Since 2020, the Armenian people have undergone a series of crises on multiple fronts, crises that have created challenging needs for intervention. Armenian soldiers returning from the 2020 war, followed by tens of thousands Ukrainian refugees and Russian emigres on the heels of the 2022 Russian invasion, and the expulsion of 100,000 Armenians from Artsakh in 2023, have created successive waves of demographic, economic and psychological pressures on the entire population. If returning soldiers, refugees, and emigres have been traumatized, the general population and organizations tasked with accommodating the inflow of newcomers have been overwhelmed. Anxiety, fear, insecurity — all symptoms of overall stress — have come to dominate personal life.
Government as well as private and volunteer agencies have been meeting the needs for material support, including housing, employment and education, but what facilities and personnel are available to deal with subjective needs — psychological and social support? What is the status of psychotherapy in Armenia? A report submitted to the Mirror-Spectator by Arpi Khalatyan, a psychologist leading a new professional organization committed to improving the quality and availability of psychotherapy in Armenia, identified the leading problems and innovative efforts to solve them. The following summarizes her report.
It may come as a surprise to learn that psychologists in Armenia are not licensed, the entire sector is unregulated. This means that anyone can declare professional competence as a psychologist, set up practice and start treating people in need. Without governmental or institutional regulation, no one bears responsibility for the quality of care provided, or the consequences a client may experience.
This reflects shortcomings in educational opportunities for psychologists.
Yerevan State University, Yerevan State Pedagogical University and the National Academy of Sciences are the three main providers of education in the field, plus a few small private universities that offer programs or psychology departments. University programs do provide basic education in the field, but with very little practical education or internship. Thus, highly-motivated graduates headed for a career as therapists will seek experience in small psychological centers, participate at their own expense in internships or various types of practical training, short- and medium-term educational and practice-based programs. Many students go to work in schools and kindergartens or other child-centered institutions as child psychologists and begin their psychological careers there. Others seek work as psychologists in hospitals. There is, however, also a group of graduates who immediately begin seeing clients without further preparation or guidance. The one positive aspect is that there are numerous psychological centers in Armenia founded by individual professional psychologists, which have more than ten years of experience in both practice and education, and which have trained multiple generations of psychologists following the model described above.
A Jungian Approach
