Animal behavior career: viable for disabled person who dislikes people?
July 24, 2017 8:39 PM Subscribe
My partner graduated from college with a degree in psychobiology, focusing on animal behavior. They're having trouble figuring out what to do with it, because most animal behavior jobs seem to either require a lot of physical labor, or require significant interaction with people, both of which are difficult and extremely draining for them. They love animals and know tons about animal biology, behavior, and handling. Where can they go with this?
My partner is chronically ill and depressed. The chronic illness means anything that requires them to be on their feet for long periods of time, or out in the sun, or doing physical labor, really isn't sustainable. This strikes out: zookeeper, dog walker, pet groomer (they did this one summer and it was AWFUL), pet store employee. The depression and their personality in general means interacting with people extensively is severely draining. Veterinary work, to my understanding, involves a lot of interaction with people as much as animals (they also don't want to be involved in euthanasia). Animal training is much more about educating the owners than actually training the animals themselves. They don't want to go into research; they got a lot of experience with that in college and decided it wasn't for them. We looked into pet sitting, but they don't really want to go freelance, and every paid position as a pet sitter we've found also includes dog walking.
Two potential fields are:
1) Animal rehabilitation. This is something they think they would really enjoy. Unfortunately, it seems like jobs like this are really scarce, and require a lot of experience that you can pretty much only get through unpaid internships or volunteer work. They would especially love, love, love to rehabilitate birds (birds are their lifelong passion). This is... even scarcer of a job, and might not even be available without us moving.
2) Service dog training. Neither of us know a lot about this, but it seems like this involves a lot more just animal training/handling and less working with people. (Police dog training is another similar thing, but they flat-out refuse to do that because they want no part in training dogs to be aggressive). I'm really not sure how one goes about getting involved in this field. I guess you would probably need a couple years experience of regular dog training before you could get into it? That would be potentially tolerable as long as it's actually a viable career path. I don't know how scarce these jobs are, though.
Three questions:
1) Are there any other animal behavior careers I'm missing that would be good for someone who is physically disabled and doesn't like people?
2) How do they break into either of those fields? In the case of animal rehabilitation, is the career path basically "volunteer a bunch and wait until a position opens up"?
3) If so, what jobs can my partner get in the meantime that will still leave them with the energy to build up their experience through volunteer work? This would be entry-level work that would not require a lot of physical labor or standing, and that limited interaction (working in any form of customer service would be extremely draining for them). Money isn't really a big concern; I've got a living stipend through my graduate program large enough that even 20 hours a week at minimum wage would be enough to keep us comfortable. Some of their varied skills include: good grammar/writing, fast typing*, cooking, wheel throwing/ceramics, working with children. Can any of those get them a leg up in an entry level field?
(*They tried transcriptioning but found they have too many auditory processing problems to make this viable)
My partner is chronically ill and depressed. The chronic illness means anything that requires them to be on their feet for long periods of time, or out in the sun, or doing physical labor, really isn't sustainable. This strikes out: zookeeper, dog walker, pet groomer (they did this one summer and it was AWFUL), pet store employee. The depression and their personality in general means interacting with people extensively is severely draining. Veterinary work, to my understanding, involves a lot of interaction with people as much as animals (they also don't want to be involved in euthanasia). Animal training is much more about educating the owners than actually training the animals themselves. They don't want to go into research; they got a lot of experience with that in college and decided it wasn't for them. We looked into pet sitting, but they don't really want to go freelance, and every paid position as a pet sitter we've found also includes dog walking.
Two potential fields are:
1) Animal rehabilitation. This is something they think they would really enjoy. Unfortunately, it seems like jobs like this are really scarce, and require a lot of experience that you can pretty much only get through unpaid internships or volunteer work. They would especially love, love, love to rehabilitate birds (birds are their lifelong passion). This is... even scarcer of a job, and might not even be available without us moving.
2) Service dog training. Neither of us know a lot about this, but it seems like this involves a lot more just animal training/handling and less working with people. (Police dog training is another similar thing, but they flat-out refuse to do that because they want no part in training dogs to be aggressive). I'm really not sure how one goes about getting involved in this field. I guess you would probably need a couple years experience of regular dog training before you could get into it? That would be potentially tolerable as long as it's actually a viable career path. I don't know how scarce these jobs are, though.
Three questions:
1) Are there any other animal behavior careers I'm missing that would be good for someone who is physically disabled and doesn't like people?
2) How do they break into either of those fields? In the case of animal rehabilitation, is the career path basically "volunteer a bunch and wait until a position opens up"?
3) If so, what jobs can my partner get in the meantime that will still leave them with the energy to build up their experience through volunteer work? This would be entry-level work that would not require a lot of physical labor or standing, and that limited interaction (working in any form of customer service would be extremely draining for them). Money isn't really a big concern; I've got a living stipend through my graduate program large enough that even 20 hours a week at minimum wage would be enough to keep us comfortable. Some of their varied skills include: good grammar/writing, fast typing*, cooking, wheel throwing/ceramics, working with children. Can any of those get them a leg up in an entry level field?
(*They tried transcriptioning but found they have too many auditory processing problems to make this viable)
I don't know if this will be a helpful lead, but your question reminded me of a relative of mine with a great love for animals, particularly dogs, and iffy social skills. He works as an ultrasound tech at a veterinary clinic and has done well in that work, despite struggling with other work environments. I don't believe it's physically demanding work, the amount of interaction with pet owners is probably limited, and it may not require participating in euthanasia. It pays more than minimum wage, but wouldn't be an option right away, since special training is necessary. And, obviously, this would be a departure from the animal behavior field. But perhaps an option to consider down the road?
posted by reren at 10:14 PM on July 24, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by reren at 10:14 PM on July 24, 2017 [1 favorite]
The problem with bird rehab jobs is the paid positions are for those managing the volunteers and applying for grants. I've been volunteering with bird rehab organizations for 10+ years and the only people paid are running the organization and the interns managing the volunteers, while the volunteers are doing most of the bird related work. But I would still recommend seeing if anywhere local could use some volunteers, it might help them discover a job they want to seek out. Depending on what they want to do it might take a while, I volunteer at a raptor rehab place and I was on a waiting list for something like six months before a spot opened up.
Meanwhile if they are good at grammar and typing have they looked into data entry positions? Friends of mine have done this from time to time, they register with a temp agency and wait to get placed at an office. My more extroverted friends hated doing this since it meant they would be working alone all day with no one to talk too. Most jobs involved getting sat in front of a computer and adding information to a database. While these aren't permeant positions they can help build a resume, and the last few people my office hired for these jobs were people who came in as temps and stood out.
posted by lepus at 10:50 PM on July 24, 2017 [2 favorites]
Meanwhile if they are good at grammar and typing have they looked into data entry positions? Friends of mine have done this from time to time, they register with a temp agency and wait to get placed at an office. My more extroverted friends hated doing this since it meant they would be working alone all day with no one to talk too. Most jobs involved getting sat in front of a computer and adding information to a database. While these aren't permeant positions they can help build a resume, and the last few people my office hired for these jobs were people who came in as temps and stood out.
posted by lepus at 10:50 PM on July 24, 2017 [2 favorites]
Pet sitting does involve interacting with people but most of it after the first meeting can be done via text/sending pictures, so that might be a place to start while sorting it out. If walking dogs is too much your partner could specialize in cats and other pets.
posted by warriorqueen at 5:25 AM on July 25, 2017 [3 favorites]
posted by warriorqueen at 5:25 AM on July 25, 2017 [3 favorites]
Depending on where you are, there may be ecology survey type jobs. However, they can be physically strenuous, the pay typically atrocious, and there isn't a lot of opportunity for promotion (unless its a government job and they transition to a managerial desk position, or academia doing research working towards tenure and more research and grantwriting).
Did your partner focus solely on the animal side of psychobiology? Otherwise, they might be able to find a tech or associate position with a PI doing stuff involving fMRIs (would involve drawing/transforming raw data on a computer screen all day) or in psych research (would involve interacting with people, but as the experiment administrator, the interaction doesn't typically require "jollying" people along or suffering fools).
If they have some maths or stats background, working in a fMRI (or other neuroimaging) lab may be viable. However, such positions are typically dependent on research grants (by a PI).
Alternatively, a year or two more of training might position them to be a (f/)MRI (or other neuroimaging) tech working at a hospital, either research or clinical. Clinical positions are pretty secure, but "politics" can be problematic unless your partner has zero ambition and is ok if other people walk all over them. Pretty minimal interaction with patients, just running the machine(s).
Accredited technical institutes offer 1-2 year courses in healthcare-adjacent (healthcare allied) fields; something like radiology might suit.
posted by porpoise at 4:17 PM on July 25, 2017
Did your partner focus solely on the animal side of psychobiology? Otherwise, they might be able to find a tech or associate position with a PI doing stuff involving fMRIs (would involve drawing/transforming raw data on a computer screen all day) or in psych research (would involve interacting with people, but as the experiment administrator, the interaction doesn't typically require "jollying" people along or suffering fools).
If they have some maths or stats background, working in a fMRI (or other neuroimaging) lab may be viable. However, such positions are typically dependent on research grants (by a PI).
Alternatively, a year or two more of training might position them to be a (f/)MRI (or other neuroimaging) tech working at a hospital, either research or clinical. Clinical positions are pretty secure, but "politics" can be problematic unless your partner has zero ambition and is ok if other people walk all over them. Pretty minimal interaction with patients, just running the machine(s).
Accredited technical institutes offer 1-2 year courses in healthcare-adjacent (healthcare allied) fields; something like radiology might suit.
posted by porpoise at 4:17 PM on July 25, 2017
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posted by AFABulous at 9:06 PM on July 24, 2017