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Psychology in India: A Career with Uncertain Opportunities - Online Journal of Multidisciplinary Research

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Psychology in India: A Career with Uncertain Opportunities

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Psychology in India: A Career
with Uncertain Opportunities
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OJMR (/ojmr.html)

Dr. Gaurav Agrawal

Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology, Dev Sansk riti Vishwavidyalaya, Haridwar, India
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Article History:
-------------------------Received: 15-06-2015 Revised: 24-06-2015 Accepted:
10-07-2015 Published: 17-07-2015
Keywords:
Career in psychology, Mental health, Opportunities in
psychology
Article code: OJMR121
Access online at: www.ojmr.in
Source of support: Nil
Conflict of interest: None declared
Indexed in: Open J-Gate
Corresponding Author: Dr. Gaurav Agrawal
Matashree International Service Near Taxi Stand,
Laxman Jhula Rishikesh, 249302
E-mail: ipigaurav@gmail.com
Contact no.: +91-9358549482

Abstract
India is on the verge of an explosion of mental illnesses.
In the coming few years India as a nation would need a
number of psychologists and mental health
professionals to help people deal with these problems.
A probe was made to explore the opportunities for future
mental health professionals and challenges they would
face in their careers. It was noted that a number of
people were suffering with mental problems and there
was a serious lack of mental health professionals in
India. Hospitals and schools were the places where
mental health professionals could look for various
opportunities. Some challenges like poor salary and
absence of any licensing authorities are the biggest
challenges for upcoming psychologists in their career in
India.

Psychology in India: A Career with Uncertain Opportunities

Background
In a big country like India with a population of 1.2 billion, you would expect that as many as millions of psychologists
can find decent jobs. But unfortunately the picture is quite opposite. Its very rare that you find a psychologist in a city
hospital or even in the whole city. Despite various big claims, finding a proper psychologist in decent hospitals is also
very uncommon. In reality most of the psychiatric facilities are accessible to the citizens of big cities only. Finding a
qualified counsellor in the schools is a bit too much to ask, despite few exceptions. Every year thousands of the
psychology graduates join the ever growing list of educated unemployed in India. They include graduates, post
graduates and even holding PhDs. For those who study the psychology as a subject of specialization and are looking
for some serious career are still in a considerable number. A systematic probe is required to understand the relevance
of psychologists/counsellors in modern India and at the same time it could be interesting to find how the
psychologists, already in the practice, are doing in their careers.
Epidemiographic View of Mental Disorders
Systematic studies for collecting the epidemiographic data about the mental disease are limited and there is enough
discrepancy among them. Such a study should collect the data about distribution of disease, frequency of disease,
population at risk and various methods to address the issue.(1) It was recently reported that in previous
epidemiological researches conducted from 1960 to 2009, the prevalence rates for psychiatric disorders varying from
9.5 to 370/1000 population in India.(2) In the same study the authors suspect that despite huge variations, as many
as 20% of Indian population might be suffering from psychological troubles.(2) In a recent survey by National Sample
Survey Organization it was reported that 1.49% of total population was suffering from various mental health issues.
There was a small difference in favor of rural population which was at 1.7% as compared to their urban counterparts.(3)
Problem with various epidemiological studies is that the most of the times they are selective in their choice of mental
disorders. Anxiety disorders and some variants of depression generally are excluded. Further, various lesser known
mental disorders are not reported as the population suffering from that and their care takers are not comfortable to call
these problems as mental diseases. In a Meta analysis study authors tried to report the prevalence rates for different
psychological disorders in India on the basis of ten prevalence studies. They reported that prevalence for all mental
disorders together was 6.54%. Prevalence rates for schizophrenia were found to be 2.3 per 1000 while for affective
disorders (depression) it was 31.2 per 1000. These numbers seem too big and scary. Further prevalence for anxiety
neurosis, hysteria and mental retardation were 18.5, 4.1 and 4.2 per 1000 population respectively.(4) Here also the
prevalence rate was reported higher in rural population as compared to urban. This is understandable as in rural India
the facilities of psychological care are quite poor. All the mental hospitals are situated in cities and rural people are
left alone on the mercy of family members. These data suggest that in a country with a population of 1.2 billion, as
many as 65 million are suffering from mental diseases. This is a real big number of mental patients and a very big
need of mental health professionals in India in every part of country. This data does not include individuals needing

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counseling and help for issues other than mental diseases.
Challenges for Teenagers and Children
Researches in last few years have reported the prevalence of mental problems in teenagers is frightening in India. It
was reported that three to nine per cent of teenagers in schools, studying in 9th standard or above and overtly healthy,
meet the criteria for depression at any one time.(5) As many as 20% of teenagers in India reported a lifetime
prevalence of depression. Further, more frustrating part is that 30-50% of cases were gone unnoticed by general
physicians.(5) One can imagine that many more teenagers would not seek even primary medical care. The reason
behind these numbers is an open secret. Indian children and adolescents are subjected to great distress by the ever
growing expectations of parents and growing burden of books. The complex relationships with parents are the main
source of stress instead of providing some coping skills.(6) The teenagers are anxious and insecure for their future.
5.3% of adolescents start using tobacco use as a coping method.(7) Another important issue in Indian teenagers is
the taboo nature of sex education which is seldom provided. Normal attraction for opposite gender, if not guided
properly leads to various unwanted events that create big stress in the lives of many people. It is the duty of parents to
provide right information and control the sexual behavior of their children at the appropriate time. But lack of
appropriate parental supervision and control and adolescent sexual activity has been shown in different studies.(8)
Psychologists and counselor in their schools and locality can be a source of great help. They not only can listen but
also provide some interventions to develop their potentials and provide safeguards against future psychological
problems.
Opportunities for Mental Health Professionals
The prevalence data and challenges for Indian teenagers discussed above are just the very small piece of the whole
jigsaw puzzle. These sufferings of the people indicate that the field of mental health is going to have a boom very
soon. There are immense opportunities for trained mental health professionals in all fields. Indian schools in coming
few years will be forced to employ a counsellor for their children and teachers both. The students are not only victims
of stress and burden but they also dont have a clue where this endless race of ill defined success is going to take
them. Teachers are also following the same age old methodologies for teaching which does not seem to help in
changing world. Teachers will be benefitted if they regularly get inputs from someone who understands the personality
of children. One who understands how their cognitive development can be manipulated, bad habits can be replaced
with good ones, what it takes to develop an environment without forcing the teaching and how to use the knowledge of
memory, intelligence, reinforcement and punishment to maximize the students potentials. Here a counsellor in school
is going to be of great help for both teachers and students. The researches have shown that presence of a counsellor
have developed the students capacities helped them deal with their social, personal, educational and emotional
issues effectively.(9) In India, Central Board of Secondary Education guidelines expect one school counselor will be
appointed for every affiliated school, but this is less than 3% of all Indian students attending public schools.(10) And
reality is that not all CBSE schools have a qualified counselor. Usually the job of counseling is trusted to some young
teacher and this fellow sees this as an extra burden. Any way this tells that in coming years there will be a big
requirement of qualified school counselors in all schools of India.
Further more in coming few years all hospitals would be hiring psychologists. At this day the most of the hospitals
dont have any psychiatry and psychology departments. And where they have even there psychiatrists are doing the
jobs of counselors and psychologists. Slowly but surely in the big cities the hospitals have started to have a
counselor. Today good hospital chains have some psychologists and they are constantly looking for some skilled and
trained psychology professionals which are a rare commodity in India. Besides the hospital settings, what India is
missing dearly is some psychologists running their own private counseling centers and clinics. This is the one area
where the most of the psychologists are employed in the whole world. According to the APA's Center for Workforce
Studies, there were 106,500 licensed psychologists in the United States in 2014, based on APA's 2012 state
licensing board list.(11) There is no such data available about India but one can easily guess that such a number
would be far smaller than this and as compared to population of India it would be very modest. India seriously needs a
number of trained professionals with skills and courage both to come forward and act as the torchbearers. The
opportunities for them would be amazing and it can ensure a bright future despite some struggle. Psychologists in
India are usually absorbed in NGOs and rehabilitation centers.
Good thing is that here also possibilities are immense. The government of India and various state governments are
always running some public welfare projects for orphan, widows, tribes, poor and disabled, criminals and drug addicts
etc. There also, good psychology professionals can find decent jobs. But here also the problem is that there is always
a disparity between job demand and qualification sought. So a psychology graduate can be in competition with one
trained in literature. This doesnt encourage the psychology graduates.
Challenges
While it seems that there are immense opportunities for psychologists in India, one cant help admitting the various
challenges that young graduates have to come across. These challenges mostly discourage the young guys to
pursue the career in psychology especially if they can look elsewhere. In reality the majority of the students enrolling
in psychology courses are those who didnt find options in other courses or in stern words were not simply good
enough to get admission in those fields that are more promising. Of course there are exceptions but those who look at
the psychology as the first choice of career; they also get to face discouraging and confusing circumstances. They
are listed here:
Poor Salaries and Not Enough Jobs
The psychologists in India receive dismal salary as compared to that prevailing in other countries. In the western
countries psychologists are one of the highest paid professionals in the healthcare. But compared to that Indian
psychologists get very mediocre salaries. According to a report published on an online source in the U.K., the wages
for clinical psychologists range from 28,313 to 37,326 per year. Senior clinical psychologists can expect to earn

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between 36,112 and 43,335. In the U.S., in 2009, clinical, counseling and school psychologists earned an average
salary of $66,040 per year while industrial psychologists earned $83,260.(12) Psychologists who have specialized and
those working in the private sector earn considerably more. In India, a psychologist earns between Rs. 60,000 to Rs.
1,200,000 depending on specialty, location and popularity. In a private hospital, a fresh clinical psychologist with an
MPhil degree can draw about Rs. 30,000 a month.(12)
This doesnt seem very attractive and inspiring. One can note that there is a big disparity between the lowest to
highest salaries in India ranging from Rs 60,000 to Rs 1,200,000 per year. The reason behind this is not just the
experience and skills rather it depends largely on the sector in which one is employed. The higher end salaries are
drawn by the psychologists employed in government mental hospitals, teaching in government universities and military
services. But then they are only handful. Others employed in private settings, small hospitals, research projects or in
schools account for mid range salaries. The psychologists and professional working in NGOs or small rehabilitation
centers are in the biggest numbers but they are at the bottom of the salary pyramid. A
more recent report provides somewhat skewed picture.(13)
Psychologists Salaries in India by Experience:*

* By curtsey of http://www.naukrihub.com/
Further it is reported that the number of female professionals in
the field of psychology has outdone that of their male counterparts in India. While 87% of the clinical psychologists
are women, they account for around 57% of the counseling jobs. In fact women can earn from around INR 180,000 up
to around INR 443,700 in this field based on experience, job skills and other factors.(13)
While if higher end of the salaries look attractive, one should notice that these are quite rare and the big disparity is
quite discouraging. But the more challenging part of the story is that in India there are not many jobs for psychologists
and counselors. Very few schools have a designated post for the counselor. There also they make use of a counselor
by assigning him the responsibilities of a sports teacher, music teacher or a go to man in case some other
specialized teacher is absent. Since there are not many options, a trained counselor is made to do everything except
counseling. Same is the case with hospitals. Rarely any hospital is going to hire a psychologist and then they would
expect him to take care of at least 20-30 patients a day. Reason is simple.
They compare him with a usual physician who is going to attend at least 50-60 patients a day. In the research field or
teaching also there are limited options. So at the end of the day the psychologists and counselors are left to
compromise with a job in NGOs or in some rehabilitation centers with minimal pay.
Lack of Licensing
Another challenging issue is that there are no licensing measures for psychologists. The Rehabilitation Council of
India (RCI) is entrusted with the job of providing the licensing of clinical psychologists and rehabilitation psychologists
only. The Rehabilitation Council of India (RCI) was set up as a registered society in 1986. On September, 1992 the
RCI Act was enacted by Parliament and it became a Statutory Body on 22 June 1993. The Act was amended by
Parliament in 2000 to make it more broad based. The mandate given to RCI is to regulate and monitor services given
to persons with disability, to standardize syllabi and to maintain a Central Rehabilitation Register of all qualified
professionals and personnel working in the field of Rehabilitation and Special Education.(14) The idea was that
psychologists who are working with disabled and needing rehabilitation need to be registered with RCI. For this an
MPhil in Clinical Psychology is the only option rendering other degrees and certificates meaningless. So since the
advent of the RCI the confusion has increased even more. The psychologists working in other fields than rehabilitation
dont know if they need to get registered with RCI or not. RCI has not helped reduce this confusion by providing
ambiguous information to the psychologists asking for clarifications. There have been voices of protest everywhere but
to no avail.(15) Many psychologists in fear of these false rumors of punitive actions (if RCI certificate is not availed)
began the search of some RCI certificate by taking some meaningless certificate course, totally unconnected to their
actual practice. Finally in response to an RTI application RCI stated that it has no authority to register anyone who is
not claiming to be a clinical psychologist or working in the field of rehabilitation.(16) Since there is no licensing or even
accepted guidelines for practicing, the employers are not sure whom they should hire. People of different skills can
apply for the same job and it is quite possible that a wrong person with not desirable skills might be working there.
This has resulted in a sense of confusion all around.
Lack of Awareness and Accessibility
Despite development of education and growing awareness of psychological issues, the age old superstitions and
reservations against psychological problems and patients are still strong. Religion and spiritual beliefs may work both

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as medicines and poison for mental illness. Many Indian people develop various guilt feelings as their lives are not
according to the religious norms.(17) Further there is a tendency to simply ignore the mental illness or not to stick to
the treatment for long enough as the psychotherapeutic treatment doesnt seem as a traditional medical treatment. In
a recent study it was found that Desire to handle the problem on ones own was the most common barrier among
respondents with a disorder who perceived a need for treatment (63.8%).(18) Perceived ineffectiveness of treatment
was the most commonly reported reason for treatment dropout (39.3%) followed by negative experiences with
treatment providers (26.9% of respondents with severe disorders). However Women and younger people with disorders
were more likely to recognize a need for treatment.(18) If you look at the school settings, teachers in schools are not
aware of even the existence of various learning problems.(19) In such a situation how would anyone expect that these
problems would be brought to the attention of psychologists. On the other hand this outlines the need of employing a
school counsellor in each school.
Conclusion
On the basis of above argument we can conclude that psychologists and counsellors have no doubt a bright future in
India but theyll have to build the road to success by themselves. There are various challenges for them to overcome
but a big population and not many people in the field provide mouth watering opportunities. In next few years of
grinding hard the field of psychology and mental health professional will find a prosperous and respectful place in
Indian society.
References
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Lakhan, R; Eknday, OT (2015). National sample survey organization survey report: An estimation of
prevalence of mental illness and its association with age in India. J Neurosci Rural Pract; 6(1): 51-54.
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Madhav, Murali S (2001). Epidemiological Study of Prevalence of Mental Disorders in India. Indian Journal of
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Bansal, V., Goyal, S., & Srivastava, K. (2009). Study of prevalence of depression in adolescent students of a
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11. http://www.apa.org/support/about/ psych/numbers-us.aspx#answer retrieved on 10th June 2015.
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14. http://www.rehabcouncil.nic.in/writ ereaddata/rciact.pdf retrieved on 10th June 2015.
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retrieved on 10th June 2015.
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https://www.facebook.com/associationindianpsychology/photos/a.824345374281415.1073741826.824341974281755/840831359299483/?
1&theater retrieved on 10th June 2015.
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Psychiatry, 55 (2): 187S194.
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Medicine, 44(6): 13031317.
19. Shukla, P., and Agrawal, G. (2015). Awareness of Learning Disabilities among Teachers of Primary Schools.
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How to cite this article:

Agrawal, G. (2015). Psychology in India: A Career with Uncertain Opportunities. Online Journal of
Multidisciplinary Research, 1(2): 1-7.

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