Thinking Of Becoming A Mental Health Professional?
Clinical psychology, counseling psychology, counseling, clinical social work, marriage and family therapy - these are some of the choices before you if you want to be a mental health professional. What’s more, your graduate study could lead to a Ph.D., M.Ed., M.S.W, Psy.D - the options can be overwhelming.
Here’s the bottom line: to practice psychotherapy in Texas, you must be licensed by the state as a clinical social worker, a psychologist, a professional counselor, a marriage and family therapist, or a substance abuse counselor. In addition, those with a nursing background can become a psychiatric nurse.
The path to become a substance abuse counselor will not be elaborated here since that license can be earned via a vocational training program that does not require graduate school.
So how do these professional titles differ if they are all licensed to essentially do the same work?
We hope that the pages in this section will help you distinguish between the many paths toward becoming a psychotherapist. After beginning to research each of the possibilities, we encourage you to do an information interview with a professional from each field to gain some personal perspectives on the similarities and differences between the academic paths.