Academic psychiatrist

If you’re interested in how research translates into clinical settings, you will find Academic Psychiatry an interesting field.

The video and information below explains what an Academic Psychiatrist does, what makes the specialty different from others in psychiatry, and why it might be a great career choice for you.

Academic Psychiatrists can be from any psychiatric specialty and they split their time between clinical work, research and teaching. The content and split of jobs vary depending on your location and speciality. You might be teaching undergraduates or post-graduates and, as with all roles in Psychiatry, there will be opportunities to take on additional roles.

There are many very areas you could research within psychiatry and your research can reflect your own interests. These areas might include:

• Biological (for example the genetics of psychiatric disorders),
• Social (for example, the social factors that increase the risk of developing mental health problems) or
• Psychological (for example research into different ways of thinking that may help or hinder how we deal with situations).

It’s great to be able to see the influence of your research on practice or policy, and you’ll always have something new and interesting to do.

If you think you might be interested in an academic career in psychiatry, it can be useful to look up the work of academic psychiatrists at several universities. This will give you a good idea of the range of opportunities.