Psychologist job description for veterans

Army 73B, Clinical Psychology, maps to this occupation in O*NET's Military Crosswalk as a commissioned-officer specialty, and enlisted behavioral health codes point here as well. The doctorate and the state license stand in front of the title either way. This occupation runs on assessment. Clinical and counseling psychologists identify psychological, emotional, and behavioral problems and diagnose disorders using interviews, case histories, observation, and standardized tests they select, administer, score, and interpret themselves. Treatment follows through psychotherapy, behavior modification, stress reduction, hypnosis, or play therapy, and no prescription appears anywhere in the occupation's O*NET record, which is where psychiatry takes over. Clinical and counseling psychologists had a median of $100,580 in May 2025, with the deciles at $55,170 and $180,960. Psychologists of all types together came in at $99,110, and school psychologists, counted on their own, at $95,990.

Core Duties and Responsibilities

Assessing a client's risk of harm to self or others outranks every other task on the list, and the documentation behind it, session notes, progress notes, and treatment plans, comes close behind. After that comes counseling individuals, groups, and families through crisis and toward workable plans, writing treatment plans that specify type, frequency, intensity, and duration, and testing whether the treatment and the diagnosis are still the right ones. BLS counted 209,400 psychologists in 2025, 81,300 of them in clinical and counseling practice and 64,000 in school psychology. A quarter work in ambulatory healthcare services, 24 percent in elementary and secondary schools, and 23 percent for themselves.

Common Skills and Technologies

Reading comprehension rates highest, ahead of social perceptiveness, active listening, and the writing all those reports demand. The technology answer here is video. Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and Google Meet all turn up in postings, with eClinicalWorks EHR for records and Google Docs and Sheets for the rest of the week.

Education, Training, and Career Path

Psychologist is a protected word: every state licenses clinical and counseling practice, typically on a doctorate, supervised experience, and an exam. A Ph.D. or Psy.D. plus an internship is the usual route, school psychologists need at least a master's, and industrial-organizational psychologists enter with one. Nearly half of practitioners report post-doctoral training and 44 percent a doctorate. Veterans have a documented on-ramp, since O*NET's crosswalk from military specialties lists clinical and counseling psychology among the civilian matches for the Army's 68X specialty in behavioral health. Employers in government outside schools and hospitals pay the top industry median at $130,960.

Sources: O*NET 30.0, 19-3033.00 Clinical and Counseling Psychologists, https://www.onetonline.org/link/summary/19-3033.00. BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025, 19-3033, https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes193033.htm. BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, https://www.bls.gov/ooh/life-physical-and-social-science/psychologists.htm.