Psychology training clinics in Australia and New Zealand: Clinic structure

摘要

Psychology clinics play a central role in training clinical psychologists. Surprisingly little empirical research has examined the structure or operations of clinics. A survey of directors of clinical training, and psychology clinic directors in Australia and New Zealand is presented. Clinics in this region vary enormously in size, throughput and staffing levels. They range from being fully funded by their university to being entirely funded out of their external income stream. Clinic-clinical program relationships are generally positive and the majority of respondents are moderately satisfied with their clinic. The greatest dissatisfaction was in research productivity: a more even balance between clinical service, training and research is desired. Contexts differ significantly between regions and universities; the results should not be used for simplistic re-evaluations of particular psychology clinics. The study, however, provides a useful description of the services being operated and raises questions that may be fruitful avenues for research.