Psychiatric Aides

People in this career often have these skills:

• Speaking - Talking to others to convey information effectively.
• Social Perceptiveness - Being aware of others' reactions and understanding why they react as they do.
• Service Orientation - Actively looking for ways to help people.
• Active Listening - Giving full attention to what other people are saying, taking time to understand the points being made, asking questions as appropriate, and not interrupting at inappropriate times.
• Monitoring - Monitoring/Assessing performance of yourself, other individuals, or organizations to make improvements or take corrective action.

• Critical Thinking - Using logic and reasoning to identify the strengths and weaknesses of alternative solutions, conclusions, or approaches to problems.

People in this career often know a lot about:

• Psychology - Knowledge of human behavior and performance; individual differences in ability, personality, and interests; learning and motivation; psychological research methods; and the assessment and treatment of behavioral and affective disorders.
• Customer and Personal Service - Knowledge of principles and processes for providing customer and personal services. This includes customer needs assessment, meeting quality standards for services, and evaluation of customer satisfaction.

People in this career often have talent in:

• Oral Expression - The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
• Oral Comprehension - The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
• Problem Sensitivity - The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
• Written Comprehension - The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
• Deductive Reasoning - The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.

• Inductive Reasoning - The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
• Speech Clarity - The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
• Speech Recognition - The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.

People in this career often do these activities:

• Encourage patients during therapeutic activities.
• Care for patients with mental illnesses.
• Monitor patients to detect health problems.
• Assess physical conditions of patients to aid in diagnosis or treatment.
• Hold patients to ensure proper positioning or safety.

• Confer with other professionals to plan patient care.
• Record vital statistics or other health information.
• Maintain medical records.
• Assist patients with daily activities.
• Feed patients.
• Clean patient rooms or patient treatment rooms.
• Perform clerical work in medical settings.
• Collect biological specimens from patients.
• Give medications or immunizations.
• Interview patients to gather medical information.
• Accompany patients or clients on outings to provide assistance.
• Engage patients in exercises or activities.

• Home Health Aides

• Psychiatric Technicians

• Childcare Workers

• Occupational Therapy Aides

• Correctional Officers and Jailers

• Physical Therapist Aides

• Personal Care Aides

• Occupational Therapy Assistants

• Social and Human Service Assistants

• Ambulance Drivers and Attendants, Except Emergency Medical Technicians