What makes a psychologist’s approach to helping people different?
It is a day in February, 2000 and I am sitting in the Sir John Clancy Auditorium at the University of New South Wales with approximately 400 first year students. It is the first class of Psychology 1A and the lecturer poses a question. It was a long time ago and my memory is slightly foggy, however the question went something along the lines of;
“If all humans need to understand psychology in order to navigate and survive the world, what is the difference between a psychologist’s approach to understanding people and every other person’s approach?”
Little did I know that that lecturer’s question would pop into my mind on a regular basis for the following two decades. As is implied in this lecturer’s question, psychology is a field that many people feel they have skills in and this can sometimes lead to the devaluation of formal psychological training.
I see this in the new organisations that are springing up, seemingly every day, to assist people with their mental health, run by people with no or very little training. Don’t get me wrong. I am in full support of more services becoming available for people to improve their mental health. There is also benefit in taking mental health services out of the clinical setting in some circumstances. However, when untrained people provide advice or assistance for mental health issues, there is a danger that they are doing a disservice to the people they are trying to help.
As my lecturer went on to explain that day in February 2000, there are significant differences between what a psychologist does and how we generally interact with each other on a day-to-day basis.
We are held accountable for drawing upon the science.
Perhaps the biggest differentiator of the psychologist’s approach for understanding human behaviour is our commitment to using the scientific method. While most people have the capacity to observe and understand human behaviour, research has demonstrated that we are inherently biased in our perceptions. These biases are, in part, due to a cognitive process that neuroscientists term “top down processing”. This means that we draw heavily upon memories and past experiences when assessing new information presented to us. This makes our perceptions of current information biased by our own individual past experiences.
To ensure that a psychologist’s assessment of human behaviour and the advice they are providing is as free from these biases as possible, a very large emphasis is placed on, understanding and subscribing to the scientific method, during our training. This means that we are taught to assess information based on the scientific evidence that is available rather than on our personal opinion or preference. This is an approach that is constantly reinforced throughout our training and continues to be reinforced throughout our careers through supervision, professional development and the requirements of our registration.
We are taught how to relate in a structured, therapeutic way.
So much of what a psychologist does is about relating with other humans, which many people see as an everyday, every person skill. What a psychologist does, does involve showing empathy and providing validation to others, things that many non-trained people are also good at. But it also involves a whole lot more than that. It involves providing education on how our minds work. It means asking the right questions at the right time and in the right way. It requires knowing how to balance validation with challenging. It involves knowing which intervention to pick for which person and at what time. It means being relatable to many, many different types of people of different ages, genders, ethnicities and socioeconomic backgrounds. It also requires doing all this on a consistent basis with people over a long period of time, while being flexible enough to adapt to their changing needs.
These are skills that are learned and developed through extensive training. They come more naturally to some people than others, but even those who have a natural affinity with people, need to be taught how to use these skills in a way that is most likely to benefit their clients. We are also required to continuously reflect on how well we are using these skills, throughout our careers. Psychologists have ongoing supervision requirements, which largely focus on whether we are continuing to relate to our clients in a therapeutic way. This process is protective of our clients because it is designed to ensure we are continuing to deliver therapy in a way that is most beneficial for them.
We are not allowed to sell you false promises.
Remember Rob the Dentist, circa 1984? That dentist whose face could not be shown in the toothbrush commercial because of restrictions on advertising health services? Well, those restrictions still exist. Psychologists, as well as many other health professionals, are required to adhere to strict advertising standards. These standards include not promoting services that have not been proven to work, not implying that a particular intervention will be effective for everybody and not describing a positive outcome that a past individual client has gotten from a health service. These standards are in place to ensure that the general public are not given the false impression that our services are guaranteed to work for them. These standards also mean that the messages you will see in advertising for a health professional are likely to be far less positive and persuasive about the chances of success than advertising messages from non-health professionals. A good rule of thumb to follow when looking at advertising for mental health services is “if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is”!
These differences in approach lead me to urge you to check out the qualifications of the person or people you are looking to turn to for help with your mental health. Clinical interventions are not always necessary for all people, however to make sure that you get the best help for your time and money, ensuring that your service provider has some form of clinical training, is beneficial. The Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) have a service available on their website where you can check the registration status and qualifications of your health professional. Follow the link here if there is a professional whose qualifications you would like to check out: https://www.ahpra.gov.au/Registration/Registers-of-Practitioners.aspx