Challenges of Data Analytics in Psychology

As a psychology student, we all know that data collection is the one of the most important things we do
because in order to test hypotheses, we should be able to collect a variety of data to come up with a result. Research
is very significant in the field of psychology because humans keep evolving and so is their mind, we cannot stick to
our past research to come up with new discoveries. We should also keep our knowledge advanced to be able to keep
up with the changes in human minds and to be able to do this we need to collect data and conduct research. But there
are always challenges faced when it comes to collecting data, especially large capacity of data.

Challenge 1:The psychology workforce is very complex.

The psychology workforce is more complex than other disciplines for a variety of reasons. Psychology is
characterized by overlapping, incomplete data sources that all have different ways of defining psychology, making it
even more difficult to get a comprehensive picture of our workforce from a single data source. As such, we must
mine multiple data sources, which collect data on segments of the psychologist population. They may overlap to
some degree, but not entirely.

There are also multiple types of psychology doctorates, such as the PhD and PsyD. Many federal data
sources collect data on research doctorate recipients (e.g., PhD) but not for PsyD holders, making it impossible to
gain information about our entire workforce from a single data source. Another challenge is that psychologists can
have a wide array of occupations, such as practitioners, academic faculty, researchers, and managers. They can be
employed in many different work settings, such as hospitals, private practice, universities, government agencies,
non-profit organizations, and corporations

Challenge 2: There is no master data file for all psychologists.

By far, the biggest challenge CWS faces is that no psychology master file exists, where we can easily
retrieve data about our psychology students and workforce, thus making it extremely challenging to longitudinally
follow psychologists throughout their education training and subsequent careers.

In comparison, the physician workforce does have a master file. When a student registers for the MCAT,
they are given an identification number, which follows them throughout their medical career. From this
identification number, the physician workforce can track how many students move on to medical school, how many
drop out, how many graduate, what they specialize in, where they do their residencies. They can determine if there
are enough doctors to meet current and future demand. They can ascertain if there is an oversupply or shortage of
certain types of doctors, such as neurologists or cardiologists. They can easily assess the demographic makeup of
this workforce. And they can look at results longitudinally.

These are only one of the many challenges faced by data analytics in the field of psychology. It shows how
important data collection is not just in psychology but also in a lot of different fields. It can predict future trends and
outcomes that can be very helpful for the economy. Data collection is also happening every time, especially in the
generation where technology is becoming more and more advanced and data collection is much easier.
Sources:

Christidis, PhD(NOVEMBER 11, 2019) 5 Challenges To Collecting Data On The Psychology Workforce
https://psychlearningcurve.org/5-challenges-to-collecting-data-on-the-psychology-workforce/