U.S. system of psychological training

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Firstly, before I start to discuss this post, I would like to thank Dr John Arden, Director of Training at Northern California Kaiser Permanente Medical Centers in America.  Over his short stay in Singapore in April, I managed to have access to him which allowed me to have this discussion about registration and licensing of psychologists in United States.

For the usual Singapore registration system, you will need to have a postgraduate degree, 1000 hours of supervised training, and to be a Full member of SPS, before you can register with Singapore Register of Psychologists (SRP).  This will take around 6 years of training, from the undergraduate level.

According to Dr Arden, in the U.S. system, it takes at least 11 years of training before one can go for the examination for licensure.  After the undergraduate and Master's degree, you will also require a PhD or PsyD.  The main difference between the PhD and PsyD is that the PhD tend to be more research-based, while the PsyD may tend to be more practice-focused.  These programs have to be APA-accredited, and are usually offered in the specialisation of clinical or counselling psychology.  One-year internships would be done within both the Master's and Phd/PsyD programs.  Another year of post-doc internship would then be done after the PhD or PsyD.  These 1-year internships would usually count for 1500 to 2000 hours of supervised practice, with 40 hours of supervised practice per week, inclusive of 4 hours of supervision and 2 hours of seminar or classes.  Only after the post-doc internship, you will be eligible for the EPPP.  For more information about the EPPP, please view here.  Once you pass the EPPP, you can be licensed as a practicing psychology in U.S.

Basically to practice in U.S., I would call these requirements the "3Es": Education, Experience, and Examination.  Once you have gone all these 3 parts and managed to pass all of them, you are then a licensed psychologist in United States.

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