 | A Bloated Minor: "Off-track" Psychology BA, BS Offer No Inroads into
Career World
source: http://www.fireflySun.com/news.html
NOTE: I am releasing this document because it has been brought to my
attention that it is being passed around administrators of higher
education, including in the last week alone, two University of
California presidents and the Board of Regents for the State of
Georgia.
This is the second in a series of reports expanding on each of the
points in my original 16-points memo. This report explores the value of
the baccalaureate (or bachelor's degree) in Psychology as a foundation
for post-collegiate employment.
Career opportunities for the holder of a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) or
Science (B.S.) in Psychology are more limited than those available to
graduates with comparable degrees in other (major) areas of study. It
is not uncommon to find psychology department web sites advertising
links labeled "Career Opportunities." I find these misleading. While
the vast majority of the jobs featured on these web sites are jobs for
which psychology majors are invited to apply, these are neither
psychologistic jobs nor do these employers restrict application to
graduates with a degree in Psychology. I mean, you can almost see the
stretchmarks, as psych profs attempt to impress upon their students
this oft-strained relationship between functions in the job description
and peripheral skills (e.g., critical thinking skills or research
design skills) arguably refined by plodding through the pile of loose
rock and rubble that is the psych curriculum. Compared to the
cornucopia of major-specific jobs for graduates with degrees in
marketing and biology, the jobs available to psychology graduates tend
to be universally available to graduates of all majors, including those
graduates for whom degrees in philosophy and english are widely
regarded as self-inflicted wounds. Contrary to the perceptions managed
by psych professors, the psychology major does not blaze a trail into a
labor market wilderness. The only labor market psychology BAs and BSs
will ever know is not open-ended, and the unfortunate, if not
unfriendly, fact about the BA or BS in Psychology is that he or she is
neither niched nor modular. To find any meaningful employment, they
will have to rely on qualities and decisions that have nothing to do
with the package of skills and knowledge they acquired in fulfillment
of requirements for their major. To phrase this another way, they will
have to set aside their persona as a psychology major and assert
themselves as individuals. Unfortunately, from time to time, the media
fosters the myth of psychology-related employment.
>From a career preparation standpoint (deferring the educational
shortfalls of the psych curriculum to another report), I recommend that
students choose a major meeting either one of the following
specifications:
Choose a major that will enable you to be a candidate for a wide range
of positions in the private sector, even if the major does not
automatically qualify you for preferential consideration. I would say
of such majors that they emphasize scope at the expense of
specificity.'
Conversely, choose a job-specific major that will enable you to
position yourself quite competitively with respect to a specific
industry or job function, even if that degree is relatively useless
outside this industry or function. Such "farm league" or "trade school"
majors accentuate specificity at the expense of scope.'
In keeping an eye to life after college, one should select a major that
offers either scope or specificity. Since each major can be evaluated
with respect to each of these criteria, I will opine that the
psychology major does not rate nearly high enough on either of these
two dimensions.
The problem with the design of the undergraduate psychology curriculum
is that training and evaluation considerations have been allowed to
contaminate educational objectives. Undergraduate psych majors are
given the training they need to compete for a place in a graduate
program in Psychology. There is far more pressure on the undergraduate
psychology major today than ever before to have published while an
undergraduate so as to compete for admission to doctoral programs,
where he or she will learn to -- what?! -- you guessed it -- publish!
So what's the problem with this? The problem is that undergraduate
psychology courses have become nothing more than pale imitations of
course work at the graduate level. The problem is that students are
socialized far too prematurely into academic and professional culture,
and those who choose not to go on for an advanced degree (or fail to
win a place in a doctoral program), are stuck with a useless
'education' too academic for the private sector and too procedural to
have offered anything substantive in the way of knowledge about the
human condition. That's right. Somewhere along the way (and by that I
mean every point along the way), psych profs forget to satisfy their
students' curiosities and provide them with something that can pass for
a package of relational knowledge/skills. Our departments of Psychology
have evolved into trade/vocational schools rather than traditional
bastions of 'higher' education. Psychology majors leave the table
hungry.
And some things are never taught. A psych major who manages to get
admitted to graduate school without having published at the
undergraduate level is at a tremendous disadvantage for building a
competitive CV. The graduate faculty assumes that, having been admitted
to a doctoral program, the student has picked up somewhere along the
way all the procedural knowledge with respect to publishing and
epistemology. When it begins to show they do not have the epistemology
of the field coursing through their veins (and this happens to a lot of
students who graduated from small liberal arts colleges with no
graduate faculty), they are treated as students who do not have the
'street smarts' to make it in this field. I remember my first driver's
lesson as a 16-year-old. My instructor was quite surprised I had not
illegally operated a vehicle at least once between the ages of 12 and
16. Most teens find a way to get behind the wheel before they are
legally of age to operate a vehicle. Everyone knows most teens consume
quite a lot of alcohol before they turn 18, let alone 21. Was it right
for my graduate faculty to assume all this insider knowledge of
academic culture from first-year graduate students? The more the burden
of professional training is placed on professors and students at the
undergraduate level, the less time there is for real education. The
original works of great thinkers (Freud, Jung) become more of an
impertinence, and students minds are closed before they are ever
opened.
Adding insult to injury, many advanced degree programs in Psychology do
not even require a Psychology B.A. or B.S. for admission. Many graduate
programs in psychology admit graduates with interdisciplinary majors or
graduates of alternative majors (philosophy, sociology, and in some
cases even business, engineering, marketing, or life science). While I
have not tapped psychology faculty for their opinions on this practice,
I imagine, based on my intimate understanding of their values, that
this practice is in keeping with their mission to win public
recognition as a science of social import and (clinical and practical)
application. Individuals with backgrounds in engineering boast a
double-appeal for psych profs on the selection committee, as such
applicants are likely to respect the growing emphasis on scientific
rigor and precision within the psychological community, and are likely
to publish research that finds its way on the national news wires
(e.g., "new cockpit design by human factors psychologist raises the
standard for aviation safety"). Such research represents a rising
standard for psychological researchers, seeking to upgrade the Science
Theater marquee that currently boasts "cutting up rats on foundation
grants." But from hanging around these psych folk, you get the distinct
impression that it's more than just the grant-grubbing self-promotion
of career-driven individuals with the souls of a company clerk
window-dressing a CV. It's also about expanding Psychology's sphere of
influence in the broader corporate and professional world, about
playing advisor or executive assistant to as many agencies as possible.
Admittedly, this might ultimately serve to widen the range of jobs for
which the B.A. and B.S. in Psychology is a fitting or dare I say
"preferred" applicant. But positioning Psychology as an ASP (third
party provider of services, to use an analogy) for other enterprises
and professions siphons resources (i.e., personnel, attention, journal
space) from psychology's namesake or signature subject: the human
condition or "psyche"). Human nature talk around the psych department
water cooler is at drought level, with a growing disinterest combined
with an uncanny aversion to risk and individual differences making the
psyche the 800 pound gorilla in the psych department. Even clinical
faculty have discovered creative ways to neglect the human condition,
allocating precious research and educational resources to vaunting
"peripheral concerns," where we find a UC-Denver professor declaring on
an APA listserv his intention to work professional ethics into the
Psych 101 curriculum. Psych 101! Imagine all these 18-year-old
innocents, awaiting with budding pristine curiosity their introduction
to the mysteries of criminal and abnormal behavior and to the meaning
and purpose of their dreams. As far as meals go, I cannot imagine how
the Psych 101 student can walk away from this table feeling not only
full, but that the food had any flavor. There's a course of illusions
served on overhead transparencies and garnished with a 5th grade
introduction to the structure of the eye, ear, and neuron. I have no
doubt the students will at least find this material more interesting
than the laundry list of mneumonics and significant moments in the
founding of the field, from the first laboratory to the first trade
journal. The Muller-Lyer and Moon illusions are, by this point in the
course, positively riveting after the parade of means and variances and
the oversimplified textbook renditions of the electromagnetic spectrum
and the sodium potassium pump that at least once (by my count) drew
contemptuous chortle from the seating sections reserved the (declared)
physics and biology majors. And while one might expect a chapter in
Personality psychology to be flavorful, these hopes are hardly buoyed
by a five-minute id, ego, and superego chased by a palate-cleansing
equal-time political salvo on the charlatan chauvinist culture-bound
case-studying Freud (proving that nothing has less personality than
Psych 101!). Unless we invest heavily in celluloid-preserving
technologies, we may lose the only mildly info-taining moment to the
60s wing of the Psych 101 archive: the Stanley Milgram obedience
experiment. A shame this would be, considering what its sudden
departure from the social psychology lecture would leave us with: the
equal-time (not to mention vicariously contrite) apology for Milgram's
ethics, followed by the reassurance that a meaningful social psychology
experiment (like Milgram's) would never happen again (proving that only
my bedroom doorstop has fewer uses than Psych 101). Fortunately, most
psychology professors have the presence of mind to resist the
temptation to assign the chapter titled "Psychology and the Law" or
"Legal Issues in Psychology." But before you heap helpings of praise on
the chef, bare in mind that this subject occupies the obscure posterior
of fewer living than defunct psychology textbooks now that the psych
textbook world discovered new content areas.
The tastefully-named "content areas" is actually a synonym for more
colorful (or off-color, depending on your viewpoint) terms depicting
the field's zombified fiefdoms. I am reminded by all those myths and
films treating vampirism as an contagious disease that many modern
communities make membership contingent on sacrificing one's soul (and
pledging to plunder the lifeblood of others). Such is the case with
psychology professors, whose nested allegiances to Science, University,
Psychology Department, and "content area" (and to their colleagues,
culture, conventions, and periodicals) leave little room for the kind
of independent thinking necessary for true scientific progress, adult
maturation, and individuation across one's true development as a
professional. As terms go, I prefer "gated (or planned) communities"
but will also accept terms like "lodge," "hive," "nation," "(closet)
denomination" and any term for adjoining lots in an industrial park.
All are preferable to the funereally-genteel "content area" with its
fits of mild manners and its embalming lines of demarcation.
Textbooks pander to more special interests than political candidates
and will hereafter be referred to collectively as "the teacher's
manual" even though the textbook itself comes with its own teacher's
manual and test bank. And while it's always exciting to be present at
the birth of a new caucus, I'd just as soon wait to see Human Factors
added to the ranks of the $120 sixth edition Myers hardchassis
(hereafter known as "Hummer H6"; please address all coupons, rebates,
donations, raffles, and financing info to "Wyatt Ehrenfels: P.O.
Box..."). But to make a long story short, lo and behold, the
gentleman-professor from UC-Denver wants to yield the floor to a
discussion of professional ethics. I'd be interested to learn what the
electorate thinks of that fine delicassy, but I suspect I haven't seen
such a public display of self-indulgence since the
actor-of-Pee-Wee-Herman-fame and the honorably-mentionable James Bond
films post producer Albert Broccoli, and won't again until Hollywood
producers place auto-erotic characters in feature roles (or until
Marvel comics debuts a superhero with superlative characteristics along
these lines). If you just survived this torrent of sardonic quips, you
should be congratulated. It is highly likely you understand my point:
that the development Psychology as a social institution and
professional community has outpaced the progress of Psychology as a
science (or conversely, that the progress of Psychology as a science
has lagged behind the social development of Psychology). If you venture
elsewhere on this web site, you are likely to find as a common
denominator in all these reports that the political and professional
aims of Psychology as a social institution/commununity is responsible
for sabotaging its science...hijacking it for purposes not indigenous
to its nature.
A Proper, Proportionate Role for Psychology Classes at the
Undergraduate Level
I would recommend an adjutant or subsidiary ("best supporting actor")
role for psychology, which is to say that psychology would serve you
more effectively as a minor supporting some related major. Drawing from
acquaintances across graduate schools, I suspect that most psychology
majors favored for admission to graduate school are actually not
interested in psychology per se but in the psychological aspects or
dimensions of some other domain (e.g., engineering, business, law,
justice, public health). Psychology does not really offer a true
education in the human condition anyway, and the courses are
extraordinarily redundant and dry. Therefore, I recommend a minor in
psychology (or perhaps a few courses that do not necessarily qualify as
a minor) in support of some other major or that allows you to
distinguish or (in the very least) differentiate yourself as a graduate
of some other major (with psychology playing species to your genus).
I have a Ph.D. in Social Psychology, and I have often been out of work
over the course of the past 5-year period, during which time I followed
up on applications with phone calls, learning that employers have a
vague impression of this construct called 'psychology.' In retrospect,
I regret not having pursued a major in biology, as (I learned too late
that) a life science degree would have opened up a wealth of careers
not available to me as a social psychologist. A psychology education
that satisfied or even whetted my curiosity about the human condition
would have vindicated my choice and saved me years of regret. But alas,
the psychology curriculum is dry, denuded, and redundant. It is grossly
un-psychologistic and since it became painfully clear to me that the
undergraduate curriculum amounted to nothing more than a watered-down
preparation for graduate school, I was left with little choice but to
finish what they started and subject myself to a more advanced weaning
(a less subtle form of indoctrination). The undergraduate program does
not know how to be anything but a pale imitation of graduate training
models and so it precipitously socializes its students into its
professional and academic cultures.
Psychology By the Numbers
According to the U.S. Department of Education, National Center for
Education Statistics, Office of Educational Research and Improvement
[NCES 98-071], 47% of Baccalaureate Recipients work outside the field;
work considered inside the field includes human services (30%),
educational (15%), and hospitals (9%). Between 1991 and 1994 (the only
span for which we have statistics), Psychology Baccalaureate Recipients
tied for last with education (and behind humanities) for the lowest
salary increase (6.3%). While 74% of survey participants reported that
their BA was important for attaining present position, only 51%
reported that their BA in Psychology was important (with 41% reporting
the Psychology degree as unimportant or not at all important). Ouch!
Granted, we can put a different spin on any statistic. Personally, I
feel compelled to apply the term critical minority to that 41%. If I
wanted to minimize it, I would note the proportion of the voting public
that cast a ballot for Walter Mondale in the 1984 Presidential Election
(41%). I believe that in retrospect, the surveyed individuals viewed
their coursework in statistics and research as unimportant.
The premature socialization of undergraduates into academic culture
(research) is a waste of time for the many ill-fated Baccalaureate
Recipients denied admission to graduate school (hereafter known as
"dead-enders" or "the living dead"). If you're present to witness the
face of the student as he learns his last outstanding application has
been rejected, you'd see that it's the face of someone who's just been
diagnosed with Stage IV cancer, of someone who's just learned their
degree is terminal. Learning you've been harboring this tumor for
three-to-four years is not something you recover from overnight. It's
as if you've been participating in a four-year longitudinal social
experiment in which you've been deceived, but not adequately debriefed.
Many psych majors are destined to learn suddenly that a graduate career
is not in their future and slowly that most of the labor market is
closed to them. This doesn't sit well with the 35% who also happened to
accumulate over $10,000 in education-related debt. The median annual
income for psychology dead-enders was fairly dismal (even by 1992
standards) at $20,000. (Incidentally, only 322 of 3,104 psychology
departments responded to an APA request for the names of its living
dead for the survey. And of the 11,000 plus names acquired, the APA
settled on a random sample of only 2,500, and of these, only 250
indicated a willingness to participate. I think we have a hidden
contract of repression among dead-enders, psychology departments, and
yes, even the APA, who waited until 1991 to perform the survey and 2002
to post any results).
It would appear to me that psychology is a bloated minor, and I would
encourage students with an interest in psychology to limiting
themselves to 2 or 3 courses that speak directly to their interests.
While I am certain that even these courses are likely to disappoint, I
am also certain that the pre-requisite structure is set up to keep you
from treating the psychology curriculum like a buffet line. The
academics, who want you to choose psychology as a major in exchange for
access to advanced coursework, would argue that without General or
Introductory psychology, you would not be able to understand the
material presented in Personality or Cognitive psychology. Nothing
could be further from the truth. Not only are the loadbearing concepts
of these courses reintroduced into the lecture of the advanced courses,
they are spelled out in their entirety all over again. They can also be
referenced in full in the textbook. Furthermore, they are not that
sophisticated as to prove opaque to the student of basic intelligence.
This is not like trying to master low-gravity fluid dynamics without a
basic grasp of calculus. (I've been searching for an aeronautics and
astronautics book that prepends its major chapters with a calculus
refresher, but alas...). But if bullied into an all-or-none decision
about the psychology major, I would select 'none' and opt for General
Studies, Interdisciplinary Studies, or some other major that combines
fascination with practical training like Physics. Even Philosophy
teaches you certain critical thinking and rhetorical skills you won't
find in Psychology. Psychology often claims the critical thinking skill
set, but I am calling its bluff. (Psychology faculty actually
discourage students from discovering, let alone, dissecting those
stages of the research methodology that allows discretion and divergent
thinking).
I have discovered a deep well of post-bacceleaureate disenchantment
among those dead-enders who once assumed there were psychology-related
positions in the private sector available to the graduate without an
advanced degree. Suddenly, they look back upon the psychology
curriculum with regret, recognizing all the pork that made the
curriculum (a) arid, (b) arbitrary, (c) redundant, and (d) more about
the field itself than about the field's subject matter. They wish they
could have limited their commitment to 1-2 psychology courses which
could serve an adjutant role in a larger package with more value from
both an education and career preparation criteria.
Now I feel psychology faculty have been somewhat disingenous in their
response to my challenge.
RESPONSE 1: "Although there isn't a Psychology Employment Universe
available to the BA, the entire Liberal Arts Employment Universe is
wide open for them."
ANSWER 1: The Liberal Arts Employment Universe is open to everyone.
That's the problem with your average universe.
RESPONSE 2: "I think perhaps they (students) see possible applications
in whatever field they eventually choose."
ANSWER 2: Seldom does the psychology major actively choose a field.
That's the problem with the major. Their education and/or training does
not provide them with a package of skills or knowledge that gives them
leverage over the universe of employment possibilities. Then they end
up working as a clerk in an insurance office, and the psychology
faculty continue to boast that there are applications even here, as if
anyone for whom psychology is a vocation should find comfort or relief
in this. Memo to psychology professors: the living dead are not looking
to you to help them rationalize their ill-fated choice of major. They
are, with my help, looking to you for some remorse and maybe a little
accountability. As a B.A. in Mathematics major, am I applying my
education when adding hours across columns on my timesheet?
One psychology professor on the TIPS (Teaching in Psychology) listserv
admits that the explanation flies mainly with those persons whose
reason for choosing Psychology as a major boils down to "you have to
major in something." I smell a new marketing strategy:
"Psychology...Because You have to Major in Something." Maybe we would
applaud truth in advertising among politicians if they distribute
campaign pins reading "[INSERT NAME HERE]: Because You Have to Vote for
Someone." Unlike elections, in which you do not have to vote, you do
have to select a major, even if it means selecting "none of the above"
(i.e., General Studies). And unlike the ballots one casts in
presidential elections, one's future is actually shaped by his or her
choice of major. Campaining for your tuition dollars, psychology
professors will continue to push Psych as the universal major because
their salary is dependent on a critical mass of students choosing to
major in Psychology. These students are often extorted into majoring in
the field by the prerequisite structure, such that a student cannot
enroll in Psych of Personality, for example, without signing on to
Intro Psych, the in-house Statistics course taught by psychology
faculty, the Research Design course, and so forth.
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