I'm a speech path, and male :jaw:
Yes, going to uni was a bit like going to an all-girls' school (only 1 other male in my year of the course, who was mature age), but the anatomy/physiology, psychology and research methods subjects are usually taken with other degree courses. I think the number of male students is increasing; I trained over a decade ago. If you're interested in the structure of language (grammar, phonetics, etc.) you will find it an interesting course. Speech pathologists also treat swallowing disorders in health/hospital settings, which most people have never heard of us doing.
Speech pathology and neuropsychology are the the most alike of the 3 courses you mentioned. You learn about how the brain functions (mainly to do with language though) in speech path as well, and how neurological damage in different areas can affect speech production and comprehension. The main difference, I think, between neuropsych and speech path is that as a speech path you also do therapy with clients - neuropsych is mostly just assessment. To become a neuropsych, you'd need to do a 4 year sequence in psychology followed by a 2 year masters, including supervised practice. You can qualify as a speech path in 4 years, or with a 2 year masters degree if you already have a bachelor degree.
Physio I would think is a much more 'hands-on' course (literally), and involves more in-depth study of anatomy. The anatomy in speech path for my course also involved learning about the whole body for the first semester, and was then specialised in head and neck for the second.
Speech path is a smaller profession than physio, and so opportunities for career advancement, if you want to go into management, are probably fewer - although speech paths and physios are on the same pay scale in public hospitals. Private practice rates of pay would be fairly similar, I imagine.
Yes Id have a chance of getting in with a lot of chicks
Don't be so sure - there's a lot of lesbians in speech pathology too
(no seriously, there are).
but id be looked at as a homo from the outside.
And what is wrong with that?
They teach people with speech impediments/impairments how to improve their speech. People whove been injured and cant talk properly. People with intellectual disabilities. Fixing them involves giving them physical exercises to strengthen parts of the mouth/throat/places of articulation.
Big misconception. You hardly need any muscle strength for speech (feel how softly your lips touch when you say 'p', compared to how forcefully you can make the sound). The 'exercises' are more like practice activities, where the client practices saying the sound/s they find difficult to produce, gradually increasing the task difficulty.
