I'm Going to be a Psychologist – A Qualitative Studyof Psychology Students on Lay Psychology and Lay Counselling
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.58743/asv2025vol13no1.386Keywords:
psychology student; informal help; professional role formation; ethical sensitivityAbstract
Lay psychology is a common part of everyday interpersonal life. Psychology students encounter it not only as recipients but also as informal providers of psychological support. Exploring these experiences offers valuable insights into how students perceive the boundaries between lay and professional help and how these experiences contribute to the formation of their professional identity. A total of 191 undergraduate psychology students participated in a qualitative study using a non-standardized questionnaire with five open-ended questions. The responses were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis, with the aim of capturing students’ personal experiences and reflections on lay counselling. Students demonstrated a high degree of ethical awareness, recognized the limits of their competence, and were able to identify situations in which professional help should be recommended. They viewed lay helping as a meaningful context for developing key counselling skills, such as empathy, active listening, and respect for the autonomy of others. Findings suggest that lay counselling provides a natural space for learning helping competencies. It may be understood as an initial step towards professional psychological practice, where ethical sensitivity and responsibility for psychological support begin to emerge. Psychology education should reflect these experiences and support students in learning how to respond safely and ethically when placed in informal helping roles.
References
Ahorsu, D. K., Sánchez Vidaña, D. I., Lipardo, D., Shah, P. B., González, P. C., Shende, S., Gurung, S., Venkatesan, H., Duongthipthewa, A., Ansari, T. Q., & Schoeb, V. (2021). Effect of a peer‐led intervention combining mental health promotion with coping‐strategy‐based workshops on mental health awareness, help‐seeking behavior, and wellbeing among university students in Hong Kong. International Journal of Mental Health Systems, 15, Article 4. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13033-020-00432-0
American Psychological Association. (2017). Ethical principles of psychologists and code of conduct. https://www.apa.org/ethics/code
Braun, V., & Clarke, V. (2006). Using thematic analysis in psychology. Qualitative Research in Psychology, 3(2), 77–101. https://doi.org/10.1191/1478088706qp063oa
Braun, V., & Clarke, V. (2022). Thematic analysis: A practical guide. Sage.
Ciechanowski, K., Banasik-Jemielniak, N., & Jemielniak, D. (2024). What’s hot and what's not in lay psychology: Wikipedia’s most-viewed articles. Current Psychology, 43(16), 14761–14773. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-022-03826-0
Connolly, S. M., Vanchu-Orosco, M., Warner, J., Seidi, P. A., Edwards, J., Boath, E., & Irgensg, A. C. (2021). Mental health interventions by lay counsellors: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Bulletin of the World Health Organization, 99(8), 572–582. https://doi.org/10.2471/BLT.20.269050
Českomoravská psychologická společnost. (2017). Etický kodex Českomoravské psychologické společnosti [Ethical code of the Czech-Moravian Psychological Society]. https://www.cmps.ecn.cz/eticky-kodex/
European Federation of Psychologists’ Associations. (n.d.). The European standard and certificate in psychology set by EFPA. https://www.efpa.eu/europsy
Furnham, A. (1988). Lay theories: Everyday understanding of problems in the social sciences. Pergamon Press.
Garzon, F., Worthington Jr., E. L., Tan, S.-Y., & Worthington, R. K. (2009). Lay Christian counseling and client expectations for integration in therapy. Journal of Psychology & Christianity, 28(2), 113–120. https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1052&context=ccfs_fac_pubs
Griffiths, M. (1995). “Pop” psychology. The Psychologist, 8, 455–457.
Jorm, A. F., Korten, A. E., Jacomb, P. A., Rodgers, B., & Pollitt, P. (1997). Beliefs about the helpfulness of interventions for mental disorders: A comparison of general practitioners, psychiatrists and clinical psychologists. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 31(6), 844–851. https://doi.org/10.3109/00048679709065510
Kagee, A. (2020). Training lay counsellors in public health: Considerations for social workers, professional counsellors and psychologists. Global Public Health, 15(6), 918–924. https://doi.org/10.1080/17441692.2020.1730931
Kucharská, A., Laufková, V., Kadrnožková, M., & Šťastný, V. (2022). Dobrovolnictví jako prostředek edukace v pomáhajících profesích [Volunteering as a means of education in helping professions]. Diagnostika a poradenství v pomáhajících profesích, 6(1). https://doi.org/10.58743/dap2022vol6no1.296
L’Abate, L. (2005). Personality in intimate relationships: Socialization and psychopathology. Springer. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/b99204
Lauzier-Jobin, F., & Houle, J. (2022). A comparison of formal and informal help in the context of mental health recovery. International Journal of Social Psychiatry, 68(4), 729–737. https://doi.org/10.1177/00207640211004988
Lilienfeld, S. O. (2011). 50 největších mýtů populární psychologie: Opravník obecně oblíbených omylů o lidském chování [50 greatest myths of popular psychology: Debunking widespread misconceptions about human behavior]. Knižní klub.
Lilienfeld, S. O. (2012). Public skepticism of psychology: Why many people perceive the study of human behavior as unscientific. American Psychologist, 67(2), 111–129. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0023963
Martináková, E. (2016). Etika u psychologů a studentů psychologie: Když nestačí být psychologem [Ethics among psychologists and psychology students: When being a psychologist is not enough]. Online Psycholog. https://www.online-psycholog.com/l/etika-u-psychologu-a-studentu-psychologie/
Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports. (2024). Rámcové požadavky na studijní programy, jejichž absolvováním se získává odborná kvalifikace k výkonu regulovaných povolání pedagogických pracovníků [Framework requirements for study programs leading to professional qualification for regulated teaching professions]. https://msmt.gov.cz/uploads/Pregradual/Ramcove_pozadavky_na_studijni_programy_2024_new.pdf
Novák, T. (2005). Zásady laického poradenství [Principles of lay counselling]. Psychologie dnes, 6(2005).
https://nakladatelstvi.portal.cz/casopisy/psychologie-dnes/81988/zasady-laickeho-poradenstvi
Poláková, D., & Přikrylová Kučerová, H. (2023). Mýty o schizofrenii pohledem vysokoškolských studentů [Myths about schizophrenia from the perspective of university students]. Česká a slovenská psychiatrie, 119(4), 141–148. http://www.cspsychiatr.cz/dwnld/CSP_2023_4_141_148.pdf
Reid, A., Dahlgren, L. O., Petocz, P., & Dahlgren, M. A. (2019). From expert student to novice professional: Higher education and professional identity formation. Springer.
Rodríguez-Prada, C., Orgaz, C., & Cubillas, C. P. (2022). Myths in psychology: Psychological misconceptions among Spanish psychology students. PeerJ, 10, e13811. https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.13811
Rønnestad, M. H., & Skovholt, T. M. (2003). The journey of the counselor and therapist: Research findings and perspectives on professional development. Journal of Career Development, 30(1), 5–44. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1025173508081
Sedláková, M. (2000). Folková (laická) psychologie: její předmět, funkce a vztah k vědecké psychologii [Folk (lay) psychology: Its subject, function, and relation to scientific psychology]. Československá psychologie, 44(5), 451–470.
Somerville, W., Marcus, S., & Chang, D. F. (2019). Multicultural competence–focused peer supervision: A multiple case study of clinical and counseling psychology trainees. Journal of Multicultural Counseling and Development, 47(4), 274–294. https://doi.org/10.1002/jmcd.12158
Vybíral, Z. (2010, February 27). Bída pop-psychologie: Selhávání psychologických elit v mediální době [The misery of pop psychology: Failures of psychological elites in the media age]. Lidové noviny – Orientace. https://www.lidovky.cz/domov/bida-poppychologie.A100227_000076_ln_noviny_sko
Vybíral, Z., Cigler, H., & Šerek, J. (2022). Nová psychologie v 21. století [New psychology in the 21st century]. Masarykova univerzita. https://www.muni.cz/en/research/projects/68818
Zedelius, C. M., Müller, B. C. N., & Schooler, J. W. (2017). The science of lay theories: How beliefs shape our cognition, behavior, and health. Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-57306-9
Zhang, H., & Firdaus, A. (2024). What does media say about mental health. Journal. Media, 5(3), 967–979. https://doi.org/10.3390/journalmedia5030061
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2025 Anna Kucharská, Olga Kučerová
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Authors publishing in this journal agree to the following terms:
Authors retain copyright and grant the journal the right of first publication, while the work is also licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which allows others to share this work acknowledging its author and initial publication in this journal.
Authors are permitted to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the work in the version published in the journal (for example, to publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
Authors are allowed and encouraged to share their work online (for example, on their websites) before and during the editorial process of their contribution, as such a practice can lead to productive exchanges of ideas and also earlier and higher citation of the published work (See the Open Access Effect).
