Best clinical psychology books according to redditors

Texts and Reference Books

Days in the Lives of Social Workers

DSM-5

Child Development, Third Edition: A Practitioner's Guide

Racial and Ethnic Groups

Social Work Documentation: A Guide to Strengthening Your Case Recording

Cognitive Behavior Therapy: Basics and Beyond

[Thoughts and Feelings: Taking Control of Your Moods and Your Life]
(https://www.amazon.com/Thoughts-Feelings-Harbinger-Self-Help-Workbook/dp/1608822087/ref=pd_sim_14_3?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=3ZW7PRW5TK2PB0MDR9R3)

Interpersonal Process in Therapy: An Integrative Model

[The Clinical Assessment Workbook: Balancing Strengths and Differential Diagnosis]
(https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0534578438/ref=ox_sc_sfl_title_38?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=ARCO1HGQTQFT8)

Helping Abused and Traumatized Children

Essential Research Methods for Social Work

Navigating Human Service Organizations

Privilege: A Reader

Play Therapy with Children in Crisis

The Color of Hope: People of Color Mental Health Narratives

The School Counseling and School Social Work Treatment Planner

Streets of Hope : The Fall and Rise of an Urban Neighborhood

Deviant Behavior

Social Work with Older Adults

The Aging Networks: A Guide to Programs and Services

[Grief and Bereavement in Contemporary Society: Bridging Research and Practice]
(https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0415884810/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1)

Theory and Practice of Group Psychotherapy

Motivational Interviewing: Helping People Change

Ethnicity and Family Therapy

Human Behavior in the Social Environment: Perspectives on Development and the Life Course

The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work

Generalist Social Work Practice: An Empowering Approach

Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association

The Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Workbook

DBT Skills Manual for Adolescents

DBT Skills Manual

DBT Skills Training Handouts and Worksheets

Social Welfare: A History of the American Response to Need

Novels

[A People’s History of the United States]
(https://www.amazon.com/Peoples-History-United-States/dp/0062397346/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1511070674&sr=1-1&keywords=howard+zinn&dpID=51pps1C9%252BGL&preST=_SY291_BO1,204,203,200_QL40_&dpSrc=srch)


The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

Life For Me Ain't Been No Crystal Stair

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Tuesdays with Morrie

The Death Class <- This one is based off of a course I took at my undergrad university

The Quiet Room

Girl, Interrupted

I Never Promised You a Rose Garden

Flowers for Algernon

Of Mice and Men

A Child Called It

Go Ask Alice

Under the Udala Trees

Prozac Nation

It's Kind of a Funny Story

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

The Yellow Wallpaper

The Bell Jar

The Outsiders

To Kill a Mockingbird

Came here to recommend Vetter!

Also, please see this list from our Wiki:


For Professionals (Social Workers, Therapists, Professional Organizers, Etc.)

The Hoarding Handbook: A Guide for Human Service Professionals. - If you're a social services professional who has reason to deal with hoarders, or a family member looking to understand the public agencies to get involved, this book is for you. Chapters discuss service delivery systems, assessment of severity and risks to self & others, housing, public health, protective services, the legal system, and professional organizers.


The Clinician's Guide to Severe Hoarding, by Michael A. Tompkins, describes an alternative strategy to help those who adamantly refuse help and yet face significant health and safety risks due to the hoarding problem – harm reduction. The book is geared towards mental health practitioners, home health aides, social workers, and professional organizers.


The Oxford Handbook of Hoarding and Acquiring is the first volume to detail the empirical research on hoarding. A resource for practitioners and researchers, the summaries of research and clinical interventions contained here clarify the emotional and behavioral features, diagnostic challenges, and nature of the treatment interventions for this new disorder.

If you value your training, education, and bank account, please, please do not go to any Alliant or Argosy program, or really any freestanding PsyD program if possible. The amount of debt you will incur is absolutely not worth the garbage training you will receive. In academic circles, at least, I have never met a psychologist, licensed or otherwise, who had any respect for these programs or their training models. The general consensus among everyone I have talked to is that these programs are essentially traps for people who don't have the academic credentials to obtain admission to a Ph.D program, but who really want to do therapy now instead of take a year to bolster their CV. The APA accredited internship match rates at Alliant are consistently terrible. San Diego had a disappointing 24% match rate last cycle, up from the previous year's 13%. Meanwhile, the Los Angeles location has APA accredited match rates between 6% and 0% and that's with 65 to 176 students applying per year.

If you want a good resource for researching PhD programs, I highly recommend the latest editions of Insider's Guide to Graduate Study in Clinical and Counseling Psychology and Graduate Study in Psychology. These books were both invaluable when I was applying, and I think the latter contains information on the therapeutic orientation of faculty members at most of the programs included (it's been a few years since I applied and I have blocked most of that process from my memory).

Sorry these links are so unformatted... I'm on mobile. The books are used as textbooks in a lot of child life courses so they are super expensive, like all freaking text books. If money is an issue PM me and I can try to scan a chapter or 2 for you.

https://online.childlife.org/clcssa/ecssashop.show_category?p_category_id=BOOKS&p_cust_id=&p_order_serno=&p_promo_cd=&p_price_cd=&p_session_serno=166866&p_trans_ty=

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0398078327/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1462305171&sr=8-1&pi=SY200_QL40&keywords=the+handbook+of+child+life&dpPl=1&dpID=51fEbbDDdJL&ref=plSrch


http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0470555009/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1462305209&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=therapeutic+activities+for+children+and+teens+coping+with+health+issues

Some of these points aren't quite right for a neuropsychologist. A neuropsychologist typically does a PhD in clinical psychology, with a year-long internship in neuropsych followed by a postdoctoral position in neuropsychology. They then need to get licensed and often board certified.

Clinical psych PhD programs are very competitive, but the good part is that good programs are fully funded, meaning that not only are you not charged tuition but you are paid a stipend for a research or teaching fellowship or a grant requiring no additional work. They pay you to get a PhD. If your grades, test scores, recommendations, and research experience are top notch, it's very easy to finish your PhD with no more debt than you finished undergrad with.

There are also clinical psych PsyD programs, which are like a PhD but more geared toward clinical practice as opposed to research careers. There are a few good PsyD programs, but unfortunately a lot of for profit PsyD programs aren't really worth your time and money. These have high class sizes (a typical incoming PhD class will be around 5 students, whereas it could be 100 or more for a PsyD program), and they typically don't offer full tuition remission or stipends. That is actually a pretty good way to determine if it's a good quality PsyD program: class sizes and amount of funding provided. You should also look at the number of students in the program that match to APA accredited internships on their first try.



The book Insider's Guide to Graduate Programs in Clinical and Counseling Psychology is the best resource for getting into a clinical psych program.

source: I have a PhD in clinical psychology.

Positive psychology is a field within "regular" psychology, and is a discipline that concerns itself with "The study of what constitutes the pleasant life, the engaged life, and the meaningful life". The positive psychology movement has been spearheaded by Martin Seligman, former head of American Psychological Association. He has several books on Amazon.

A good place to start would probably be Flourish by Martin Seligman.

If you want to dig further I can recommend [Character Strengths and Virtues] (https://www.amazon.com/Character-Strengths-Virtues-Handbook-Classification-ebook/dp/B0054WFG4Y/). I think this book is great, though it is expensive.

Another good one is Positive Psychology in Practice: Promoting Human Flourishing in Work, Health, Education, and Everyday Life, which is a collection of academic articles on positive psychology.

Edit: The wikipedia page also has some stuff that might be interesting.

This book has a list of questions: https://www.amazon.com/Insiders-Graduate-Programs-Counseling-Psychology/dp/1462525725/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1487821182&sr=1-1&keywords=insider%27s+guide+to+clinical+and+counseling+psychology

This is helping my ADHD relative (we have weekly appointments where I go through it with him): www.amazon.com/Mastering-Your-Adult-ADHD-Cognitive-Behavioral/dp/0190235586/

Do you have an ultra-organized friend who can go through it with you? ($40 book = cheaper than weekly therapist appointments)

>About half.

Ah, yes, >60% is so rare. As rare as the Hope Diamond.

>And that's this poll.

This "poll" is the APPIC match survey, so it's everyone participating in round one of the match.

Nice try at dismissing data that doesn't agree with your argument. You'll go far in science.

>If you go to actual universities websites and Check around you will see that there are only a handful that are as high as 50% most were in the 20-30% range.

Check Norcross' book.

>There was a thread a while back discussing this with a lot of links and comments from people who choose applicants.

Huh, there's so many threads and links, yet you can't post a single one, but you sure can dismiss the APPIC data I provided. Again, you're quite the scientist.

>Considering most take on 20 or few students and it being hard to get in, . As a BA student your likelihood of getting in is even lower.

Again, the stats don't support your argument. >60% don't have master's degrees prior to admission to doctoral programs, thus their likelihoods of admission were not lower.

>I've never had a professor that got in a PhD program without their masters.

Oh no, you bested me with your anecdotes! I....am.....defeated.....

>However I have friends in other fields who have. It seems much more common in other fields. I think that's because there is less competition.
>
>
>If you are competing with Msc graduates who have a few published papers and you are just a B.A with some side experience, you aren't going to beat them.

Nice false equivalency there. Clinical programs care less about your master's degree and more about the research you've done. All things being equal, having just a BA vs having a master's degree isn't a tie breaker. It comes down to fit, personal characteristics, and what research ideas you bring to the lab.

Finally, as I've alluded to Norcross' book in the past, I thought I'd quote directly from it:
https://www.amazon.com/Insiders-Graduate-Programs-Counseling-Psychology/dp/1462525725/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1510792237&sr=8-1&keywords=Insider%27s+Guide+to+Graduate+Programs+in+Clinical+and+Counseling+Psychology

>A Master’s Degree First?
A common question during our graduate school workshops is whether students should secure a master’s degree before seeking the doctorate. Fortunately, our workshop participants and you realize that no simple answer is possible to such a complex question. Nonetheless, the following are some broad reasons for seeking a master’s degree first.

>Low grade-point average. The vast majority of APA-accredited doctoral programs will not consider applicants with a GPA below 3.0.

>Weak GRE scores. Similarly, most university-based doctoral programs rarely accept bachelor’s-level applicants whose combined Verbal and Quantitative scores fall below 1,000 (or 145 on the revised scale).

>Scarce research or clinical experiences. Doctoral admission committees understandably desire that
you have had some direct experience with those activities you intend to pursue for a lifetime.

>Uncertain career goal. Indecision about your subfield in psychology, or outside of psychology, is a strong indicator for a master’s program initially.

>Late application. Doctoral programs hold to earlier deadlines than do master’s programs, so those students waiting too late to apply will be redirected to master’s programs.

>Terse letters of recommendation. By virtue of late transfer into a university or into the psychology major, some students lack sufficient contact with faculty for them to write positive and detailed letters of recommendation expected by doctoral programs.

>Inadequate coursework in psychology. Doctoral programs require a minimum level of education in the discipline prior to acceptance, typically at least 15 to 18 credits of psychology course work.

>Completing a rigorous master’s program in psychology can correct many of the foregoing impediments to acceptance into a doctoral program. As we describe in Chapter 8, students typically strengthen their grade point average, acquire clinical and research experience, sharpen their career goals, and establish close relationships with faculty during the 2 full-time years of a master’s program. For these and other reasons, many students opt for a master’s degree at one institution before seeking the doctorate at another. Doctoral psychology faculty were surveyed in detail regarding the value of a clinical master’s degree for gaining admission to their programs (Bonifzi, Crespy, & Rieker, 1997). Assuming a good undergraduate GPA and good GREs, the effect of having a master’s degree on the applicant’s chances for admission was negative for 7% of the programs, neutral for 48% of the programs, and positive for 45% of the programs. However, assuming mediocre GPA and mediocre GREs, the effect of having a master’s was more neutral than positive overall. Put another way, it is clearly the applicant’s overall credentials—rather than possession of a master’s degree per se—that carries the day. This same study (Bonifzi et al., 1997) and our own research (Mayne et al., 1994; Norcross et al., 2004) consistently demonstrate that Ph.D. clinical programs hold a positive bias toward baccalaureatelevel applicants. By contrast, Psy.D. clinical, Ph.D. counseling, and Ph.D. school psychology programs view master’s degree recipients more favorably and accept higher proportions of master’s-level applicants. Keep these biases in mind as you consider the selection criteria of graduate schools.

Give him a copy of "The Psychopath Code: Cracking the Predators that Stalk" by Pieter Hintjens.

https://www.amazon.com/Psychopath-Code-Cracking-Predators-Stalk/dp/1514342022/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1486357547&sr=8-1&keywords=Pieter+Hintjens

A Ph.D. is indeed often (although not always) a research degree, but Ph.D.s are trained as clinicians (and generally don't pay tuition for graduate school). I am a clinical Ph.D., and I work with patients.

An MSW or any of the other paths to clinical licensure are also clinical degrees.

I would encourage you to look at all of the possibilities before you commit to a specific path. See if your library has this book.

Insider's Guide to Graduate Programs in Clinical and Counseling Psychology

Was recommended by a Prof and it details everything you need to know to get started on graduate school stuff. It's seriously worth the investment, it will answer so many questions. Worth nothing this is primarily focused on the States with some minor focus on Canada. If you don't plan on studying in North America, the general info will still be helpful but a lot of it is about the individual programs.

There are 2 resources I'd like to refer to you which helped me a lot in my own process.

The Insiders Guide to Programs in Clinical Psych

This PDF

They look at the whole package. Obviously more competitive programs will be... more competitive. So if your gpa is lacking, you will want to make up for it with practical experience, research participation etc.

There was a book that really helped me out quite a bit when I was applying. I would really suggest getting it as it totally walks you through step by step. https://www.amazon.com/Insiders-Graduate-Programs-Counseling-Psychology/dp/1462525725/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_t_0/139-2244996-0386028?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=3020BXQAS2WEY8T4GPNC

To add to your second point, I'd check out The Insider's Guide to Graduate Programs in Clinical and Counseling Psychology as a more comprehensive guide to available programs. When I talk to prospective graduate students about choosing a clinical psych doctoral program, I tell them to look at

1. Cohort size - the smaller the better. Most PhD programs will have 5-7 students, while I've seen PsyD programs vary from 10-100+.
   
   
2. APA internship match rates - as close to 100% as possible. Due to the proliferation of for-profit schools with large cohort sizes, there are currently more students applying for internship than there are APA accredited internship spots in the U.S. Internship is important for licensure and some positions (e.g. federal) will not hire you without completing an APA accredited internship. Also quality of training at a non-accredited site can vary extremely.
   
   
3. EPPP pass rate - closer to 100% the better. EPPP is the national licensure test for psychologists. While it is difficult since it covers a wide variety of domains in psychology, including I/O psych which isn't covered in most clinical programs, good doctoral programs will have prepared their students well enough that their collective pass rates should be very high.
   
   
4. When you begin getting face-to-face hours with clients. In order to be competitive for many internship sites, you need to accrue a certain amount of intervention and assessment hours. Some programs backload the clinical portion of their training into the last 2 years, which is not preferable. Good programs will start you seeing clients in some form pretty early on (1-2 years in).
   
   
5. Stipend/Scholarship/Financial aid opportunities - PhD programs are typically funded, but you must publish or perish as recompense. For those not research inclined, that can be quite intimidating. Most PsyD programs do not fund tuition, although there are a fair amount that offer some form of scholarship. I've even seen a PsyD program (University of Denver) offer a full ride to someone. Any kind of financial assistance you can get for a PsyD program is great, since PsyD programs will typically run at least 20k per year.

Your plan sounds reasonable. A couple of years experience teaching would be valuable and look good on an application. I have heard that this is a good book on the topic:

http://www.amazon.com/Insiders-Graduate-Programs-Counseling-Psychology/dp/1462518133

Good luck!

Mastering Your Adult ADHD: A... https://www.amazon.com/dp/019023556X?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share

This is what I’ve been using at least.

Interesting that you mention this here. I'm in the middle of reading The Psychopath Code, and it's chilling to realize how many psychopathic traits can be found in some people in China. It's almost starts to feel like psychopathy is a prerequisite for becoming successful. I haven't finished it and thought much to start a separate discussion, but you can check out the book here https://www.amazon.com/Psychopath-Code-Cracking-Predators-Stalk/dp/1514342022 and read online for free at https://www.gitbook.com/book/hintjens/psychopathcode/details.

Dude. I just saw your post on my phone and ran to my computer just to reply. You know that Star Trek scene when Chekov ran to the transporter? That was me, trying to help.

And because this is r/ADHD, here is the TL;DR:

1. Mastering Your Adult ADHD
   
   
2. To-Doist
   
   
3. The Eisenhower Matrix
   
   ---------------------------------------------------------------
   
   Listen, there is this book that was recommended in /r/ADHD called Mastering Your Adult ADHD. I cannot recommend this book enough. It's a workbook that you're supposed to go through with a therapist that introduces a series of organization skills to compensate for ADHD symptoms.
   
   You see what I'm getting at? It's a book of exactly what you're looking for. Personally, the instructions in the book were sometimes so easy and stupid that they made me scoff, but in the end they had helped me tremendously.
   
   Buy the client book only. You will not need the therapist guide. I know because I bought both. It's just mostly the same stuff but with details of how to coach patient to stay on track.
   
   
   Now, about your to-do list and calendar.
   
   I used to do notepads and wall calendars too, but with a cross-platform to-do list app, you can bring your list everywhere you go.
   
   TODOIST premium costs $2.5 USD per month. You certainly should just use the free version if it suits you. At premium, it comes with full features including build-in reminders, prioritization, categories, projects, comments, and other stuff I don't use and am not familiar with. Who cares? It's not like they pay me or something.
   
   How do you stick to the list? That was my problem. The key, to me, is (1) to have constant access to the list and (2) look at the list every morning before I leave my bedroom and everytime I look at my phone. I have the app installed on my phone, on my work phone, and in my laptop as an app. Also, it is my front page in Chrome. On my phone, I use a full screen widget so the list is just a swipe away. That's the thing with cross-platform apps. You can't forget about your list even if you try.
   
   That, combined with Google Calendar, allows me to tackle my life in a structured way.
   
   Lastly, how do you prioritize your tasks? There's the Eisenhower Matrix. It's just a categorization of your tasks and there are a lot of websites talking about this and I liked the one I posted above and they're not trying to sell you anything. Read it. Seriously.
   
   I hope this post may end up be useful to someone.
   
   

Same guy? https://www.amazon.com/Mastering-Solution-Focused-Counseling-Jeffrey-Guterman/dp/1556202679

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solution_focused_brief_therapy

The only thing I would recommend is current textbooks. Books aimed at layman people are easier to digest but aren't exactly accurate.

Oxford Textbook of Psychopathology is pretty good. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th Edition lists out exactly what criteria is to be considered, and specifies categories.

No problem!

1. It's been a while, but I think this book helps to figure out the research requirements of the programs. In a general sense counseling programs seem to be more focused on practice, whereas clinical programs are more research/academia focused. Ultimately, you wont be able to completely know until you interview and talk to many current students/faculty. No matter where you go, your last year or two will be primarily focused on research.
   
   
2. I was the same way. I didn't look super hot on paper because I wasn't a superior student in undergrad. I'm in the midwest. No, where you go to school has little to do with where you end up, especially in smaller college towns where your city will most likely already be saturated with psychologists. California is a bit of a different story. Unless you go to school in CA, you'll probably need to take a few extra courses (psych of sexuality) to transfer your license. Our past faculty had to do that at age 50 to make the move to CA. Remember that you will most likely do your internship in another state, then look for a job in another state. Your nearly two years of clinical post-doc hours will give you plenty of time to fulfill state requirements.
   
   You can PM me if you would like more...

I like this or this and this

How is your junior/senior GPA? If it's fairly high, above a 3.4 or 3.5, that will show improvement over the years. Research experience, good recommendations, and good scores on the GRE will top it off, giving you a shot.

I'd highly recommend checking out Insider's Guide to Graduate Programs in Clinical and Counseling Psychology: 2016/2017 Edition by Norcross and Sayette. It details everything you need to prepare your application, breaks down schools by research interests, plus lists all doctorate programs in clinical & counseling psych, gives their average acceptance GPA, GRE scores, requirements, etc. It's a lifesaver.

Wow this is a tough call!

1. Have you considered going the psychiatric route? Med school would probably offer a better ROI than a psyd (though idk if research experience is a must).
   
   
2. I think it’s worth applying to a few PhD programs. No lie without research experience it may be a bit of a long shot, but you could pick a few from the Norcross book that place a fairly equal weight on clinical and research experience. If your background includes a lot of statistics/lab work you may be able to leverage those experiences in your applications.
   Book- https://www.amazon.com/Insiders-Graduate-Programs-Counseling-Psychology/dp/1462525725/ref=nodl_
   
   
   
3. Out of curiosity, if you are able to prescribe medication with your NP, how would that translate to you post doctorate? Would you be able to prescribe medications legally alongside of therapy? I genuinely have no clue about this but if you could, that may increase your salary range and make the ROI of a psyd program more worthwhile (this is total conjecture though).

In regards to your second question -- I strongly suggest you pick up a copy of Insider's Guide to Graduate Programs in Clinical and Counseling Psychology. It will be an amazing tool and reference point when trying to decide on (or even search for) programs in the field.

https://www.amazon.com/Insiders-Graduate-Programs-Counseling-Psychology/dp/1462518133

I have a used copy of an abnormal psychology book. I think it's a 2011 version. I would have sold it at my university, but I was too late for this year. If you're interested I can send it to you.

EDIT: I found it on Amazon if you wanted more information about it. http://www.amazon.com/Abnormal-Psychology-Susan-Nolen-Hoeksema/dp/0073382787/ref=sr_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1325007328&sr=1-7

You're looking at the Clinical Psych program for UNC Chapel Hill -- I was pulling that information for the Counseling Clinical Psych program in Charlotte. Totally different program. Probably should've clarified.

I'm getting my information for those schools directly from this guide.

If you're primarily interested in doing psychotherapy, there's also a broad variety of options for more professional degrees, from masters programs in social work and clinical psychology to PsyD (doctorate in psychology) programs that are "scientific practitioner" programs. Some Ph.D. programs are also much more focused on clinical work than others. Get yourself a book on the process! This one helps for clinical and counseling programs in the US (and Canada, I believe?); this book discusses the application process.

I'd also talk to professors and get insight from them, rather than strangers on the internet.

There is a great book on Adult ADHD that has practical suggestions and great insights: "Could this be Adult ADHD" by Jan Willer. Have recommended the book to many colleagues.

https://www.amazon.com/Could-Adult-ADHD-Clinicians-Recognition/dp/0190256311

This is where I am at currently. I have yet to try non-stimulant medications but I bought cognitive behavioural therapy books for ADHD off Amazon and it's making things easier.

I understand ADHD so much more now but more importantly I have weapons to combat my issues.

The therapy book I have recently completed is : https://www.amazon.ca/Mastering-Your-Adult-ADHD-Cognitive-Behavioral/dp/019023556X/ref=sr_1_15?ie=UTF8&qid=1518641632&sr=8-15&keywords=ADHD+therapy+book