Running head: EXAMINATION OF CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY

Examination of Clinical Psychology
University of Phoenix
PST/480
Karen Wilson
Nov 14, 2011

Examination of Clinical Psychology
Clinical psychology is a very important as well as popular part of the field of psychology that is used very often. To begin, a definition of clinical psychology will be included. According to APA (2009) “Clinical psychology attempts to use the principles of psychology to better understand, predict, and alleviate ‘intellectual, emotional, biological, psychological, social, and behavioral aspects of human functioning’” (Plante, 2011, p. 5). The following paper will first describe the history and evolving nature of clinical psychology. …show more content…

Research provides an avenue for exploration in clinical psychology and makes it possible to answer questions that need answering. Without research, there would be no answers to problems that individuals face and there would be no solutions to those problems. Research needs to be used to perfect current techniques and to also provide new or better alternatives for future techniques. Statistics are important in the field of clinical psychology because they give up to date, pertinent information regarding individuals and types of mental illness they may have. Statistics can also show what types of resources have been used to help those individuals, if they were helped at all. Statistics classifies information into groups and therefore psychologists can interpret that information for either further testing, or strictly to use as informational purposes. Statistical information provides probabilities and the validity of tests that have been performed to help psychologists use that information to apply it to his or her current situation. The use of statistics in any field can play a significant role in collecting information, and in the field of clinical psychology, it can be used to help many people. The last item to be discussed is the difference between clinical psychology and other mental health professions.
Clinical Psychology vs. Other Mental Health Professions Clinical psychology as mentioned earlier