After my first year
as a psychology student, I found that there were many misconceptions about the
field. Chances are, you have heard about Sigmund Freud and his bold theories or
Pavlov and his famous conditioning experiments. Many of my fellow students imagined
me either sitting around discussing strange and abstract theories or
experimenting with rats. Some of my favorite psychology errors that I have been
asked so far have been:
"Can you read my mind?"
"Are
you able to psychoanalyze me?"
"Oh
now that you're in psychology you'll be able to figure out what's wrong with
me, right?"
To start off:
-Psychology
is the scientific study of behavior and mental
processes-
Over the course of
my schooling I expect to examine a few of the big myths that surround the field
of psychology. Today I am going to address the common misconception that all
psychologists are bespectacled, sit next to their client that is comfortably sprawled across a leather sofa, and talk
about feelings.
This is actually
very wrong! Clinical and counseling psychologists in the United States right
now actually only occupy less than 11% of all jobs held by psychologists (U.S.
Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2014). Here is a small overview of all of the other
kinds of psychologists that you may not know about! I do strongly suggest
researching on your own about these different occupations, especially if one
catches your interest!
