Psychology

In addition to your subject specific knowledge, your psychology degree will equip you with a range of transferable skills including:

• written, verbal and visual communication skills
• understanding human behaviour
• handling data, statistics and numerical information
• proficiency with information technology including databases and statistical software
• problem solving
• project management
• ability to critically evaluate sources of information
• responsibility for own self-learning and skill development
• teamwork, collaboration and social interaction
• planning, reflection and independent study skills

Due to the range of career options and sectors open to you, it is important to consider your options early on in your course and look for opportunities to gain relevant experience and skills.  As well as improving your CV, gaining experience can also help you to make choices about your future career.

All psychology students have the opportunity of taking an optional placement year as part of their studies. It will be your responsibility to find and apply for a placement but there is lots of support available from us both  in terms of internet resources, group workshops and one-to-one appointments.

A psychology-related placement could mean many different things. Have a think about:

• what are you looking to get out of the placement in terms of experience or skills
• what sort of settings and locations are you interested in
• what sort of role are you looking to find

Psychology-based placements

It is more difficult to find one website which houses all psychology related placements. You may need to contact organisations speculatively and some of these opportunities may be unpaid. It could be worth looking for placement roles within organisations such as:

• Home Office
• National Crime Agency
• Metropolitan Police
• NHS
• Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services
• Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development
• Social Communication Disorders Clinic at Great Ormond Street Hospital
• Youth offending teams
• HM Prisons and probation services
• IAPT Services

Start your search

Professional psychology

Psychology graduates enter a diverse range of occupations and further study.  About 20% of UK psychology graduates become chartered psychologists progressing in fields such as clinical, forensic, educational and occupational psychology. Take a look at the BPS website to find out more about career options in professional psychology.

For all routes into professional psychology there is a requirement for postgraduate study at either a masters or post-doctorate level. It is important to be aware that acceptance onto professional doctorate qualifications is extremely competitive and it is very rare for students to progress straight onto this qualification following graduation. If you are interested in a professional psychology career it is really important to gain substantial paid or voluntary work experience with the client group you are interested in working with.

Professional psychology career stories from UoN alumni stories

The case studies are, in the main, from Nottingham alumni working in clinical, educational, forensic, health, occupational and, sports and exercise psychology

Using psychology in careers helping others 

Psychology graduates often use their skills to help others within roles such as community work, counselling and advice work, mental health work, research or teaching.  

As an alternative to clinical psychology graduates could also investigate careers such as Psychological Well-being Practitioner or High Intensity Therapist. Both of these roles are based within NHS IAPT (Improving Access to Psychological Therapy) services.

Applications for assistant psychologist or psychological well-being practitioner can be competitive so gaining voluntary or other work experience within the community, education, research, or mental health can be highly beneficial ahead of applying to these types of roles.

Read UoN alumni stories about using psychology in careers helping others

These career stories include:

• Dafinah Azman, Assistant Psychologist, Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health NHS Trust
• Francine Wheldon, Paediatric Occupational Therapist and Sensory Integration Practitioner working in a private practice
• Jessica Fath, Trainee Psychological Wellbeing Practitioner, Rethink Mental Illness

Using psychology in business-related careers

Some graduates progress to more business related jobs such as marketing, PR and advertising, human resources (HR), consultancy, finance and retail management. Also see the next section on careers in HR and marketing for top advice.

Read our UoN alumni about using psychology in business-related careers

These career stories include:

• Daisy Orme,  Account Management Associate, Gartner
• Sarah Maddison, Data Scientist and Software Developer, Tessella
• Abi Bennetts, Digital PR Strategist
• Martina di Costanzo, Project Manager, Rolls-Royce

Using psychology in research

Some psychology graduates wish to continue researching into the field of psychology.  This could involve studying at PhD level or undertaking a research assistant position.  A masters level qualification may be useful for this type of work.

Read our case studies from two UoN PhD researchers

• Karl Miller, PhD researcher
• Luke Sawyers, PhD researcher

HR

Using your knowledge and understanding

HR departments are generally responsible for developing and implementing policies to ensure staff are used effectively within an organisation. This covers a diverse range of areas, including employment conditions, recruitment, pay, training, working practices, and equality and diversity.

A psychology degree involving intensive study of how and why people think and act the way they do is often seen as an excellent course of preparation for working in HR.

For example, understanding the theory and concepts behind reward and motivation can inform how staff incentive programmes are developed to encourage productivity and staff retention, as well as informing the development of staff wellbeing policies. As another example, understanding how assessments can be used effectively in testing and interviewing candidates, or measuring employee engagement and satisfaction, can draw upon skills from your psychology degree.

Using your skills

Employers will expect students with a psychology degree to be effective listeners, approachable and detail-orientated while possessing excellent written and verbal communication, data handling and problem-solving skills.

All these skills will be useful for a career in HR as you will be working with people, sometimes during potentially sensitive situations where staff will speak to you confidentially about issues that affect them. You will need to ensure policies and activities are followed exactly and records are updated as well as dealing with data and sensitive information (such as attendance records and pay details) requiring effective data handling skills developed during your degree.

Occupational psychologist

You may also be interested in working as an occupational psychologist. This role entails looking at how people behave at work, and, depending on the needs of the organisation, can cover broad areas such as counselling, personal development, designing work environments, selecting candidates and employee training and motivation.

To work as an occupational psychologist you will need a British Psychology Society (BPS) accredited masters course such as the University's MSc Occupational Psychology.

Find out more about a career in HR

Marketing

Marketing essentially involves understanding people’s needs and wants to create marketing campaigns that show how a product or service meets these. Marketing is a common career path for psychology graduates who want to use the skills developed on their degree in a non-clinical setting.

For instance, an understanding of cognitive psychology concepts such as cognitive biases and how people might not trust something ‘new’ and ‘untested’ could be useful when looking to market a new product or service.

Principles of social psychology are also commonly used by marketers, such as to create marketing campaigns that encourage potential customers to gradually change their behaviour and become paying customers.

In addition, researching and understanding human behaviour is very relevant to being a market researcher, and can be useful in considering and anticipating customer needs in other marketing roles, such as creating plans to engage with a particular audience.

Employers are looking for people who have excellent communication skills and creative problem-solving skills, which you will develop during your studies. 

Find out more about a career in marketing

Here are some examples of the graduate employment destinations. The most common sector destinations for UoN psychology graduates are healthcare, social care and education.

Graduate destinations from the Graduate Outcomes survey

Every year up to 30-40% of psychology graduates choose to build on their undergraduate study by undertaking a psychology related taught masters course. 

Graduates have successful achieved places on courses including:

• Brain Imaging
• Health Psychology
• Mental Health Research
• Occupational Psychology
• PGCE courses 
• Psychology Research Methods
• Rehabilitation Psychology

Psychology MSc courses at the University of Nottingham are offered within the School of Psychology and the Division of Psychiatry and Applied Psychology in the School of Medicine.

Most students who wish to progress to a PhD will have studied at postgraduate taught level. Other students opt to take a postgraduate qualification which will allow them to pursue a particular career interest, such as teaching.

For careers in professional psychology a specific doctorate-level qualification is often a requirement.  These doctorate courses offer a combination of academic teaching and service based learning alongside research.  Entry is extremely competitive and students should gain as much relevant experience as possible before applying. 

The British Psychological Association

Careers in Psychology 

Job vacancies across a range of sectors

Prospects - what can I do with my degree?

Explore further study

Check out our career paths pages