Author
Provisional Psychologist & Founder, PsychVault
📍 Perth, Western Australia
Ethan H. Smith is a provisional psychologist based in Perth, Western Australia, and the founder of PsychVault. He has accumulated over 1,400 hours of direct client contact — around 400 hours from full AHPRA registration — with experience across a broad range of neurocognitive and mental health presentations. His clinical work has included psychometric assessment (Conners 4, WISC-V, WIAT-III) for ADHD and Specific Learning Disorder diagnoses, individual and group-based interventions, and NDIS-related assessments. One of his more memorable projects: designing and running a Minecraft-based social skills group for autistic adolescents. He has also worked with LGBTIQA+ autistic clients, and brings personal insight to that space as someone who received his own neurodivergent diagnosis later in life. Ethan completed Clinical Masters coursework at ECU and has a research background through the Centre for Emotional Health at Macquarie University. He built PsychVault because the gap between what clinicians create for their own practice and what the broader community can access felt unnecessary — high-quality resources shouldn't live in one person's filing cabinet. His writing covers the practical side of working as a psychologist in Australia: the internship year, supervision, AHPRA registration, and the realities of building a practice.
Direct client contact hours
1,400+
Hours from full registration
~400
Clinical focus
Neurocognitive & neurodivergent presentations
Assessment experience
Conners 4, WISC-V, WIAT-III
Written by Ethan Smith
80 hours sounds simple. The rules around what actually qualifies are anything but. A breakdown of individual minimums, flexible allocations, group supervision, and what AHPRA actually requires.
A practical guide to the Australian Psychology Board internship pathway. Understand the 5+1 requirements, logbooks, supervision hours, competencies, and how to survive without burnout.
Everything provisional psychologists need to know about finding, vetting, and committing to a principal supervisor — from searching the register to red flags before you sign.
The NPE is not an academic exam. Here is what the Psychology Board actually wants from you, how the 150-question exam is structured, and what a solid study approach looks like.
A practical guide for provisional psychologists on the green flags, red flags, and grey areas of the supervisory relationship.
What happens to your progress if admin issues push you out of a clinical masters in semester one, and why the answer might surprise you.
A practical guide for Australian psychologists and allied health clinicians on what neuroaffirming documentation actually means, and how to spot it in the resources you use.
A practical weekly system for provisional psychologists doing the 5+1 internship — built from real logbook experience, not the AHPRA website.
A practical guide to finding psychology resources that actually work in Australian practice — covering templates, handouts, NDIS tools, and what makes a clinical resource worth using.
A practical guide for psychologists and clinicians on writing progress notes that satisfy clinical, legal, and funding requirements without turning documentation into a second full-time job.
Understand the NDIS reasonable and necessary criteria and learn how to write psychology reports that justify supports clearly for Australian clinicians.
A practical guide to the psychology templates clinicians use most — CBT worksheets, intake forms, case formulation, behaviour support, and NDIS documentation.
A practical checklist for writing clearer NDIS psychology reports — stronger functional wording, cleaner recommendations, and less admin for Australian clinicians.
A practical guide to creating psychoeducation handouts for Australian practice — clear, credible, and designed for real clinical sessions.
A grounded guide for clinicians who want to sell psychology resources online while still sounding credible, helpful, and professionally aligned.
