Abstract
Understanding what factors shape individuals’ aspirations for choosing a psychological therapy career has drawn much attention over the last few decades. However, specific research into this area of career choice has been scarce, with investigations solely focussing upon gaining data directly from practitioner participant sample groups. Consequently, in order to obtain more comprehensive findings, this present research investigation, examining factors that influence psychological therapy career choice, has gathered data from three distinctive, yet, well-informed perspectives. Utilising sample groups consisting of therapy practitioners, therapist supervisors, and therapy course directors, totalling twenty-five participants, this investigation carried out conversational-semi-structured interviews, analysing the resultant material using Interpretative Phenomenological Analytic methodology. Accordingly, via the establishing of a number of superordinate and subordinate themes, this research proposes that twelve influential factors play crucial roles in shaping the career choice of psychological therapy. An overriding implication to emerge from this research suggests that prospective psychological practitioners embark upon their therapist career path as a result of wanting to combine a familiarity with human anguish with occupational wants and needs.