A fellow behavior analyst colleague of mine connected me with a prospective student that shared similar interests as me. She is very interested in pursuing a Ph.D. and work in the area of health behavior change. Here are her questions, and my answers in RED.
Was it a Ph.D. in health psychology, per chance?
Ph.D. Psychology/Behavior Analysis Emphasis (University of Florida ’19)
Was it more research-focused, academic, or clinical?
Research-focused
How did you decide which program you wanted to attend/Where were your research interests?
I found a great mentor in Jesse Dallery. All of us in our lab focused on health behavior change in some capacity. I focused on reducing sedentary behavior in the workplace.
How are you using that experience now, did you find it valuable towards your work with BehaviorFit?
I started BehaviorFit more as a knowledge share of information that I learned along the way while in my Ph.D. program. BehaviorFit grew as I got better at writing, networking, and – eventually – people reached out that wanted help with their fitness behaviors.
What other certifications or qualifications do you think would be useful for creating a fitness and ABA coaching practice (or maybe none at all, just learning more content on your own?).
I’d say you need a combination of both knowledge and experience. Knowledge comes in a variety of forms – graduate programs, online certificates, mentorships. There are tons to choose from. With anything, you need to know the basics when it comes to book work (i.e., knowing the research) and formal education. But, at the same time, you need to have experience.
I watched your interview with Ryan O’Donnell a while back about Behavior Fit, and I remember you mentioning you spent a lot of time working on content and web design, and you had mentioned you found that valuable, also very time-consuming. Other than that, do you have recommendations and suggestions for growing a client base?
You have to learn to do good work and show people that you offer a valuable service. If not, the “clients” that you do acquire will not be satisfied. Learn to solve someone’s problem and your client base will grow. Then, you have to figure out how to market yourself/company. That’s an entirely different conversation altogether. You have to make it easy for people to find you and if they have a problem that you can solve.
I am really looking to expand my scope of practice of ABA into health and wellness. I am also looking at PhD programs in other areas of psychology, like Health Psychology, to try to expand the application of the science of ABA towards a more proactive approach to health and wellness (through research and teaching, along with some private clinical application), so any and all advice is greatly appreciated.
Work hard for longer than you think. Do a lot of free work to gain experience to determine if you even like the work at all. Take lots of data, be a scientist, and change interventions when the data tell you too!
