Careers with an undergraduate degree in psychology

After graduating with a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology, you may decide to continue your education and earn a Master’s or Doctoral degree in Psychology or a related field.

With a B.A. in Psychology, you are also prepared to apply for jobs in a number of different areas.

The following resources will help you explore some career opportunities available with a B.A. or advanced degrees.

Career Center

We recommend students visit the career center throughout their time at the University of Mississippi and attend events sponsored by them. The Career Center is a free resource that can assist you to help determine the best type of career to pursue as well as help you search for, apply to jobs, successfully interview for jobs, and negotiate salaries once you have an offer. We also recommend students register with Handshake, which is the University’s job and internship search database. Here is the student’s guide for getting an account and here is a handout with helpful tips for students. We also recommend watching this video created by the Career Center regarding potential careers with a BA in psychology.

Potential careers in psychology

There are many potential careers you can pursue with an undergraduate degree in psychology (see the table below for some). There are also multiple websites and resources that can help you explore potential careers. Here are some:

• An Online Career-Exploration Resource for Psychology Majors (2016) by Drew C. Appleby (Indiana University—Purdue University Indianapolis).  This resource includes an “80-page student section consists of more than 2,400 hotlinks psychology majors can use to explore 300 careers they can prepare to enter that have been organized into 15 broad occupational categories to facilitate searching.”
• American Psychological Association’s facts about careers
• The U.S. Department of Labor: Occupational Outlook Handbook: Psychologists
• Assess your Employable Skills Self-Efficacy The authors of this questionnaire, Ciarocco and Strohmetz (2016) suggest that once you have taken the questionnaire and scored it, you can use the results “as the start of a personal professional development plan. Students could self-assess their strong and weak skills and then develop a long-term plan through curricular and experiential opportunities to develop weak skills. They could re-assess their skills set after they implement their professional development plan.” (p. 6).
• Career Decision Tree for Psychology majors (Dr. Retta E. Poe of Western Kentucky University, as modified by Hanover College)
• Dr. Margaret A. Lloyd, of Georgia Southern University, has established a website for the undergraduate psychology major. This site helps the student plan their time as an
  undergraduate and provides Career Options.
• Fifteen Careers in Psychology and Related Fields are described by Dr. Melissa J. Himelein of University of North Carolina at Asheville.
• Potential Careers in Psychology and Law has multiple subspecialties. See this webpage of the American Psychology-Law Society for more information about those specialties.
• Exploring Careers in Aging

Post baccalaureate Research Assistant Job Opportunities

Potential Careers with an Undergraduate Degree in Psychology (Table compiled from old website CareersInPsych)

How to prepare for a career