Professional competencies for psychology

The Professional competencies for psychologists have not been updated since 2010, so it is time to refresh them. By updating the core competencies for registration, we can ensure they are contemporary, and we can be confident that psychologists are properly trained and qualified to safely and effectively deliver services in our current context and into the future.

The Professional competencies for psychologists include the following improvements:

• All the competencies are listed in one document, rather than several documents (as they are now). This will improve understanding about the knowledge and skills expected of a psychologist and will make it easier for psychologists to develop their annual CPD learning plan.
• There is a greater emphasis on professional reflection and reflexivity, purposeful and deliberate practice and self-care (new Competency 3), to help pracitioners to practise professionally and safely in a sustainable way.
• Competency 7 has been enhanced to better address the diversity in the Australian community, and in turn to require psychologists to work with sensitivity and respect with the diversity of clients, colleagues and others they are likely to encounter in their day-to-day work.
• Competency 8 has been enhanced to emphasise culturally safe care with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples, families and communities in line with the changes to the National Law and the commitment made by those implementing the National Scheme and the Board to achieve equity in health outcomes between First Nations Peoples and other Australians.
• There is a greater emphasis on digital competence due to the increasing use and reliance on digital technology in psychology practice.

Yes. The Professional competencies for psychologists have been published on our website at least 12 months before they come into effect on 1 December 2025.

This transition will support the current workforce by giving psychologists time to complete a self-assessment against the updated competencies and to plan any continuing professional devleopment (CPD) that is needed relevant to their professional role and context of work (i.e. scope of practice).

The transition will also support the future workforce by providing the Australian Psychology Accreditation Council (APAC) time to work with higher education providers to incorporate the updated competencies into their curriculum and align expectations for graduate outcomes.

Since the updated competencies improve on the current competencies that have been in use since 2010, psychologists will not be starting from a basis of ‘no competence’. The updated competencies enhance the current requirements and provide additional clarity about what is expected. The purpose of the transition period is for psychologists and other stakeholders to become familiar with these improvements.

The national psychology exam will be based on the updated competencies in the first exam period after the Professional competencies for psychologists come into effect on 1 December 2025. This means that the February 2026 exam period will include exam items that assess the updated competencies.

We will be consulting on the updates to the Guidelines for the national psychology exam and the exam curriculum during 2024. We will publish an advance copy of the curriculum when it has been finalised after this consultation to give you time to prepare before the exams in 2026. We encourage all exam candidates and their supervisors to familarise themselves with this consultation.

If you plan to sit the exam in 2026, now is the time to start including the updated general registration competencies into your exam study plan.

What you need to do will depend on where you are up to in your training when the Professional competencies for psychologists come into effect, and whether your training was based on the current or the updated competencies. Please see the table below .

Updated general registration competencies will not affect your general registration as a psychologist. Practitioners who currently hold general registration will remain registered when the updated competencies come into effect.

Psychologists will need to become familiar with the Professional competencies for psychologists including the enhancements to:

Competency 3: Exercises professional reflexivity, purposeful and deliberate practice, and self-care.

Competency 7: Demonstrates a health equity and human rights approach when working with people from diverse groups.

Competency 8: Demonstrates a health equity and human rights approach when working with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples, families, and communities.

Instead of self-assessing against the current competencies when developing your continuing professional development (CPD) learning plan each year, you will self-assess against the updated competencies as relevant to your scope of practice.

Any CPD to meet, refresh, extend or improve your knowledge and skills can be done as part of the 30 hours of CPD that all psychologists complete each year to maintain registration. CPD includes a variety of learning modes such as: reading, workshops, seminars, conferences, professional podcasts or DVDs, active CPD, master classes, supervision, and reflective and reflexive professional practice.

You are already familiar with the CPD requirements and how to engage in supervision and learning to ensure you are a safe and effective practitioner. You can apply these same learning processes to ensure you meet the updated competencies.

The updated competencies for general registration will not result in any changes to the application timeframes, application process, or the requirement to complete the transitional program.

If you apply for general registration after the updated competencies come into effect, the transitional program must include assessment of competence against the updated competencies as shown in the table below. The national psychology exam will be based on the updated competencies after the Professional competencies for psychologists come into effect.

Higher education providers (HEPs), will need to become familiar with the Professional competencies for psychologists including the enhancements to Competencies 3, 7 and 8.

The Australian Psychology Accreditation Council (APAC) updated the accreditation standards in 2019, and many of the proposed improvements to the Board’s general registration competencies are already incorporated into the graduate competencies.

APAC will continue to work with HEP’s to ensure the Board’s competencies and the graduate competencies align. While higher degree students will have to meet all the competencies for registration by the end of their sixth year of training, those doing the Master of Professional Psychology will need to achieve some of the competencies at the fifth year, with the remaining being demonstrated by the end of their one-year internship program.

It is anticipated that enhancements to units of study to include the updated comptencies will be primarily subsumed within the usual quality assurance processes HEPs and accredited training providers do when revising course content, and will be assessed via the usual APAC course re-accreditation processes.

Employers who use the general registration competencies to inform their selection processes (e.g., key selection criteria), role descriptions and performance management processes will need to become familiar with the Professional competencies for psychologists including the enhancements to Competencies 3, 7 and 8, and update their relevant documentation.

Employers and organisations who offer continuing professional development (CPD) opportunities to their staff may wish to focus any upcoming CPD opportunities on the three competencies that have undergone the most change (C3, C7 and C8), to help their staff to transition to the updated competencies.

Supervisors will need to:

1) Become familiar with the Professional competencies for psychologists including the enhancements to Competencies 3, 7 and 8.

2) Complete your own self-assessment against the updated competencies and engage in CPD in any areas where you find gaps that are relevant to your scope of practice and supervisory role.

3) Help your supervisees to self-assess against the updated competencies and to develop an outcome-focused learning plan for achieving any learning goals.

4) Assess supervisees against the updated competencies when providing supervision for training purposes (e.g. placements, internship programs). There is no change to the processes you use to assess supervisee knowledge, skills and abilities. You will continue to use your current assessment methods (e.g. direct observation, reflective practice, review of practice documents, periodic review and feedback of competence).

Supervisors who hold Board-approved supervisor status (BAS) can continue to supervise provisional psychologists and registrars throughout the transition to the updated competencies. We expect you will continue to supervise within your scope of practice and within your limits of competence and refer supervisees to other professional supports for advice where appropriate.

No. The Professional competencies for psychologists do not alter the criteria or process for how we manage concerns (complaints or notifications). It will remain the same as it is now. This means that we do not take regulatory action when a practitioner safely practices within their scope of practice and does not engage in behaviour that places the public at risk.

Yes. Area of practice endorsement (AoPE) is not a registration category. It is a notation to be included on a psychologist’s record on the public register of practitioners to show that the psychologist has completed a Board-approved qualification and a period of supervised practice (registrar program) in an approved area of practice.

This means that psychologists who have an endorsement hold general registration. Graduates of a higher degree program must meet all eight general registration competencies when applying for general registration as a psychologist. If you have successfully completed the higher degree pathway by graduating from an approved program of study in Australia, you will automatically meet the required competencies for general registration.

On renewal of general registration (30 November each year) you will need to meet all eight general registration competencies as relevant to your individual scope of practice in addition to meeting the specific competencies relevant to your area of practice endorsement.