For a variety of reasons, most graduates don’t go on to do any kind of post graduate qualification. Possible reasons include: lack of funds, lack of interest, or simply that they weren’t able to gain entry to one of the highly competitive graduate programmes. This means most people who study psychology will enter the job market with only a bachelor’s of psychology.

A common misconception is that a bachelor’s degree in psychology enables someone to work as a psychologist. That is not true, Australia and New Zealand require at least six-year sequence of education and training to qualify as a Psychologist. This typically consists of a three year bachelor’s degree, a one year honours degree, and a 2 year master’s degree. Moreover, not just any postgraduate qualifications in psychology are suitable, but specific qualifications with a very limited number of spaces relative to the number of applicants. Some universities may not offer an accredited master’s degree, instead only a longer 3 year degree such a Doctor of Clinical Psychology is available. Another issue is that some graduate degrees are full-fee, in 2025 fees are over AU$40,000 / year at some universities.

Another misconception is that a psychology bachelor’s degree qualifies someone to work as a social worker or counsellor. This is also inaccurate as these occupations have their own specialised degrees. Many of the other roles that are commonly suggested for psychology graduates like human resources, sales, or public relations are better prepared for with other more relevant degrees.

In some industries like engineering or information technology, a bachelor’s degree alone is an adequate qualification, so employers are searching for graduates in these subjects. Yet no job specifically requires a psychology bachelor’s degree, meaning little demand from employers. This means that psychology graduates have to compete with other generic graduates for jobs for which any degree is acceptable.

This lack of demand for psychology graduates is reflected in the relatively low salaries they end up receiving. Despite this lack of demand, universities are churning out huge numbers of Psychology graduates. In 2023, New Zealand tertiary institutes produced 2,110 domestic psychology graduates, a staggering number considering only 590 engineering graduates and 1,655 teaching graduates were produced in the same period. Almost as many psychology graduates were produced as nursing graduates. In fact nearly 9% of all Bachelor degrees were awarded in psychology [1].

Unsurprisingly, given this lack of demand, many students fail to find a professional role after graduation. In Australia, only 55% of those working full-time were in a managerial or professional role. Lower than the average of 69.2% across all study areas and far lower than degrees like nursing, pharmacy, computing and information systems, rehabilitation, or teacher education, all of which scored in the 80s or 90s [2].

Even if some of these graduates suddenly decided to pursue post-graduate qualifications, it’s impossible due to the limited number of slots available.

It’s not uncommon for students enrolling in an undergraduate psychology degree to have the expectation that it will be focused on clinical psychology. They are probably hoping to learn all about issues they or their friends are facing, like anxiety or relationship issues, and how to resolve them. Some students may have received a diagnosis of ADHD, or have self-diagnosed themselves based on social media, and want to learn more about how to manage it. In reality, most undergraduate psychology curriculums spend very little time on the kind of applied topics that students associate with psychology.

Instead, undergraduate psychology is packed with such topics as sensory coding, perceptual processing, neuroprocesses, research methods, and statistics. Some students chose psychology because they "hate maths and statistics" and are subsequently shocked to learn that statistics is an integral part of the undergraduate curriculum at their university. Obviously, it is impossible for the undergraduate psychology curriculum to be completely packed with practical content, that would leave nothing left to teach at the master’s or doctorate level, but the small amount of practical application leaves students feeling dismayed.

Alternatively, some students have an outdated view of psychology, believing they will learn all about the work of Freud or Jung. They may also subscribe to some pop psychology notion, like the idea that people only use 10% of their brain and that they will learn how to unlock the other 90%.

Not only is the curriculum different to expectations, it’s also not relevant to the kind of roles most graduates end up pursuing. Some university websites will argue that a psychology degree is good preparation for roles as varied as advertising, human resources (HR), recruitment, policy analysis, journalism, marketing, and data analyst. Yet very little of the curriculum offers any sort of substantive preparation for those roles. If those jobs are of interest, then there are far better degrees that will put you in a more competitive position in the tough job market.

Although psychology degrees teach some material on data analysis, it isn’t taken seriously by employers. Universities are also producing copious numbers of graduates with degrees in statistics, data science, business analytics, and econometrics, who are far better prepared due to the more detailed instruction received.

It’s quite likely that the actually useful knowledge in a psychology degree could be distilled to about a semester’s worth of classes. Although it is a characteristic of universities that the undergraduate curriculum is tailored more as preparation for an esoteric PhD than any other purpose, psychology is worse than many degrees in this respect.

Every year the Australian Department of Education funds the Graduate Outcomes Survey (GOS) which asks graduates about their employment, experiences with their degree, and any further study they are undertaking. One of the questions relates to whether graduates believe they are working in a job which uses their skills and education. This scale of perceived overqualification (SPOQ) can be viewed as measuring how useful their education is in the job market. For those who completed an undergraduate degree and are now in full-time employment, psychology tops the list with a whopping 47% of graduates reporting they are not utilising their skills or education. Contrast this with more useful degrees like nursing, pharmacy, or dentistry where 10% or fewer graduates viewed themselves as not utilising their degree. The average across subjects was 27.8% making psychology much worse than average [2].

In New Zealand, psychology subjects are essentially charged at around the same rate as other undergraduate subjects. But in Australia there is a big difference in the fees charged for different subjects, with undergraduate psychology / behavioural science being in the most expensive band. This means for a domestic undergraduate student their student contribution in 2025 is A$16,992. That seems like a lot for a degree that doesn’t perform well in the labour market.

Another issue for Australian students is that if they decide to pursue psychology further, many of the graduate level courses don’t have Commonwealth Supported Places (CSP), so the student needs to pay the full cost of their education. This could mean that by the time the student qualifies they’ve accumulated a huge amount of debt. For some this may still be a worthwhile choice, but it is worth considering carefully.

The replication crisis refers to the phenomenon of researchers being unable to repeat the results of a previously conducted studies. Being able to repeat an experiment and draw the same conclusion is a key part of the scientific method. Widespread failure to do so brings the whole foundation of a subject into question.

One example of this is when a large group of 270 researchers attempted to replicate 100 studies that had been published in three leading psychology journals. They were only able to replicate the original results in 39% of cases [3].

Another large replication project called Many Labs 2 attempted replication of 28 studies, including some classic studies. The results were similar to those of other replication projects. Only 50% of the replications had statistically significant results in the same direction. Of these, 75% had effect sizes smaller than the originals [4].

There are many reasons for the replication crisis such as selective reporting and analysis, and even outright fraud. Indeed, some well known figures in the discipline have been found to have faked data. This has led to psychology often being viewed with scepticism.

While psychology is not the only subject suffering from a replication crisis, it appears to be one of the worst offenders. Why would you want to spend three years learning a lot of material, much of which is of questionable accuracy? It seems like a huge waste of time. It could be that half of the material in the textbook or taught in lectures is wrong. The problem at this stage is that nobody knows for certain which half.

Another problem with psychology is that it doesn’t fall into the category of respected degrees. Like it or not, some degrees are respected more than others. Mention studying psychology to your friends and you may get some negative remarks. Obviously you shouldn’t choose a degree based solely on the opinion of others, but the big problem comes when it is time to find a job.

As mentioned, many people will enter the job market with just a bachelor’s degree, but there is no job that requires a bachelor’s degree in psychology. That means competing with huge numbers of other jobseekers for roles where essentially any degree is a suitable qualification. When these potential employers are reviewing applications, they will often give preference to candidates with degrees that are perceived as more rigorous. The logic is that in order to obtain one of these challenging degrees, the person must be smarter and more diligent, and will then apply these same qualities to their job. In contrast the stereotype of the average psychology graduate is someone who hasn’t planned ahead and lacks quantitative skills. Maybe the stereotype is unfair, but a reasonable number of people hold it and it is something graduates will have to deal with.

A UK survey of student academic experience found that psychology was the degree in which students dedicated the fewest hours each week [5]. On average, psychology students only dedicated 26 hours per week to their course (made up of contact hours and independent study), a strong indicator of a degree that isn’t very challenging.

US students rated the average difficulty of a Psychology course as 2.8 on a five point scale. This was close to the bottom quartile meaning approximately 75% of subjects were harder than psychology [6]. This study found that a 1 unit increase on the five point difficulty scale was associated with 30% higher earnings a decade after graduation.

Many students who start a psychology undergraduate degree have aspirations of becoming a clinical psychologist, yet they don’t realise how competitive entry is to these programmes. This problem exists in New Zealand, Australia as well as other countries internationally such as the UK and Canada. Some students devote many years of their lives trying to get into a programme without being successful.

In the case of New Zealand over 2000 people graduate in psychology each year [1]. While not all of these want to be clinical psychologists, the total number of training places across the country is in the 80 to 90 range [7]. While some universities are planning to increase the number of places, the total number still be tiny relative to the number of applicants. Many students spend years reapplying for entry in the hopes of being successful. They may also be forced to undertake extra qualifications in an attempt to boost their GPA, or spend additional time gaining relevant work or life experience to make their application more competitive.

Concentrating all your effort on becoming a clinical psychologist is risky as a single significant life event can derail the process. If you suffer from burnout, financial problems, personal or family illness, or less than exceptional grades, you are left with few options. In contrast a bachelor’s or honours degree in some other discipline is at least worth something in the job market.

What are some scenarios are where you should pursue the psychology degree and what are some where you should think twice:

Most students will be trying to enter the labour market with only a bachelor’s degree, yet a bachelor’s degree in psychology is relatively poor preparation for most roles. The kinds of jobs that are normally suggested as suitable are often better prepared for with other degrees. Another issue is that the curriculum isn’t what many students expect, and due to the replication crisis, much of the information is likely inaccurate. Some students want to become a professional psychologist, but admission is often very competitive, leaving many students facing disappointment. Be sure to investigate the number of spots available and factor that into your decision-making.

[1] “Field of specialisation for students gaining qualifications from tertiary education providers.” https://www.educationcounts.govt.nz/statistics/achievement-and-attainment .

[2] QILT, 2023 Graduate Outcomes Survey : Short Term Graduate Outcomes in Australia. QILT, 2024.

[3] O. S. Collaboration, “Estimating the reproducibility of psychological science,” Science, vol. 349, no. 6251, p. aac4716, 2015.

[4] R. A. Klein et al., “Many Labs 2: Investigating variation in replicability across samples and settings,” Advances in Methods and Practices in Psychological Science, vol. 1, no. 4, pp. 443–490, 2018.

[5] J. Neves, J. Freeman, R. Stephenson, and A. Rowan, Student academic experience survey 2025. Advance HE, 2025.

[6] V. Novik, “The role of learning in returns to college major: evidence from 2.8 million reviews of 150,000 professors,” Available at SSRN 4275668, 2022.

[7] “Clinical psychology programme to take more students.” https://www.thepress.co.nz/nz-news/360502096/clinical-psychology-programme-take-more-students .