OverviewSalaryAboutEducationWhere are the jobsEmploymentGenderRace/Origin
Overview
Diagnose and treat mental and emotional disorders, whether cognitive, affective, or behavioral, within the context of marriage and family systems. Apply psychotherapeutic and family systems theories and techniques in the delivery of services to individuals, couples, and families for the purpose of treating such diagnosed nervous and mental disorders.
Highlights
Undergraduate program resulting in the highest median salary ($53K): English Language and Literature
Largest undergraduate program (27.8% of workers): Psychology
Explore Pathways
Titles for this career often contain these words
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Responsibilities and activities
Marriage and family therapists typically do the following:
- Encourage clients to discuss their emotions and experiences
- Help clients process their reactions and adjust to difficult changes in their life, such as divorce and layoffs
- Guide clients through the process of making decisions about their future
- Help clients develop strategies and skills to change their behavior and to cope with difficult situations
- Refer clients to other resources or services in the community, such as support groups or inpatient treatment facilities
- Complete and maintain confidential files and mandated records
Marriage and family therapists use a variety of techniques and tools to help their clients. Many apply cognitive behavioral therapy, a goal-oriented approach that helps clients understand harmful thoughts, feelings, and beliefs and teaches how to replace them with positive, life-enhancing ones.
Many marriage and family therapists work in private practice. They must market their practice to prospective clients and work with insurance companies and clients to get payment for their services.
Marriage and family therapists work with individuals, couples, and families. They bring a family-centered perspective to treatment, even when treating individuals. They evaluate family roles and development, to understand how clients’ families affect their mental health. They treat the clients’ relationships, not just the clients themselves. They address issues, such as low self-esteem, stress, addiction, and substance abuse.
Marriage and family therapists coordinate patient treatment with other professionals, such as psychologists and social workers.
Salary
Median salary: $51,340 annually
Half of those employed in this career earn between $39,130 and $68,020.
Context: Median Salary
How do salaries for this career compare to other jobs' salaries?
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Salary growth for marriage and family therapists
Is this job likely to reward you for sticking with it through pay raises and promotions? The higher a job’s “experience quotient,” the more you are likely to get as you stay there.
Experience quotient percentile
Take a minute to look at how much you might expect your salary to increase with each five years' experience, as well as how the numbers working at each age change. Does this seem to be a job for the young or the old, or could it be a career offering steady salary growth for many years?
Salary distribution
Number employed
About Marriage and Family Therapists
How do benefits for this career compare to other jobs? The availability of health care, especially employer provided health care, and pension plans can add significantly to the value of compensation you receive in a career. These charts compare how this career compares to other careers with regard to health care and pension plans.
Employee has health insurance
Employer is providing health insurance
Employer-provided pension plan is available
Worker concerns
Some jobs are more stressful than others, and some are just plain dangerous. The following list gives the percentages of marriage and family therapists who report hazardous or difficult situations typically occurring at least once a week.
- Time Pressure (100%)
- Unpleasant or Angry People (64%)
- High Conflict Frequency (61%)
- Exposed to Disease or Infections (39%)
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Personality and skills
Can you see yourself in the ranks of Marriage and Family Therapists? Here are the skills and traits that could lead to success.
Compassion
Marriage and family therapists often work with people who are dealing with stressful and difficult situations, so they must be compassionate and empathize with their clients.
Interpersonal skills
Marriage and family therapists work with different types of people. They spend most of their time working directly with clients and other professionals and must be able to encourage good relationships.
Listening skills
Marriage and family therapists need to give their full attention to their clients to understand their problems, values, and goals.
Organizational skills
Marriage and family therapists in private practice must keep track of payments and work with insurance companies.
Speaking skills
Marriage and family therapists need to be able to communicate with clients effectively. They must express information in a way that clients can understand easily.
Education pathways to this career
Education attained by marriage and family therapists
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), marriage and family therapists typically hold a master's degree.
Sometimes the typical education identified by the BLS differs a bit from the reality of the how much education current workers actually have. The donut shows the education level held by people currently working as marriage and family therapists as reported in responses to the American Community Survey.
Details: Education and training recommended for marriage and family therapists
To become a marriage and family therapist, applicants need a master’s degree in psychology, marriage and family therapy, or a related mental health field. A bachelor’s degree in most fields is acceptable to enter one of these master’s degree programs.
Marriage and family therapy programs teach students about how marriages, families, and relationships function and how these relationships can affect mental and emotional disorders.
There are several organizations that accredit counseling programs, including the Council for Accreditation of Counseling & Related Educational Programs (CACREP), the Commission on Accreditation for Marriage and Family Therapy Education (COAMFTE), and the Masters in Psychology and Counseling Accreditation Council (MPCAC).
Details: Licensing and certification recommended for marriage and family therapists
All states require marriage and family therapists to be licensed. Licensure requires a master’s degree and 2,000 to 4,000 hours of postdegree supervised clinical experience, sometimes referred to as an internship or residency. In addition, therapists must pass a state-recognized exam and complete annual continuing education classes.
Contact and licensing information for marriage and family therapists is available through the Association of Marital and Family Therapy Regulatory Boards.
Education level of Marriage and Family Therapists
About 59% of marriage and family therapists have a graduate-level education, and 83% have at least a bachelor's degree.
Education attained by marriage and family therapists
None
High School
Some College
Associate's Degree
Bachelor's Degree
Master's Degree
Professional Degree
Doctorate
Top college degrees
Here are the top college degrees held by the 81% of people in this job who have at least a bachelor's degree. Some of degrees may link to multiple programs due to the way Census classifies college majors. Click on a program to learn more about career opportunities for people who major in that field.
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College majors held by marriage and family therapists
This table shows the college majors held by people working as marriage and family therapists. If you see "**" before the name of a degree/program, that means this field is one that the Department of Education believes is preparatory for this career. However, you can see from this list that those recommendations are far from your only path to this job!
Major
Select any title to learn more about that degree
Salary comparison for bachelor's only
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Career salary (tail) versus Career/Major salary (dot)
Does the bachelor's-only salary rise or fall with this major?
Salary for bachelor's-only
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Salary for all workers
For people with this career and major
Median
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Middle 80%
Education for Career and Major
Bachelor's
Master's
Professional
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Workers with this career/major
Percentage in this career with this major
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The link between degrees and this career
With the following sankey diagram, you can follow the top ten bachelor's degrees held by people working as marriage and family therapists, and then, in turn, you can see the 10 occupations that hire the most of each degree's graduates. We hope this provides ideas for similar jobs and similar fields of study.
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Where are the jobs
State-by-state employment numbers
Some careers tend to be centered in specific parts of the country. For example, most jobs in fashion are in New York or California. Let's see if your dream job is easy to find in your dream location! We have a few choices for viewing the data that can help you get a full employment picture.
Select a state to see local area details
Number of Marriage and Family Therapists per 1,000 workers (ACS)
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Job density versus job count
Which states hire the most marriage and family therapists? We wonder if that's a fair question since states come in all sizes, so instead let's start with the question of which states have the highest density of people working as marriage and family therapists. You can choose to view the number of jobs per state if you prefer.
Salaries by state
Let's get a feel for where marriage and family therapists earn the highest salaries. There are several choices for which data we consider and how we view that data, and each can lead to different conclusions, so please read on...
Median salary versus state ratio
We use two methods to compare salaries across states:
- In-state comparisons: the ratio of median (middle) salaries for marriage and family therapists compared to the median salary for all people working in each state, or
- Median salary: the unaltered median salaries for marriage and family therapists.
The darkest shading corresponds to states in which marriage and family therapists earn the highest salary when compared to other jobs in the state. We think this figure might be a better indicator than the actual salary for your buying power as a state resident.
Select a state to see local area details
Location-adjusted median salary for Marriage and Family Therapists (ACS)
Employment
20% of Marriage and family therapists are working part time.
We’ve found that some jobs have a huge number of part-time workers, and typically that is because they are unable to find full-time work or the job itself can’t provide full-time hours. With 20% part-time workers, this occupation has a higher percentage of part-time workers than 67% of careers.
Employer types
This donut shares the break-down of workers by employer type, giving us a picture of what employers most typically hire for this career.
Employers of undefined (ACS)
Private for-profit
Private not-for-profit
Local government
State government
Federal government
Self-employed incorporated
Self-employed not incorporated
Working without pay
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Distribution: Salaries of marriage and family therapists by type of employer
Here are the salary distributions based on employer type.
Gender
Marriage and family therapists and gender
With 77% women, this occupation has a higher percentage of women than 87% of careers.
Gender of Marriage and family therapists
Men (23%)
Women (77%)
Distribution: salaries by gender
Does gender greatly influence your salary in this career? The closer the bars are, the less discrepancy there is.
We only include salary data when the survey error is less than 20%, so you may see only partial information for some categories.
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Context: Women in the workforce
How does this career compare to other careers with regard to the percentage of women in the career.
Context: Salary inequity
The median salary for all full-time male workers in the
US exceeds the full-time median salary for women
by 19%. The situation is
better for marriage and family therapists, with the median salary for men
only 3.1% higher than
the median salary for women.
Race/Origin
Race and origin of Marriage and family therapists
This donut shows the distribution of race and origin among those employed as Marriage and family therapists.
Race/origin of marriage and family therapists
White (70% )
Black (20% )
Asian (3% )
Other (2% )
Multiracial (2% )
American Indian (1% )
Hispanic (0% )
Pacific Islander (0% )
Distribution: salaries by race/origin
Some careers might have a pay disparity based on race or origin, the closer the below bars are the less of a discrepancy is present.
We only include salary data when the survey error is less than 20%, so you may see only partial information for some categories.
