I learned in the talk that there is a variety of different type of works in the field of health psychology even though they all focused on studying environmental factors contributing to a person’s mental and physical health. One can work as a health professional by providing health-related information, recommending appropriate medical procedure based on the patient’s current situation. Or you can focus on a specific topic in the field of health psychology. For example, the guest speaker yesterday are doing research on how TBI can affect the chance for athletes’ to get mental disorders like anxiety disorder and depression. Also, the graduate student mentioned how his research by far focused on the health disparities in LGBTQ group. And he has been trying to publish his research online or other forms of media to educate people more about how health policies influence the health condition of LGBTQ group.
There are different kinds of health psychology program as well. Clinical and Non-clinical. One can study sociology, other branches of psychology, and many other majors as an undergraduate to be able to study in one of these health psychology programs. The experience of research and your personal ability are the most important things one needs to develop in order to work in the field of health psychology.
I was surprised to learn how fast the field of health psychology develops. Although it is a whole new field in the 1970s, it had become well-established by now. And I do feel there is an increasing demand for works from health psychology with a world changing at a fast pace toward a “not-so-healthy” direction.