The differences between psychology and clinical psychology

While psychology and clinical psychology share similar elements, the differences between these psychological specialties may determine which degree program you pursue.

Clinical psychology, one of the largest specialties within the field, addresses a wide range of mental, behavioral, and spiritual health issues using a variety of evidence-based and evidence-informed interventions and approaches. Students enrolled in clinical psychology programs focus on the knowledge and practical skills needed to enter professional clinical practice.

Our psychology programs offer interdisciplinary graduate education that crosses and merges multiple disciplines within the diverse field of humanistic psychology. Through this approach, exploration of what it means to be human in the 21st century is expanded beyond traditional definitions. Humanistic psychology incorporates the entirety of the human experience into interventions, essentially addressing the whole individual within their unique context. Culture, personal experiences, and supportive networks are just some of the considerations we train students to explore. Our curriculum helps students develop the ability to conduct ethical and effective psychotherapy, consultation, education, and training based on psychological research rooted in the intersectionality of multicultural, mind-body-spirit, and humanistic-existential psychology.

The main difference between our programs boils down to this: The psychology programs can support the expansion of knowledge and application in various settings, while clinical psychology goes further to include providing direct mental health services as clinical practitioners (preparing students for licensure eligibility in certain states.)

“We can help a person to be himself by our own willingness to steep ourselves temporarily in his world, in his private feelings and experiences. By our affirmation of the person as he is, we give him support and strength to take the next step in his own growth.”

-Clark Moustakas, psychologist

The Department of Humanistic Psychology

Saybrook offers the following M.A. programs in humanistic psychology:

We offer several Ph.D. programs as well. These include:

We also offer several professional certificates that offer a more streamlined experience:

These programs focus on professional psychology and practice while integrating complementary, holistic practices—such as meditation, nutrition, biofeedback, and spirituality—that help students improve patient wellness and mental health.

What can you do with a degree in psychology?

With a degree in psychology, students will work more creatively with humanistic theories and practices to enhance their effectiveness. Our degree programs will prepare you to work in a variety of fields, such as (not limited to):

  • Education
  • Research
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Pastoral care
  • Developmental psychology
  • Social psychology
  • Social work
  • Shamanism
  • Life coaching
  • Community activism
  • Spiritual healing and guidance
  • Consultation

Building humanistic approaches can be challenging, but when students have the proper instruction, a strong foundation in human theory, and the understanding of the self, they will be ready to engage in client-centered therapy.

The Department of Humanistic Clinical Psychology

Saybrook offers the following programs in clinical psychology:

  • Ph.D. Clinical Psychology
  • Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, Advanced Assessment Specialization*
  • Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, Consciousness, Spirituality, and Integrative Health Specialization
  • Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, Complex Trauma and the Healing Process Specialization
  • Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, Creativity, Innovation, and Leadership Specialization
  • Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, Existential and Humanistic Psychology Specialization
  • Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, Jungian Studies Specialization
  • Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, Applied Psychophysiology Specialization

*Advanced Assessment Specialization is open to clinical psychology students only

What can you do with your degree in clinical psychology?

With a degree in clinical psychology, students will work more creatively with humanistic theories and practices to enhance their methods. Students learn to mentor and treat clients toward inner healing and capacity building. Our degree program will prepare you to work in a variety of fields and settings, such as (not limited to):

  • Private practice therapy
  • Hospitals
  • Clinics
  • Pastoral care
  • Developmental psychology
  • Social psychology
  • Social work
  • Spiritual healing and guidance
  • Education
  • Research
  • Counseling
  • Shamanism
  • Entrepreneurship

“One can choose to go back toward safety or forward toward growth. Growth must be chosen again and again; fear must be overcome again and again.” — Abraham Maslow, psychologist

What sets Saybrook’s psychology and clinical psychology programs apart?

Saybrook University was founded by scholars who understood human beings to be interconnected with the world around them, to help us relate better to one another by exploring human behavior in responsible and curious ways. The uniqueness of Saybrook’s psychology and clinical psychology degree programs lies in our heritage of humanistic, existential, transpersonal, and phenomenological inquiry. Saybrook faculty, alumni, and students continue to question, critique, and offer alternatives to many of the axioms of mainstream academic psychology and professional practice, including those of the now predominant biomedical model. Through creativity, spiritual commitment, sound research, scholarly writing, and integrative professional practice, members of the Saybrook community keep alive the spirit of innovative and creative approaches to the increasingly complex issues of our times. The psychology and clinical psychology degree programs both offer students a foundation of scholarship and practice based in the tradition of existential, humanistic, and transpersonal psychology. Learning encompasses a course of study that takes the student beyond traditional field-specific boundaries to focus on such subjects as consciousness, spirituality, integrative health, creativity, innovation, and leadership, and existential and humanistic psychology.

Saybrook’s programs are offered online or through a hybrid-online format, making them accessible anywhere in the world. With this flexibility, Saybrook offers graduate students the opportunity to impact the world through positive outcomes in their own communities.

Our shared humanistic legacy

The Department of Humanistic Clinical Psychology and the Department of Humanistic Psychology in Saybrook’s College of Social Sciences together comprise the heart of the legacy of the Old Saybrook Conference held in Connecticut in 1964. Luminaries such as Carl Rogers, Abraham Maslow, Gordon Allport, and Rollo May came together at that time to articulate the need for a psychology of the whole human being to address what was lacking in other emerging approaches to psychotherapy and psychological research. They, and other innovative thinkers including James Bugental, Henry Murray, Viktor Frankl, Charlotte Bühler, and Virginia Satir, realized an approach to psychotherapy and human science that did not reduce human beings to fragments of their life experience.

Under May’s original guidance and inspiration, what is now Saybrook University evolved as a distance learning institution over the past five decades, expanding on and giving birth to vibrant and creative offshoots of the original vision. Today, these two departments embody and impart through their curriculum a truly expansive view of the prosocial human being seeking meaning and wholeness in the context of multicultural, global social justice, ecological sustainability, and deeper spiritual awareness and connection. Our programs affirm cultural humility and respect for indigenous sources of our cherished notions about healing and living the good life.

Find Your Community at Saybrook

Saybrook University embodies distance learning, but nothing can substitute for the joy of sharing an in-person experience with your community. Our Residential Conferences bring students, faculty, and impactful speakers together for a week of safe and supportive academic, professional, and personal exploration that can change your life.

Listen to Unbound: Saybrook Insights Podcast

For those interested in our humanistic psychology and humanistic clinical psychology programs, we recommend checking out Unbound: Saybrook Insights Podcast which covers topics relevant to both graduate students and prospective students. The second episode below, in particular, features a fascinating discussion with Dr. Kelly Serafini from our clinical psychology program.


Discover more

For more information on humanistic psychology, we invite you to complete the form below and our admissions counselors will reach out to you.

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