Charleston, SC: This afternoon, the American Psychological Association awarded local woman Angie Parsons a degree in pop psychology, despite her having taken just two college courses in psychology.
“This is an amazing honor, and one I completely deserve,” said Ms. Parsons. “While I may not have any knowledge based in academia or research, I’ve spent enough time gathering information from other sources to warrant my B.S.”
Ms. Parsons was awarded her Bachelor’s of Science after having watched countless hours of both Oprah and Dr. Phil, both of whom have years of experience in the field. “They’re practically professors, in terms of how much they talk,” Ms. Parsons explained. “Plus, Dr. Phil is bald like a professor, and sometimes he
wears jackets with leather patches on the sleeves. And, I mean, duh… it’s DOCTOR Phil, right?”
Much like her counterparts who attended college on a regular basis, Ms. Parsons spent a great deal of time with her nose buried in books. She said that, although the “self-help” section of her local Barnes & Noble might not have as many selections as a university library, the lack of depth was more than made up for by the breadth. “In just one week, I skimmed through a book about a boy raised by wolves, one about a woman dealing with depression, AND something about improving your sex life by balancing your checkbook,” she said.
When first contacted by Ms. Parsons, the American Psychological Association was hesitant to acknowledge her efforts. They claimed that her lack of a senior thesis made her ineligible to be recognized as a degree-worthy individual. In response, she got on Livejournal and wrote a 10,000-word essay on the relevance of “Chicken Soup For The Soul” as a means of treating cognitive dissonance. Ms. Parsons said, “Granted, I stumbled across ‘cognitive dissonance’ because I was just trolling Wikipedia for articles relating to Freudian defense mechanisms, but it seemed like as good a topic as any.” After her Chicken Soup blog registered 37 hits, the APA was forced to recognize her accomplishment, since that was twice as many readings as any other senior thesis published by a college student had.
Now that she has her degree in pop psychology, Ms. Parsons is looking forward to pursuing a career as a life coach. “Admittedly, I’m not actually qualified to do anything within a legitimate field. But I figure that I can tell people what’s wrong with them and how they should live their lives, all the while throwing in buzzwords and acting superior,” she said.
In the meantime, Ms. Parsons has become an inspiration to a generation of late-twenty-somethings who never got around to finishing college after dropping out at the end of their first year. Dubbed the “post-secondary home-schoolers,” these individuals are leaving behind their internet discussion-board squabbles over the state of the economy to pursue their MBAs. The publishers of the “For Dummies” series of books have already begun work on a “Finding a Job” title for these intrepid students.