I will go through the series of questions that I asked Professor Chang, an I/O Psychologist at Michigan State University, about her career, as well as the writing processes and types of communication that her job requires.
Q: 1) What made you want to become an I/O Psychologist?
A: Professor Chang told me that she knew she wanted to go into psychology because she was always interested in the interactions and relationships between people. She first tried shadowing a clinical psychologist in a hospital, but she quickly learned that that sort of work just wasn't for her. She couldn't handle the mental patients who where too far gone to make any progress with, and didn't like the environment. That's when she decided she wanted to pursue a career that was applicable to the general population of people. Since the general population of people are involved in the workplace, she decided that I/O psychology was the perfect fit for her.
Q: 2) What type of work and research do you conduct?
A: She not only is a professor of I/O psychology courses, she also conducts and publishes her own research. The main focus of her work is on occupational health. She studies how an individuals work life and experiences in the workplace relate and interact with their family and home life. She wants to find out how certain stressors in one area of a persons life can affect the other parts of their life.
Q: 3) What are some benefits to your job, are you rewarded in any way?
A: Her favorite part of her job is teaching students about I/O psychology. Its quite a feeling to be able to benefit kids like that and help them grow. She loves to introduce new students to the field and get them interested in it, not only to benefit them, but to benefit and expand the new and emerging field of psychology. She also likes to interact with graduate students and work on research with them.
Q: 4) What are your primary methods of communication?
A: Since she is a professor, her biggest type of communication is oral. Most of her time is spent lecturing, in meetings, or discussing research with her colleagues. She like to meet and discuss things with her students as well. Another big part of her communication is emailing students and other researchers in her profession. The third type of communication she uses is summarizing her data and publishing it in psychology magazines.
Q: 5) How have you learned to communicate in your field, was there anything you had to adapt to?
A: The one type of communication she had to learn was the technical and professional writing of APA (American Psychological Association). The research she publishes is in a different, technical type of language. She said that the language and writing in this field changes frequently and its difficult to stay updated and adapt.
Q: 6) What are your personal long term goals and plans for the future?
A: She plans on further pursuing her research while teaching more courses at MSU. In her research she wants to further investigate the health and wellness of employees in the workplace, as well as the stress and issues they face both in their work and home lives. Something else she plans on doing is conducting interventions with the topic of stress and work on family life so she can help to solve the many issues that workers face.
I learned a lot of new things from this interview with Professor Chang. I just want to thank her again for her time to sit down and talk with me. I feel like I am in the same position that she was in when she decided this career was for her, and I feel like I have the same passions that she does. I'm starting to thing I would enjoy this career since I also enjoy learning about the interactions of people and how their health, wellness, and stress in some parts of their life can carry over to other parts. The work place is such a applicable field because much of the general population is involved in it. I am excited to finish her I/O class and get to learn more about this field. It wasn't surprising that much of her communication is oral since she is a professor, but I was surprised when she told me the only type of writing she does is her publications. Overall, I think this was a rewarding experience to get to talk with her and I'm excited to see what the future holds for me in this field.
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