The data represent (1) salaries for individuals who are employed full time (at least 35 hours per week in salaried positions), (2) net income after office expenses for self-employed individuals who are working at least 35 hours per week, and (3) net income for individuals with a full-time (at least 32 hours per week) independent practice. Because many psychologists have additional sources of income from multiple work activities and settings, these data may not represent total income.

Throughout the years, the report has intentionally remained fairly consistent in format and content. Nevertheless, some slight modifications are present in the current volume. First, a new section has been added that addresses how managed care has impacted doctoral-level salaries. Second, the tables that illustrates doctoral-level salaries by selected metropolitan areas have been expanded to include more major cities. Third, a new table depicting doctoral-level salaries by state has been included.

Method

The 1997 Salary Survey was mailed in May, 1997 to a stratified random sample of 20,000 APA members. Individuals were eligible for inclusion in the study if they had indicated full-time employment in the Membership Directory database, were under 65 years of age and were U.S. residents.

A one-page questionnaire (see Appendix A) requested the following information: employment setting, type of position, hours per week spent in the position, total years of work experience, total annual earned income, full-time salary or net income, zip code of employment setting, and the extent to which managed care has impacted net income. In order for nonrespondents to be tracked, the survey was not anonymous. A postcard reminder was mailed to nonrespondents in late June, 1997. Another reminder letter and survey were mailed in late July, 1997 to those members who had not responded by that time.

A total of 8,452 members returned useable surveys, indicating that they were employed full time, and provided some data on employment setting and position, as well as on other relevant variables. Surveys were excluded from analyses if the respondent was working on a part-time basis or failed to provide data on the other variables. Eighty-seven percent (N=7,350) of the respondents were at the doctoral level and were employed full time while 13% (N=1,102) were at the master's level and were employed full time.

Organization of the Report

The report is divided into 17 sections. The first 13 of these provide salary data for a specific type of position at the doctoral level. The sections are as follows:

1. Faculty Positions
2. Educational Administration
3. Research Positions
4. Research Administration
5. Direct Human Services - Clinical
6. Direct Human Services - Counseling
7. Direct Human Services - School
8. Direct Human Services - Other Psychological Subfields
9. Administration of Human Services
10. Applied Psychology (Industrial/Organizational)
11. Applied Psychology (Other Psychology)
12. Administration of Applied Psychology
13. Other Administrative Positions
14. Master's-level Positions
15. Doctoral-level Salaries by Sex, Race/Ethnicity and Years of Experience
16. Doctoral-level Salaries for Selected Positions, Regions, Cities, and States
17. Impacts of Managed Care on Net Income Since 1996

For both doctoral- and master's-level respondents, data are presented separately for each position. Salary data for faculty positions (Sections 1 and 14.A) are broken down by academic rank. For all other positions, salaries are reported by years of experience: 0-1; 2-4; 5-9; 10-14; 15-19; 20-24; 25-29; and 30 years or more. In many instances, the number of respondents in the "0-1" category is too small to report detailed information, primarily because many psychologists do not join APA until a year or two after they receive their degree. More extensive information on starting salaries is available in APA's Doctorate Employment Survey (e.g., Wicherski and Kohout, 1997).

Each section begins with a description of the position. The first figure in each section gives frequency distributions and summary statistics for salaries of respondents. These summary statistics include percentiles, medians, means and standard deviations. No statistics are reported when the N is less than 5.

Where there were a sufficient number of respondents, salaries are presented for specific employment settings for a particular position. (Appendix A contains a complete listing of these settings in the survey instrument.) In these cases, each section presents summary statistics for doctoral-level respondents employed in specific settings, broken down by academic rank or years of work experience. Medians, means, quartiles, and standard deviations are reported.

Respondents provided 11-12-month salaries for most positions, and they are reported in this manner. The exception to this is "Faculty Positions" in Section 1 and 14.A, where salaries are reported on a 9-10-month basis.

Caveats

Readers should be aware of the possible sources of error when using the information from this report. Eligibility for inclusion was based partially on data provided by APA members in 1995. There may have been changes between the collection of membership data and the selection of the sample for the Salary Survey from these data two years later. Furthermore, some members were excluded because they did not report employment data or reported inaccurate employment data.

A 42% response rate was obtained for the 1997 Salary Survey, which is considerably lower than the 60-65% response rate typically obtained with other surveys that are conducted by the APA Research Office. An effort was made to boost the response rate by over-sampling new doctorates and by not making the survey anonymous to allow follow-up mailings to nonrespondents. The Salary Survey was originally anonymous but this was changed in 1989. Appendix C contains a summary of the characteristics of the population from which the sample was drawn, and of respondents and nonrespondents. This table provides some idea of the degree of non-respondent bias (i.e., whether those who responded differed greatly from those who did not) and how representative the sample is of the population from which it was drawn.

Data in Appendix C indicate that respondents and nonrespondents were quite similar with respect to major field, highest degree earned, licensure/certification status, gender, and distribution by region. Differences, where they existed, were not substantive. The population is overwhelmingly doctoral, but attempts were made to augment the representation of respondents at the master's level by including all eligible master's-level APA members. This was successful in that 13% of the respondents were at the master's level compared to just over 7% representation among the eligible membership.

The number of respondents in some categories is very small and the statistics reported should be viewed with caution. This is particularly the case for the salaries of master's-level respondents.

Salary data in this report are based on a nationwide sample. For locations where the cost of living differs significantly from the national average, salaries would be expected to vary accordingly. Section 16 presents information on salaries by region, selected cities and for selected states.

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