Counselor + Psychology = Counseling Psychology

I am puzzle with the state of psychological and counseling services in this country. I was told that counseling grads are filling up posts as Psychology Officers. What really differentiate psychology and counseling is not very clear in the Malaysian setting. Both parties seem to be doing psychological test.

Counselors Act (1988) was enacted among others to determine of the standard of counselling training programmes, the qualifications for eligibility to be registered as a counsellor; the prescribing of ethics; the regulating of fees charged as remittances for counselling services and the ruling on the types as well as the levels of counselling accessible to Malaysian. I guess psychologists are covered under the Counselor Act (1988) as well.

Then the state of practice which has a mixture of counseling and psychology is basically known as Counseling Psychology. However, some psychologists aren’t counseling psychologists. Their works are behaviorally oriented. They are behavioral psychologists and most of our clinical psychologists are behaviorist.

At the end of the day, the monetary gain that they get from the status of their career (as determine by SPA) matters to most of them. Whether they are counselor or psychologist, let the academics in this field determine…