Aspiring Applicants
Some useful resources for aspiring applicants
Notes and Tips on Applications for Clinical Psychology Training – Yorkshire and Humber Region
Below are some thoughts about the application and interview process collated from the Leeds, Sheffield, and Hull course staff. They are not exhaustive or prescriptive. For the application you will need to be selective about what you address due to the limits on space. Interview questions tap into these areas, focusing on your experience, reflection and learning rather than just ‘what you know’.
Play to your strengths, aim to show your potential.
We want:
• People who are strong academically, who can be curious, critical, constructive, persuasive, engage in complex discussions, synthesise, and articulate ideas.
• People who are strong clinically, who can build alliances, manage uncertainty, collaborate, adapt, deal with ruptures, and communicate at a lot of different levels.
• People who are strong professionally and personally, who engage in reflection, develop resilience and sensitivity, maintain high standards, seek to know themselves, engage in thinking about power, language, values, complexity and ultimately making a difference to those in distress.
Some thoughts about the process overall
• Read the websites of the Programmes that you are applying to; check all their admissions information, some of it may really help your application and interviews (for example, shortlisting criteria on webpages). Also have a look at the research interests of the programme team, see if there are topics that interest you for research.
• Start early, brief your referees, update them with what you are putting in the form.
• Add all required academic transcripts, proof of graduate basis for chartership etc.
• Think about presentation – introduce some structure, headings, avoid long blocks of text.
Thorough checks for spelling, punctuation, and grammar
• Watch out for over-inclusion of ‘the right phrases/words’ from other sources – it can look like you are forcing words in.
• Do answer the questions.
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- Put only the right information (in the correct order) in each section.
- The question for the main section is about how your experiences make you a better candidate for training – focus on your learning and development rather than detail of the experiences; what you have learned rather than what you have done.
- Make sure there are no gaps in your experiences (or use the later section to explain them).
• Think about the competencies of the programmes that you are applying for – what have you done/learned that makes you look like you will be successful on the programme.
• At the interview really answer the question posed, not the one you wanted to be asked!
• Prepare some information that you might be asked about beforehand, about a piece of research and some clinical work for example but be prepared to talk about it in a new way.
• Try and manage your anxiety – all the Programmes want to see you at your best, so give yourself the best chance by doing whatever helps you manage your nerves; take your time, rest well before hand, ask for the question to be repeated, get some fresh air in between tasks etc.
Application Tips
• Be sure on why you want to be a clinical psychologist. For example, demonstrate your understanding of the job role.
• Not all relevant experience needs to have come from your educational or professional life.
For example, you may be in a carer position for a relative who has struggled with their mental health.
• When speaking about your experiences, don’t just list them – explain how they are relevant to the application.
• Consider who you are as a person and your lived experiences – how could these attributes and experiences strengthen you as a psychologist?
• When referring to other people you may have worked with or supported within your application, be mindful of confidentiality and respectful towards them and their lived experiences.
• Demonstrate your wider reading and understanding of the wider context.
• Remember to check your grammar and spelling – if you’re unable to this yourself, get someone to support you with this.
Interview Tips
• Practice presenting ahead of time – you may be asked to share your thoughts on a topic.
• If you’re asked to share something about yourself, link it back to psychology where possible.
• Practice honestly sharing your thoughts and opinions about psychology concepts.
• Research into psychology – what new trends or developments interest you.
• Demonstrate how your wider interests can be a strength in a psychological context.
• Reflect on your personal strengths and weaknesses – what have you learnt from these.
• Don’t be afraid to ask for clarification or have something repeated.
• Take your time to process the questions – this shouldn’t be seen as hesitation but as
thoughtful processing.
• Present yourself in a professional manner.
Experience and academic ability
What selection staff want to know about applicants
Do you demonstrate that you can comprehend and discuss complex ideas in an understandable manner?
• Do you have relevant experience that differs from the average applicant (e.g., having overseas experience; submission of articles; charitable work)?
• Are you bringing something different to the profession?
• More people have good clinical experience than they have good research experience – you need to have both (even if the latter is from research aspects of clinical experience rather than formal ‘research’ roles).
• If you have completed higher degrees (PGDip, MSc, PhD), what has this taught you and what you will bring to the course? Knowing about all the stages of research/evaluation from conception and design through to writing and presenting is all good preparation.
• Critical appraisal is a key skill in looking at theory and application as well as social issues and research – how have you done this in relation to your work and wider issues that affect it, what have you learned from doing this?
• Don’t underestimate the value of everyday evaluation – how have you examined your ‘day-to-day’ work using outcome measures or other ways of working out if/how you are making a difference?
• Be curious – about people, their distress, their recovery, about how they and you can make sense of their lives, and about how theory and research evidence can help you do this.
• How have you used theory and models– applying it flexibly and creatively?
• Think about all the other roles that are additional to therapy, consultation in teams, complex assessments, team formulation, skills groups, teaching and training others.
• Be careful about overclaiming autonomy, it only needs to be appropriate for the stage that you are at.
Reflection
Describing experience and skills is necessary to demonstrate some aspects of the information that is required, but it is also important to reflect on your experiences and demonstrate learning from these. Has it made a difference to you/changed you in a better way?
• Don’t just describe a situation, talk about what you might have done differently in hindsight, and what it has meant for you/your clients/your learning.
• How have you been able to build relationships, manage ruptures and facilitate change?
• What has helped your development? Who or what have you learned most from? How have you been influenced by others in your professional journey?
• What difference has supervision made to you – and to what you do?
• What have you found challenging, what did you do about it and/or learn from it?
• There’s potentially lots of strength in talking about your identity and how this fits with those around you (similarities and differences) – again what has this taught you (about you, communities and wider society)? How can you/should you use this?
Values
Think about what attributes and values you would like to see in a clinical psychologist working with yourself, a friend or family member, think about how you can show the reader/interviewer how you represent these and what your key values are.
• Showing a passion about psychology and the helping profession - not from an outsider looking in with interest perspective, but a more compassionate approach to understanding and facilitating social justice.
• Enthusiasm for the profession (e.g., evidence of having engaged in psychological activities, promotion of the profession).
• Using respectful language, not pejorative or judgemental terms.
• How have you balanced the ‘expertise’ that you have developed with the ‘expertise’ that service users, families and carers have – consultation, co- production, collaboration.
• Show your awareness of wider social, political, ethical, economic, and cultural issues (including, but not limited to, published literature and professional and practice guidelines etc.) – how they affect you and the people you work with – and anything done to address these.
• Empathy - do your responses to the questions demonstrate an emphatic approach to stepping in the shoes of other people and their emotions / lived experiences.
• Talking about ambitions – about the sorts of difference you want to make (as a psychologist and in wider roles) can work well.
Authenticity
Make it real – use examples to illustrate your points/answers; draw on a real-life experience, some clinical work you have done, supervision you have experienced, research you are aware of, a working environment you have been in, etc.
• Be yourself! You will come with a wealth of knowledge and experience; we want to hear and know all about it.
• Honesty – not to inflate limited knowledge to make it appear much more than it is.
• Having a sense of who you are from the application form – rather than standard ideas or responses.
• What have you done to become more aware of your ‘self’?
Resilience
Can you manage the demands of a challenging course at this moment in your life? For example, if you speak about only just surviving undergraduate, it makes me reflect on the transition to post graduate and the professional role.
• Evidence of stamina and endurance to complicate a challenging course (e.g., having worked alongside studies).
• There’s potentially lots of strength in talking about your experiences of distress/adversity, your own and those close to you – what has this taught you (e.g., what works for you and for others) and how can you/should you use this?
• What can you say about your resilience and the things that have shaped it?