Graduate students in clinical psychology who are applying for advanced training at the pre- and postdoctoral levels often erroneously assume that downplaying one's own limitations, treatment failures, and narcissistic injuries is advantageous to their chances of being accepted. This paper demonstrates an alternative point of view that emphasizes the attractiveness of candidates who are able to articulate their struggles, ambivalences, and challenges in their early clinical work with patients.

1. James Tobin, Ph.D.
Licensed Psychologist PSY 22074
220 Newport Center Drive, Suite 1
Newport Beach, CA 92660
www.jamestobinphd.com
Assistant Professor of Clinical Psychology
949-338-4388
Argosy University
601 South Lewis Street
Orange, CA 92868
1

2. Heated Competition for Positions:
Supply vs. Demand
The number of sites participating in
the APPIC internship match is not
keeping pace with the number of
applicants.
(Bangen et al., 2010; Ginkel et al., 2010;
Stedman, 2007).
2

3. Heated Competition for Positions:
Supply vs. Demand
Most graduate students find the application process
stressful and anxiety-provoking.
Failure to match has a profound negative
impact on graduate students.
3

4. Do Students Feel Prepared
for the Application Process?
Unfortunately, the answer is No!
The literature indicates that, in
general, applicants tend to believe that
their graduate training does not
prepare them well for the application
process.
The most popular book that students use is “Internship in
Psychology: The APAGS Workbook for Writing
Successful Applications and Finding the Right Match”
(Williams - Nickelson & Prinstein, 2004).
4

5. Personal Essays and the Interview
Essay writing and interview preparation (Madson et
al., 2007) are the most commonly cited components of the
application process for which students do not feel prepared.
In a survey of 674 graduate students, Bangen et al.
(2010) found that essay writing strategies were not
emphasized by doctoral programs in preparing their
students for internship and postdoctoral positions.
5

6. What Are Internship and Postdoctoral
Training Sites Actually Looking for in
Applicants?
 Rodolfa et al. (1999) surveyed 402 internship sites and found
the following:
1- fit between applicant goals and site
characteristics
2- clinical experience
3- completion of coursework
4 - the interview (e.g., interpersonal/relational
competence)
5 - APA status of doctoral program
6 - completion of comprehensive exam
7 - professional demeanor of applicant
8 - quality of recommendation letters
6

7. What Are Internship and Postdoctoral
Training Sites Actually Looking for in
Applicants?
More recently, Ginkel et al. (2010) surveyed 610
internship sites and found the following:
1- fit between applicant goals and site
offerings
2 - the interview
3 - professional demeanor of the
applicant
7

8. What Are Internship and Postdoctoral
Training Sites Actually Looking for in
Applicants?
Ginkel et al.’s (2010) conclusion: “… personality characteristics
of the applicant might be the deciding factor that separates them
from their peers in the search for increasingly limited internship site
placements” (p. 217-218).
Ginkel and colleagues suggested that training directors
can support applicants with “practice interviews” and
“additional consideration of essay materials” (p. 218).
8

9. An Issue of Emphasis
Students, and their directors of clinical training, seem to
be emphasizing certain components of the application
(e.g., number of clinical hours) at the expense of factors
that are actually more important, such as personal essays
and the interview (Bangen et
al., 2010), i.e., specifically, the personal
demeanor/character of the applicant.
9

10. 10

11. The Personal Essay
Example #1: Currently, I am finishing up my doctorate in
psychology at xxxxx. I completed over 750 hours of
diagnostic practicum at xxxx. I completed 12
psychological test batteries including projective and
objective measures of personality, etc.
Example #2: I have always been interested in
psychology, and my passion for clinical
psychology has been consistently growing
since I was an adolescent.
11

12. The Interview Question:
Tell Me About Yourself
Example #3: I grew up in Ohio and moved to
California during high school when my father took
a promotion. I have two younger sisters, and an
older brother. I enjoy playing the piano, and I have
done community service work in Haiti teaching
children language skills. I like to help people.
12

13. Describe Your Theoretical
Orientation
Example #4: I think of myself as integrative.
Each theoretical orientation has something
important to offer, and I can draw from the
best of each to give my client the most
optimal pathways to change.
13

14. Describe Cross-Cultural Issues as
They Relate to Your Clinical Work
Example #5: When working with a client, the
clinician must understand the cultural
factors of the client’s ethnic group and
realize that the client may have a different
worldview than the clinician. These cultural
factors need to be attended to so that the
client feels empathized with and understood.
14

15. Tell Me about a Clinical Case
Example #6: John was a 17-year-old
depressed boy who I saw in a residential
setting for drug and alcohol abuse. I used
CBT and relapse prevention techniques to
address his marijuana addiction and
family stressors he presented with. I also
had the opportunity to run a group that he
was in, so I was able to follow him in two
different therapeutic modalities. The case
went very well.
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16. 16

17. “A Word of Caution”
“A word of caution: Candidates should be honest.
Sometimes anxiety about not getting an internship
offer will tempt an applicant to tell the site what it
wants to hear. Selection committees eye with
suspicion the applicant who claims that their training
site is perfect given his or her career goals, yet nothing
in his or her previous work or practicum experience
confirms this stated interest” (Mitchell, 1996, p. 91).
17

18. Instead of Telling Site Representatives What You Think
They Want to Hear, Try Being Real!
I call these “the realities of our field”:
Tension, challenge, struggle
Relational strengths and limitations
Uncertainty/discovery
Perseverance with ongoing self-doubt/concern about the
efficacy of your efforts
Making mistakes (the capacity to learn)
Being rigid or biased (i.e., the film “Jaws!”)
18

19. Do Something, Anything Other than the
Status Quo; For Example ...
Example #7: Cross-cultural awareness and its role
in the therapeutic process have been
emphasized in my training. But to be honest, I
am not certain I have been as sensitive as I
would have liked to these issues in my clinical
work thus far. I am not even sure if I know how
to recognize stereotypes and prejudices I may
hold toward particular clients, as they are often
not obvious but emerge only later, when it’s
usually too late.
19

20. The Professional Socialization
of Graduate Students in Clinical Psychology
 The literature on psychotherapists-in-training
describes a tendency on the part of many
clinical psychology graduate students to
foreclose on opportunities for selfdisclosure and self-exposure (Pound, 2012).
 This occurs in numerous contexts, especially in
those that are highly evaluative.
20

21. The Field Seems to Value the Use of the Self
(At Least in the Abstract)
Beyond knowledge- and skill-based
approaches to supervision, there has been
growing attention toward encouraging the
supervisee’s self-awareness and ability to
understand and use the self in the clinical
situation (Ladany, 2007, p. 393).
21

22. The Field Seems to Value the Use of the Self
(At Least in the Abstract)
Experts in the areas of critical thinking have
begun to highlight meta-cognitive abilities
(Fauth et al., 2007; Halpern, 2003; Yanchar et
al., 2008) such as reflective
skepticism, independence of
thought, awareness of personal bias, capacity
to learn from consequences of actions, and
intellectual humility, in addition to the more
declarative-based knowledge pertaining to
scientific theory and research methodology.
22

23. Yet the Student’s Use of the Self is Not As
Supported As We Would Like to Think
 Students have been trained to, or believe they
should, never write “I” statements in papers.
 There is a focus on “what the professor (or
supervisor) wants.”
 Many graduate programs consist of cultures in
which compliance, deference, and common
forms of social etiquette (kindness, compliance
not being “a problem,” etc.) are emphasized and
rewarded.
23

24. Given these Circumstances, It is No Wonder
That the Stage is Set for....
 What Olin-Hrbek (2012) has called
“self-in-role” personas marked by
the student fearing the rejection of
vulnerable core elements of his or her
identity if these are shared/exposed.
24

25. “Self-in-Role Persona” // Winnicott’s False
Self
 Or, Winnicott’s (1969) false self: “going on
being” (the free spontaneous expression of the
child’s subjectivity) is interrupted by
impingements.
25

26. 26

27. Pedagogically, What is Lacking
in Clinical Training?
 The traditional vision of clinical psychology training is
that students move from mastery of descriptive
knowledge to more sophisticated capacities
including critical analysis, use of selfexperience, and the ability to generate unique
theoretical views and new knowledge
(e.g., Lehmann, 1963).
 Yet, no clear explication exists as to how to
support or evaluate the occurrence of this
transition.
27

28. Pedagogically, What is Lacking
in Clinical Training?
 Good science, like good literature, depends on a
unique voice that challenges what has formerly
been assumed.
28

29. Pedagogically, What is Lacking
in Clinical Training?
 This is dispositional as much as, or even more
than, it is intellectual.
 It emanates from a position of skepticism and the
acknowledgement of a discrepancy between selfexperience and what is commonly assumed
(“subversion”).
 The literature on critical thinking has talked about
dispositional and attitudinal components of the
construct (e.g., Ennis, 1987; Halpern, 2003; Taube,
1995).
29

30. 30

31. 10 Meta-Skills for Clinical Psychology Training:
The Capacity to Subvert
 These meta-skills were developed based on
anecdotal clinical and supervisory evidence, as
well as my survey of the educational and clinical
psychology training literatures.
 I have arranged these meta-skills into a rubric
which I use for my own teaching and
supervision, and to offer feedback on application
essays and mock interviews.
31

32. Meta-Skill #8
#8: Challenges or refutes commonly-held suppositions
or assumptions; seeks to meaningfully identify the
shortcomings of consensus viewpoints or dogmatic
“party-line” thinking.
Example: It is generally believed that the quality of
the therapeutic alliance is associated with
treatment outcome. Yet, paradoxically, it has
been my experience that for some patients, at
certain times, what appears to be most
beneficial in their treatment is a break-down or
fracture of the alliance.
32

33. Conclusion
 From the start of training, faculty and
supervisors must work to accept and support
students’ personal experience and their
emerging professional voices.
 Graduate school cultures must value skeptical
and subversive thinking (i.e., subversion that is
not merely rebellious but, rather, is rooted in
actual subjective experience) and find a way to
pragmatically incorporate the evaluation of this
capacity in academic curriculums.
33

34. Essay and Interview Support for Pre- and
Postdoctoral Training Positions:
An Application Prep Service
34

35. References
 Bangen, K.L., VanderVeen, J.W., Veilleux, J.C., Kamen, C
., & Klonoff, E.A. (2010). The graduate student viewpoint
on internship preparedness: A 2008 council of university
directors of clinical psychology student survey. Training
and Education in Professional Psychology, 4, 219-226.
 Ennis, R.H. (1987). A taxonomy of critical thinking
dispositions and abilities. In J.B. Baron & R.J. Sternberg
(Ed.), Teaching thinking skills: Theory and practice (pp. 926). New York: W.H. Freeman/Times Books/Henry Holt &
Co.
35

36. References
 Fauth, J., Gates, S., Vinca, M.A., Boles, S., & Hayes, J.A.
(2007). Big ideas for psychotherapy training.
Psychotherapy:
Theory, Research, Practice, Training, 44, 384-391.
 Ginkel, R.W., Davis, S.E., & Michael, P.G. (2010). An
examination of inclusion and exclusion criteria in the
predoctoral internship selection process. Training and
Education in Professional Psychology, 4, 213-218.
 Halpern, D.F. (2003). Thought & knowledge: An
introduction to critical thinking (4th Ed). Mahwah, NJ:
Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
36

37. References
Ladany, N.C. (2007). Does psychotherapy training
matter? Maybe not. Psychotherapy:
Theory, Research, Practice, Training, 44, 392-396.
Lehmann, I.J. (1963). Changes in critical
thinking, attitudes, and values from freshman to senior
years. Journal of Educational Psychology, 54, 305-315.
Madson, M.B., Aten, J.D., & Leach, M.M. (2007, August).
Applying for the predoctoral internship: Training program
strategies to help students prepare. Poster session
presented at annual meeting of the American Psychological
37
Association, San Francisco, CA.

38. References
Mitchell, S. L. (1996). Getting a foot in the door: The
written internship application. Professional Psychology:
Research and Practice, 27, 90-92.
Olin-Hrbek, D. (2012). False self manifestations of
psychologists in training. Dissertation Abstracts
International: Section B. The Sciences and
Engineering, Vol 64(12-B), 2004, 6338.
Pound, K.S. (2012). The challenge of self-disclosure for
student therapists and the development of the provisional
clinical self. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section B.
The Sciences and Engineering, Volume 63(4B), 2002, 2069.
38

39. References
Rodolfa, E.R., Vieille, R., Russell, P., Nijjer, S., Nguyen, D
.Q., Mendoza, M., ... Perrin, L. (1999). Internship selection:
Inclusion and exclusion criteria. Professional Psychology:
Research and Practice, 30, 415-419.
Stedman, J.M. (2007). What we know about predoctoral
internship training: A 10-year update. Training and
Education in Professional Psychology, 1, 74-88.
Taube, K.T. (1995, April). Critical thinking ability and
disposition as factors of performance on a written critical
thinking test. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the
American Educational Research Association, San
Francisco, CA.
39

40. References
Williams-Nickelson, C. & Prinstein, M.J. (2004).
Internship in psychology: The APAGS workbook for writing
successful applications and finding the right match. APA:
Washington, D.C.
Winnicott, D.W. (1969). The use of an object. The
International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 50, 711-716.
Yanchar, S.C., Slife, B.D., & Warne, R. (2008). Critical
thinking as disciplinary practice. Review of General
Psychology, 12, 265-281.
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41. Essay and Interview Support for Pre- and
Postdoctoral Training Positions:
An Application Prep Service
41