LEC12: How to get a Job

Where Psychology Graduated Work

• immediate Employment: a survey of 800 psychology alumni revealed that a large proportion secure employment prior to graduation or within 1-3 months of graduating.

• Roles without Postgraduate Study: Graduates enter diverse careers directly after their undergrad degree, including roles as Research Assistant, HR associates, client support consultants, case managers, policy officers and child safety officers.

• Postgrad pathways: Over hald surveyed graduates completed postgrad qualifications either in psychology or related field such as law, med, teaching and social work.

What Employers Look for and How Psychology Helps

• Top Transferable Skills: Research on employer requirements consistently highlights key ‘‘ soft skills’’ like written and verbal communication, problem-solving, teamwork, self-management, critical thinking, IT and learning how to learn.

• General Reasoning Boost: Research demonstrates that studying psychology significantly improves statistical, methodological and conditional reasoning skills - outperforming gains seen in law, med, chem.

Muggle vs Psychometric Thinking in daily life

• Observed Score vs True Score: Every measurement consist os a True Score plus Measurement Error.

• The Law of Large Numbers: Increasing the number of observations or survey questions reduces measurement error, bringing the evarge score closer to the true population value

• Regression to the mean: People often invent casual stories for natural, random variation. For e.g. flight instructors mistakenly believed criticism improved pilot performance, when in reality extreme performances simply regressed back toward the mean naturally.

• Correlation does not equal Causation: Correlations between 2 variables often result from reverse causation or even a third variable.

• Effective Learning strategy: Repeated retrieval practice and distributed practice yields far superior learning outcomes.

Evaluating Workplace Programs (Research Designs)

• Randomized Controlled Trials (RCT): Uses random assignment to compare outcomes against a control group; provides clear evidence of causation but can be expensive or impractical.

• Quasi-experiments: compares existing groups without random assignment .Practical but cannot prove causation with complete certainty.

• Quantitative Surveys: Collects score able rating data across larger, more representative samples.

• Qualitative Research: Focus groups, interviews focusing on gathering detailed stakeholder opinions through smaller and less representative samples.

Career Strategy and Interview Success

• proactive Problem Solving: When working on placements or projects, present employers with options and potential solutions rather than just identifying problems.

• Becoming an ‘ Instant Expert ‘ : Rapidly research new topics, prioritize systematic reviews, meta-analyses and highly cited papers.

• Interview preparation: Thoroughly analyze the job criteria and company strategic plan, practice answering potential question out loud or on video and turn past limitations into positive learning experiences.

• Pitching Course Skills: CVs can highlight concrete competencies in survey design (Qualtrics), statistical software (Jamovi, Excel), psychometric evaluation and research methodology.