Forensic Psychology

Psychology is the science of behavior and mental processes. Within the subject of psychology, there are seventeen main fields within it, and even more subfields within each of those fields. These fields cover various categories, such as clinical, counseling, forensic, school, social, and sports psychology. The main field being focused on is Forensic Psychology, which is the intersection of the law and psychology. Both law enforcement and psychology play a huge role in this field due to interaction with criminals, attorneys, doctors, etc. Its emphasis is focusing on the reason why criminals commit the crimes they do as well as tracking whether or not mental illness is involved. In order to achieve the title of being a Forensic Psychologist,

students will have to have an education involving psychology and the law, practice psychology outside of school, and participate in post-doctorate programs.
Forensic Psychology is a mixture of both law and psychology. Students should be educated in both fields in order to become successful with this career. Forensic psychologists typically work in institutions and correctional facilities, depending on their level of degree. Several responsibilities of a forensic psychologist include being an expert witness in a trial, a jury consultant, a post-trauma psychologist for a police station, victim advocates, and also work with juvenile offenders. An expert witness in trial would gather evidence from a case and would inform his gatherings to a court in front of the jury as well as the judge. Making sure information is accurate is important because it could be one of the leading factors either convicting a criminal or proving their innocence. A jury consultant is hired by lawyers to work on a case. “Some jury consultant duties include setting up mock juries, analyzing focus groups, researching case materials and completing other strategic psychological research” (Study.com). Post trauma psychologist are needed for families or a single person who lost a loved one and needs help in coping. This can also lead to another job in the police station known as suicide prevention. This also helps the same people to not have any thoughts about suicide from a past experience they have had. A victim advocate helps crime survivors as well as their friends and family. This can be for cases such as rape or kidnapping. It helps provide protection as well as suggesting new places for shelter and education. Psychologists that work with juvenile offenders have different fields that they can work with. Most of the time, they will help the juvenile with counseling as they are in juvenile detention. They can also help with teaching them how to live after they get out since they are still so young in age. The median salary that you can get depends on you live for jobs, but it is typically fifty-two thousand to seventy-five thousand dollars per year. This shows that even though this job is stressful and can be time consuming, it can be worth it, especially life changing to some people. There are some steps that you will need in order to obtain it such as college and internships, but they are all achievable.
In order to become a forensic psychologist, it is necessary to have a high school education.

Some main courses you will need to take involve math, science, english, speech, and social sciences. For math, you will need to take statistics in order to obtain the knowledge about independent and dependant variables, probability, and graphs. Science includes biology (genetics, brain anatomy, and evolution), psychology (how the brain works and develops), and forensic science (fingerprinting, crime labs). English and Speech are in order to gain the confidence in front of audiences such as attorneys and lawyers to testify well-written evidence to use in court for a case. Lastly, social sciences such as geography and sociology to see how people react to different cases as well as the different social norms in their society. Without these basic courses throughout high school, forensic psychology isn’t impossible but will be more challenging to pursue through college. When moving on to college, most of these courses will be the same yet more challenging. It will go into greater depth than the high school course did. Some courses to take in college include introductory psychology, chemistry, statistics, sociology, criminology, English composition, philosophy, and communications. All these courses lead up to a doctorate degree, which is the highest degree awarded by a graduate school. In order to have a psychology occupation, you will need to acquire a doctorate degree. Psychology

doctorate degrees take four to seven years to complete. There are two different types of doctorate degrees that one can receive. You can be a Doctor of Psychology and receive your PsyD or you can be a Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology and receive your PhD. A PsyD is for students who want to be in more of a clinical setting and just see patients on a normal basis. A PhD, however, has more emphasis on research. For being a forensic scientist, it would be smart to receive a PhD rather than a PsyD. Colleges can be hard to find that focus mainly on forensic psychology but it is possible to major in these courses and transfer over to a different college after completing it and focus on forensic psychology. According to Dr. Eric Mart, “After completing internships and supervised experiences to become licensed, many psychologists pursue post-doctorate programs with a concentration in forensic psychology” (Mart). Most states only require that you do postdoctoral training equaling one year's worth of work. You can do more if you want to excel in experience before starting on your career but one year is the mandatory amount. When I asked Mrs. Heidi Aldous, the psychologist at Greenhurst Elementary, what the most important thing to people should know or understand, she said “The field requires a lot of training before one is considered proficient and even then it is a field that requires continuing education,” (Aldous). This is showing that even though having completed college, it is still necessary to keep educated and learn new things. After completing college, internship, and your postdoctoral training, you will be headed to the right track of becoming a forensic psychologist.
“Increasing numbers of graduate programs offer dual degrees in psychology and law, with others providing specialization in forensic psychology” (Cherry).

Anne and Curt Bartol also stated, “As recently as 25 years ago, the term forensic psychology had barely been introduced into psychological or legal literature. Today, as we have seen, it is a commonly encountered term” (Bartol). It is shown that there has been an increasing amount of courses based of forensic psychology and more colleges are starting to add this major to their courses. More people are starting to hear about forensic psychologists and what they do. Based on how little known forensic psychology was, it still isn’t getting as much credit as it deserves. Forensic Psychologists don’t start or complete cases. They only add information to the case in order to get it to a closing point with more evidence. Because of this, it isn’t as widespread as other psychologists in other fields, but it’s still growing. In 1895, scientists only studied and experimented eyewitness testimonies. About 1896, psychologists were starting to be able to actually become one of the people giving eyewitness testimonies at criminal trials instead of just studying them. But this was only limited to cases that weren’t taking over the job of medical specialists. In 1916, psychology started to join with law enforcement and led to the invention of the lie detector test. Lastly in 2001, forensic psychology finally became noticed as a

specialization within psychology. As it can be seen, forensic psychology hasn’t been that recognized until 2001, making all the earlier work seem not as important. Now, forensic psychology is being used in most criminal cases and is being learned all around the country.
Forensic psychology is now known world-wide and is used on many cases. Even though most of these psychologists don’t get a lot of credit, they are still a big part in solving criminal cases and helping people with their mental issues. You need to go through high school, college, internships, and postdoctoral programs. A doctorate degree in psychology takes from four to seven years to complete in order to finish with enough knowledge and expertise in your field. Forensic psychology can make a lot of money in order to live a stable life, especially if a lifelong goal is to start a family. There will be enough money to live financially and happy as well. Yes, this occupation will be a long and difficult road, but it is interesting as well as life depending for some families. There seems to be no days that it would get boring, which is something that most students look for when choosing their career. Forensic Psychology is the career that I want to do and I am determined in order to accomplish it.