over-subscribed area of psychology in which 15000~apply per year (for many years now).

If you do want to go into the field it's difficult as departments are filled easily, work experience is difficult to find, generally massive competition and if you don't, then your degree is honestly not that special to employers at all, it's a ten a penny degree. And the public perception of the subject isn't great. It's not well 'respected'.

To quote GodspeedGehenna, university is an investment. It's sad when you know a person who gets a first in psy from a RG uni and ends up working in admin there for many years as they can't find a way into their desired area of psy. My anecdotal story

Ok. Feeling worried now

Look don't worry. I was exactly the same last year. Don't worry about it. But that's good in a way-you have to be realistic about a degree and it's progress, there's no point ignoring the facts or you'll regret it later.

I'd advise you to seriously look at what you want to do-get as much experience, talk to as many people as you can about how they think about what they do in psy. Also ask about job prospects (that's what I did). I wouldn't ask your psy teacher though ha. Get in touch with your local hospital maybe.

Also use unistats to find the exact prospects for your course at your unis. Really great site. Also check out the UCAS data tables.

On the other hand I must say-if you don't get places with psy, remember you can do a masters in something different most of the time after your BSc, which is useful. More money though.

It's difficult to really know, but if you do like psy enough and you don't have any real interest in anything else then stick with it. At the end of the day you have to be happy with what you're doing. Uni choices are a lot of pressure, but don't worry. You have all the time in the world. Well, nearly. I changed my course on UCAS during my A2 exams, universities don't mind. Hell, you could even start psy and change after a month if you found something else or even after a year. I know someone who started a course, changed, then went back again!

Basically, just consider those things and facts. If you're still happy, stick with it. If you're at uni and you want to change, you can. I just feel it's better knowing the stats and facts before you spend loads on a not so worthwhile degree (imho). I was just like everyone else, 'im gonna be a forensic psychologist, everythings gonna be awesome' until I read posts on this site, which led me to facts and great knowledge in which helped me realise it would never be that easy-especially in the increasingly difficult world of employment in psychology-and in general.

Yeah but from just doing a psych degree (which too many people have in all honesty) you're not going to stand out to general employers, unless maybe you went to a really good uni and had great work experience. Employers have loads and loads of psych grads to choose from.
Plus if you want to start a psych business then you need to do postgrad anyway, and there's always a massive supply of people wanting to do postgrad in psych, so it's difficult to get a place.

The archaeology story is anecdotal, and that degree is far less popular and oversubscribed than psych.

obviously you need to make yourself stand out,
surely thats the same for all degrees though?

But loads of people have psych degrees in comparison to most other degrees (apart from law), so post-grad is difficult to get in psy. And would a general non-psy employer choose a psy graduate over a law one? honestly, I doubt it.

But loads of people have psych degrees in comparison to most other degrees (apart from law), so post-grad is difficult to get in psy. And would a general non-psy employer choose a psy graduate over a law one? honestly, I doubt it.

ah I get you, well I plan on going into a psychology specific job so it's not too bad, I already have work experience I can do over summer/in my first year of study then I'm going to either do the MSci at Birmingham or the year in industry at Leeds and so hopefully that and whatever else I do thats psychology related and a strong 2:1 or first will mean I get onto a postgrad