Please describe, what are the Core differences between Clinical Psychology and Health Psychology ?
Health psychology is the study of psychological and behavioral processes in health, illness, and healthcare. It primarily concerns how psychological and behavioral processes impact on physical health and illness, modelling health behaviours and enabling strategies to be developed to help people and organisations to better manage their health. This may also include health promotion strategies to manage diet and exercise, and beating unhealthy habits such as smoking, but may also involve helping people to cope more effectively with stress or associated mental health problems.
Clinical psychology, on the other hand, concerns evaluation, diagnosis, and treatment of psychological disorders and behavioural problems (e.g: depression, anxiety, bipolar disorders, schizophrenia, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), etc.).
Though their focus differs in many ways, there is obviously also a good degree of overlap in areas they share, for example in treatment programs for behavioural or mental health issues.
Health psychology is the study of psychological and behavioral processes in health, illness, and healthcare. It primarily concerns how psychological and behavioral processes impact on physical health and illness, modelling health behaviours and enabling strategies to be developed to help people and organisations to better manage their health. This may also include health promotion strategies to manage diet and exercise, and beating unhealthy habits such as smoking, but may also involve helping people to cope more effectively with stress or associated mental health problems.
Clinical psychology, on the other hand, concerns evaluation, diagnosis, and treatment of psychological disorders and behavioural problems (e.g: depression, anxiety, bipolar disorders, schizophrenia, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), etc.).
Though their focus differs in many ways, there is obviously also a good degree of overlap in areas they share, for example in treatment programs for behavioural or mental health issues.
Dear Atiq,
I agree with Paul's comments on the differences of the two disciplines. Some clinical psychologists focus on both mental health and health in their practice.
Dear Atiq,
The health consequences of smoking is within the range of health psychology
while the reason or motives for your smoking (stress release, regressive behaviour and the like) could be subject to the field of clinical psychology.
The aftermath of smoking lung or bladder cancer fits into medicine but your death anxiety can be modified within clinical psychology. Your after-death worries belongs to theology (e.g. hospital chaplain)
Thanks for highlighting how health psychology, clinical psychology, medicine, and theology would look at different aspects of a situation, Beatrice.
I agree with all that has been stated above, and comment Atiq for raising this vital question. As a Behavioral Medicine Consultant, I like to think of behavioral medicine--closely related to health psychology--as being a more circumspect specialty than clinical psychology. It takes about one year longer in coursework in most Behavioral Medicine doctoral programs than the general psychology coursework. Likewise with health psychology.
The specialization in health or clinical psychology takes 4 additional years after your examination in our country.
Yes, Beatrice, when you put body/mind and mind/body together you get to the essence of what healthcare should be about, and it is immensely more open systems than the mechanistic closed systems of the current biomedical model. The depth of diagnosis and treatment both change remarkably when the two are put together in their more holistic framework. I call it the "future of medicine".
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