If you’re an aspiring Clinical Psychologist, here’s my layperson book review of Clinical Psychology in Singapore: An Asian Casebook.
Disclaimer! I’m not a psychologist and have no training in psychology, it’s just a personal interest of mine.
The book starts off with an introduction to clinical psychology in Singapore
And is followed by 20 case studies split into 3 demographic categories of:
- Child and Family
- Adults
- Older Adults
Do keep in mind that this book was published in 2015, so the info is close to a decade old. But here are some interesting facts.
[FACT 1]
James Cook University was the first university to offer postgrad psych programmes in Singapore starting in 2004.
[FACT 2]
NUS started offering 2 postgrad psych programmes in 2008. An NUS only programme and a joint degree programme with the University of Melbourne
[FACT 3]
Male candidates made up only 17.5% of the enrolled cohort at NUS between 2008 – 2014
Moving on to the case studies, they follow a consistent format.
Starting with an intro, background, assessment, diagnosis, integrative formulation, treatment, discussion and ends off with some discussion questions.
One of the new things I learnt was the Five Ps formulation framework that was used in the integration formulation part of every chapter.
I did some additional reading on my own on this and discovered that it’s a formulation framework utilizing five factors developed by Macneil et al. (2012) in which they conceptualized a way to look at clients and their problems, systematically and holistically taking into consideration the (1) Presenting problem, (2) Predisposing factors, (3) Precipitating factors, (4) Perpetuating factors, and (5) Protective factors.
If you’d like to find out more, the paper is open access and titled: Is diagnosis enough to guide interventions in mental health? Using case formulation in clinical practice.
I won’t comment too much on the cases as I’m not qualified to do so, but I found chapter 4’s case on Anxiety and Autism Spectrum Disorder interesting as it highlighted how the intervention didn’t just include the child diagnosed with ASD, but also involved providing psychoeducation with the parents on ASD.
Chapter 18 was also interesting to me. It was about the neuropsychological assessment of financial decision making.
The case involved an 88 year old Chairman of a large family business who initiated legal action against one of his daughters for trying to acquire a controlling interest in the family business.
And his psychiatrist was brought in to assess his mental capacity and financial decision-making abilities.
From a layperson’s POV, I felt the book provided a great introduction to clinical psychology and the examples and structured format really help me digest and understand better.
Would definitely recommend this to aspiring Clinical Psychologists with the caveat that the book is old and there might be changes to the science and the landscape of clinical psychology in Singapore.
If you’d like to get a copy of Clinical Psychology in Singapore: An Asian Casebook, you may purchase it from the NUS Press.
