ANALYSES OF THEIR PUBLIC
IMAGE
1.- Introduction2.- Method of the research2.1.- Research´s chronology2.2- Objectives2.3- Sample3.- Analysis of the Results3.1- Introduction3.2- Professional positioning of Psychology3.3- Assesment and evaluation of experiences
with psychologists
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In January 1989, the Professional Psychological Asociation of Spain Colegio Oficial de Psicólogos decided to carry out a project under the name " Identity and Image of the Psychologists in Spain: a Study under the perspective of the Social and Professional Marketing".
The objective of this article is to present an
analysis of the social image spanish psychologists
have in society. This is in fact the second part of
this wide project which has been divided in three
major sections. After the first part presented the
identity of spanish psychologists (Chapter titled
Socio Economic and actual labour situation of
professional psychologists in Spain: a comparative
study about the differences between specialties) ,
this second part will study how is this identity
perceived in spanish society.
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In October 1992 we started the survey with the realisation of 42 interviews in Valencia. The qualitative research permitted a study in depth of some specific concepts. From the data obtained in these interviews, we prepared a questionnaire with 49 items which should evaluate some very different aspects.
This questionnaire was first modified following the results of the pilot phase in Valencia and it was finally distributed in all Spain from 7th June to 15th July.
The consolidation of Psychology in Spanish society, as the first hypothesis, suggests that in he last 20 years the number of persons who have contacted with a psychologist has considerably increased. Nevertheless, this is in fact the first study carry out in Spain with a statistical representatitity.
In order to measure the image we decided to use two instruments: the scientific literature and the conclusions obtained from the qualitative phase.
According to them we establish 4 different stages in the analysis of the psychologists' image :
STAGE 1.- Evaluation of the experience with psychologists
STAGE 2.- Necessary elements to exercise the professional psychology
STAGE 3.- Degree of awareness of the psychology and psychologists
STAGE 4.- Evaluation of the Psychologist status related to other considered close professions.
The 4 stages acted as a guide to structure the questionnaire.
The research has been conducted among individuals older than 18 years who were inhabitants of towns with a population of more than 5000 residents. This decision was taken due to the fact stated in the first part of the research that psychology in Spain is basically a urban profession.
The total number of interviews was 1523. The margin of error was fixed at 3,0% and the confidence level at 95,5%. The distribution of the sample was stratified and proportional to the population, first of each Autonomous Community and second to each city within the Community. The individuals were chosen by the Random-route method and considering the quotas stablished within the variables of sex and age.
The interview consisted of a personal one following a structured questionnaire.
The following figure shows us the distribution of the sample among the 17 spanish Autonomous Communities (Figure 1). The rest of tables (Figure 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7) descrives demographic charasteristics of the sample:
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In this chapter we will analyse those aspects related to the position of the psychologist compared to other professions (Stage 4), as well as the assessment of the experience with psychologists (Stage 1). Nevertheless we will make a short synthesis of the results obtained in the other parts of the research (Stage 2 and 3).
Regarding the grade of awareness of Psychology and psychologists we can say that it is, in general, optimum. Nevertheless, the research has revealed some interesting aspects such as the ignorance of some new specialties in psychology, or the traditional identification of psychology with psychiatry which has long been observed (Guest, 1948; Wiebe, Cohen, 1955; Nunnally y Kittross, 1958; Tallent y Reiss, 1959; Murray, 1962; Kabatznick, 1984; Wood, Jones y Benjamiín, 1968; Koeske et al., 1993). Although people are aware of the university rank of Psychology, around 16,8% still think that there are some other ways to obtain the qualification of psychologist. These other ways could be correspondence courses or private non-official schools. This data inform us about the negative attribution that psychology has still nowadays.
The psychologist is clearly identified, first of all, as a clinic psychologist, then as educational professional and then in the organisational area. There is no awareness of the possibilities this professional group offers in other fields or at least we can say that these other areas are not used to identify the image of the psychologist.
Our questionnaire listed many different tasks which are developed by psychologists together with others which traditionally have been attributed to psychologists, such as astrology or palmistry. The objective of this question was to compare the data with the results obtained in former researchs which related occultism and psychology (Seisdedos 1983). In this case, the non-scientific tasks were mostly not chosen by the individuals in the interviews. Moreover, most of the tasks mentioned in the interviews suited to those which in fact correspond to the usual psychologists tasks. The results revealed an approach between reality and image of the Psychology (Figure 8).
As the figure shows us, the psychologist' s professional profile is that of a practitioner who develops tasks mostly in a clinical area such as the diagnosis of mental problems (87,1%), passing tests (85,3%), psychotherapy (71,9%) or teaching of relax-methods (66,2%). It is interesting to note that 37,2% think that psychologists can make medical prescriptions. This fact tells us something about the possible lack of definition in the roles of psychiatrists and psychologists. It is also remarkable the fact that hypnotism is thought to be done by psychologists in 15,4% of the cases.
Regarding palmistry and astrology, only 3,2 % and 6,8% of the interviewed population identified them with the usual psychologist' tasks. This shows us an increase in the information available by people in those areas.
The profile of the psychologist as a professional involved in educational areas is also clearly perceived in society, as 73,2 % identifies him with a practitioner who does interviews for vocational orientation. The professional who deals with Work and Organizational tasks (elaboration of personnel selection 68,2%, assistance to companies 55,9%, participation in training courses 50%) is identified by 50% of the population, followed by the psychologist involved in Traffic-Safety areas (elaboration of driver's evaluation 43,6%). The fact that drivers have to pass an evalutation made by psychologists to obtain the driving license doesn' t mean that peple identifies the psychologist as the professional who develops this task. We can make the hypothesis that probably these professionals, as being part of the drivers' examination centers, are mostly identified with doctors.
Although we can talk about an optimistic general image of the profession when considering the tasks atributted to psychologists, we obtain different results when we put the questions in another way. Another part of the questionnaire introduced a list of knowledges psychologists should have in order to exercise the profession. As the figure 9 indicates, there were very different subjects included, some of them used in the various specialties psychologists work on, some others which have nothing to do with it and the rest which consisted of subjects learned in the University but really not important in the development of the career. Here are the results:
As we can see, the list contains 14 different categories from which 5 are fully treated during the studies in Spain (statistics, biology, philosophy, sociology and pedagogy). Another group of five categories are not so intensively worked (advertising, pharmacology, informatic, economy and marketing), law isn' t at all considered in the studies and astrology, parapsychology and graphology aren't considered at all as scientific subjects within psychology in Spain.
What we asked the individuals was to estimate if all these knowledges were useful for the professional practice. Some of them obviously are, but others, like for example philosophy, is seldom used by practitioners. The purpose of this question was not to examine people about their knowledge of psychology, but what we tried was to determine which subjects appear in the people's minds when talking about psychologists.
Therefore philosophy has been evaluated as very useful (56,1%), whereas informatic is only considered important by 27,4% of the sample (although nowadys it is necessary in many professions). It is satisfactory to observe that only 10,5% think that astrology is still useful, and other subjects, as parapsychology (38,1%) and graphology (35,5%) are considered to be used by more than a third of the individuals. This is in fact worrisome since it reflects that population become blurred about the instruments used by psychologists. Compared that data to those obtained in the former questions, it clearly appears that astrology and palmistry aren' t part of the psychology' profile, but there are still a group of subjects, which we call "parallel" and which are still associated to psychology. Therefore we arrive to the similar conclusions of Seisdedos (1983).
The high percentage of the sample that relates sociology (83,5%) and pedagogy (74,3%) to psychology, could reflect a problem of identification and confusion between these three different professions.
In this summary we also want to mention the attributes that people think are necessary in order to exercise the profession. In this context it always appears the combination of the human qualities with the proper professional techniques. The ranking for these two essential elements is always the same, first the human qualities and then the technique.
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Evaluation of the psychologist's status related to other considered close professions
One of the most important objectives of our research was to establish the similiarities and differences between us and other professions which are somehow considered related to psychology. This is something which in fact has traditionally been studied in this kind of investigations. For this purpose we have designed a chart with two data categories. On the one hand it appeared a group of professions (which included psychology) which we thought had a strong relation to our role, and on the other hand there was a number of variables which we have chosen after the results obtained in the interviews.
The group of professions included in this chart were also chosen following the comments obtained during the interviews. The group of professions is: psychiatrist, doctor, economist, social assistant, pedagogue, teacher and priest. The second reason for the comparison with this group of professionals was the fact that the literature about image studies confirmed the existence of other researches which made that kind of comparisons. The analysis of these comparisons confirmed us afterwards the right election of these different professional categories.
The eight professions, including that of psychologist, were evaluated after nine different categories which are presented in the figure 10.
The nine variables tried to establish the positive and negative aspects of psychologists as they are perveiced among spanish society, as well as to establish the perception of the profession' s value. The survey's purpose was to confirm the existence of these perceptions and if these perceptions were enough to differenciate psychology from the other professions.
The interviewed had to indicate in the Likert-scale his degree of agreement with each variable in connection with each profession. The Figure 11 shows the results obtained.
In graphs of the figure 12 we can observe the compared results of the means obtained for each profession, for each variable.
We can highlight some interesting data. The graph tells us that doctors is the profession with the greatest social prestige and recognition, as they get the best evaluation within the positive categories. Psychologists obtain an intermediate classification and Social Assistants are the ones with the worst evaluation. Priests is the category with the most varied classification.
Getting closer to the results we can clearly see that:
Psychiatry is, among all the other considered professions, the one which has more affinities with the practice of clinic psychology. As graph 2. shows, there is a nearly perfect overlap between these two professions. This fact shows the lack of definition and low differentiation in the roles of the two group of professionals. Only the categories " earns more money" and " has social consideration" indicate a small advantage of the psychiatrist over the psychologist, and this is probably due to the influence of the medical adscription.
Concerning doctors, and as we have already mentioned before, they get the best evaluation (graph 3). Their positioning is optimum in all the variables, except for the item " is manipulative". In this particular case, psychologists get a higher evaluation. In the categories "socially useful", "earns money" and " has social consideration", doctors clearly obtained a higher score.
Social Assistants (graph 4) have the lowest evaluation, although they are "socially useful" after doctors and teachers. In the other categories, and except for the already mentioned item and "facility to find a job", psychcologists lie clearly over them.
Economists (graph 5) are the most materialist professionals. Their type of profession, closely related to the world of the private firms, leads to an image characterized by material values. After doctors, they have the highest score in "earns money", "social power" and "facility to find a job". They are considered as the most manipulative ones. Another relevant aspect is that this profession is the less linked to personal problems. It has an average social consideration and it is the sixth in social usefulness.
There is also a considerable overlap between teachers and psychologists (graph 6), although the image of the former in the items " materialist" and "manipulative" is more positive. Teachers obtain a substantial advantage in social usefulness, as they get very close to doctors. Compared to teachers, psychologists have better labour expectations and earn more money.
Studying the results reflected in graph 7, we get the impression that pedagogues are not really well identified in spanish society. It is curious to observe that they have the lowest score in " social usefulness". They get the same evaluations as psychologists in "command respect", "degree of materialism" and "being manipulative". It is thought to earn more money than psychologists and at the same time they have a lower social consideration and power. The practice of their profession causes them little personal problems and their labour expectations are slightly inferior.
All this data make us think about the new studies, called psychopedagogy, which will appear in the Spanish University in short-term. From the results obtained in the research, we suppose that the profile of pedagogues is blurred in spanish society, not that of psychologists. For that reason we think that the new graduates in this category won' t have a clear professional profile. Moreover, the word "psico" will probably approach them to the image of psychologists so that psychopedadogues will take profit from their better social image.
It is obvious that priests don't have much problems to find a job (Graph 8). In other categories they have a negative image, f.i. in " being manipulative" he gets the same score as the economist, and in "social power" he lies close to the doctor and the economist. Concerning social consideration and capacity for commanding respect, his evaluation is average. Priests are thought to earn the less money and they are perceived as poorly socially useful (after pedagogues). Comparing priests with psychologists, psychologists get always higher evaluations except for three items: facility to find a job, social power and manipulation. Priests are supposed not to have much personal problems in connection with their professional practice.
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The objective of the questions were to obtain information from the individuals who have had directly or indirectly a professional connection with a psychologist. There were around 20 questions which evaluated such different aspects as the type of professional service given, the person who was the one to receive the service, causes for going to the psychologist, number and period of professional contacts, evaluation of the service and degree of satisfaction.
From the data obtained we can estimate the percentage of people who have had professional contacts with psychologists. Around 21,07% of the total population have professional contact with psychologists. In Figure 13 we can see the kind of relationship between the individual and the psychologist: In 50% of the cases it was between the interviewed and the psychologist, followed by the contacts between the children' s interviewed and the psychologist. As the familiar relationship gets weaker, the percentage diminishes.
Figure14 shows the number of contacts distributed after the person who got the service and the different psychology specialties.
As we can see, the areas called "hospital", "clinic/psychotherapy" and "school/educational" are the ones that have a larger number of professional contacts. This confirms the fact that the clinic and educational areas are the more relevant specialties seen from a social point of view.
Asked about how did the individuals choose that particular psychologist, we see that 37% of the cases followed the recommendations given by somebody (Figure 15).
It is difficult to interpret the figure which says that 39,4% didn't have alternative to choose. In this context we can think of several possibilities: the psychologist worked in a public hospital (in Spain doctors are assigned to patients) or in Social Service Centres; the person were sent to the professional f.i. in a job selection process, in a trial or in a school. If we mix the reasons to choose a psychologist with the practice area we can see that the conclusions are very congruent (Figure 16).
In general, the number of professional contacts held with psychologists varies from 1 to 5, and the percentages decreases considerably after a number of 25 (Figure 17). This fact evidents a good relationship between client-psychologists. This can also be seen in the time of the professional contact, as in 63,7% of the cases the period was inferior to 6 months. (Figure 18).
The number of contacts varies in relation with the professional areas (Figure 19):
The period of the professional contact also varies within the different specialties (Figure 20).
There was another group of questions that tried to measure the efficiency of the professional services and some personal aspects of psychologists. The individuals were given a statement and they should express their agreement (5) or disagreement (1) with it. Figure 21 summarises the results:
The degree of satisfaction, the expectation before going to the psychologist and the assessment after the service (measured through the intentionality of recommending the service), obtained high scores.
The higher percentages are achieved in the items
related to personal items such as language used,
cultural level, image and physical looking.
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Created by: Paco&
Javier.
Last Updated: October 16, 1995.
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