General Health Psychology

Justification of the title

The Degree in Psychology is the basic level of training that enables one to work as a Psychologist in Spain, and is not recognized as a health profession by itself, therefore, its graduates can legally develop all psychological professional skills, except those that involve assessing and intervening on health in the health field. These skills have already been framed in the General Law on Public Health (BOE 33/2011) which stipulates the obligation to complete postgraduate training in General Health Psychology in order to be recognized as a General Health Psychologist.

The seventh additional provision of said law, dated October 4, establishes the profession of General Health Psychologist as a regulated profession, the exercise of which requires possession of the corresponding official Master's degree, obtained, in this case, in accordance with the provisions of article 15.4 of the aforementioned Royal Decree 1393/2007, dated October 29, in accordance with the conditions established in the Agreement of the Council of Ministers of May 31, 2013, published in the "Official State Gazette" of June 4, 2013.

The ministerial order establishing the verification requirements for the master's degree (BOE ECD/1070/2013) under the agreements reached by the various agents of Spanish Psychology (Conference of Deans of Psychology, Council of Colleges of Psychologists of Spain, the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Health of the Government of Spain) stipulates the basic characteristics that said master's degree must contain in order to be able to develop psychological professional activity on one's own or another's behalf in the health sector, carrying out research, evaluations or interventions on any aspect of health-related behavior, within the framework of the provisions of the Law.

In recent decades, there has been an increasing number of professionals and researchers who are directing their work not only towards traditional health settings but towards others that could be considered as emerging. The General Public Health Law is merely a response to the spectacular increase that psychological health services have experienced, which allows us to predict a growing demand for these professionals and, consequently, an equally growing demand for specialized and quality training that contemplates new contexts of health intervention, together with the traditional contexts that are already established.

Various studies show that Health Psychology occupies the most relevant place in social importance as a professional activity for psychologists (Santolaya, Berdullas and Fernández, 2002). On the other hand, there is evidence of the incomplete integrated construction of academic and professional competences in the degree qualification and in professional practice (Roe, 2004). In this context, the General Law of Public Health frames a new professional regulation in psychology that makes it obligatory to undertake master's studies for the professional accreditation of the Psychologist as a General Health Professional.

Going deeper into the areas or contexts of action of the General Health Psychologist, it must be pointed out that the professional functions of this one are related to a large number of activities related to preventive and intervention practices in very different contexts, both in those in which the different contextual elements (agents, contents, interaction formats, organization of spaces, times and materials) are arranged, in an intentional and priority way, to achieve certain health purposes, as in those others that, without having as a central focus of their activity a health purpose, offer certain complementary services and programs that do respond to that purpose. The following list includes those contexts in which a professional intervention of a psycho-health nature can currently take place:

Health and quality of life area:

• Early care centres and generally non-concerted hospitals.
• Centers and services that focus their activity on the elderly.
• Clinical-Psychological Cabinets

Scope of social reintegration:

• Penitentiary centers.
• Centres and services that focus their activities on young people at risk and in need.
• Centres and services that serve groups of migrants and people belonging to ethnic minorities.
• Centres and services that care for people in situations of social marginalisation.
• Legal centres and services: juvenile courts, adoption and foster care, abuse and gender violence, family mediation, etc.

Leisure and culture area:

• Recreational centres and services: children's playgrounds, theme parks, etc.

Scope of professional and occupational training:

• Centers and services dedicated to vocational training and accident prevention.
• Examination centres.
• Centers and services dedicated to the design, development and elaboration of virtual education programs (e-learning).
• Centers and services focused on job placement.

Scope of social media:

• Editorial centers and services.
• Centres and services dedicated to the design, preparation and development of psycho-health resources in digital format: multimedia programmes, telematic resources (Internet), etc.
• Centers and services dedicated to the design, preparation and development of radio psychosocial programs.
• Centers and services dedicated to the design, preparation and development of television psychosocial programs.

It can be observed, therefore, that the demand for guidance, advice and intervention from these professionals is no longer limited to the more formal health field (in its various stages) and has recently extended to other contexts, so that the professional sectors in which health psychologists are going to develop their work are expanding every day. This requires that General Health Psychology have a regulated postgraduate education that allows it to respond to a wide variety of needs and demands.

Thus, and as has become a tradition in the countries of the European Union and in the USA, it seems justified and necessary –for professional, academic and research reasons- to propose specialization through a master's degree in General Health Psychology.

External and internal consultation procedures for the development of the study plan.