Psychologist Expert
AfterQuery • Remote, United States
Education
PhD
Type
Hourly
Pay Rate
$122/hr
Listed
29d ago
About this role
From the AfterQuery listing
Licensed psychologists to build the clinical and behavioral scenarios frontier AI labs use to test model judgment and safety.
AfterQuery builds the expert evaluation data that frontier AI labs use to measure and improve their models. We're hiring licensed psychologists as contractors to author and grade the clinical and behavioral scenarios those evaluations run on.
What you'll actually do
Author realistic clinical vignettes, including risk assessment and ethical dilemmas
Write reference responses with the clinical reasoning and safety framing behind each call
Grade model output for clinical accuracy, ethics, and risk handling
Flag responses that are warm, fluent, and wrong about risk, and say precisely why
Who this is for
PhD or PsyD with an active, unencumbered US license
2+ years of clinical or research practice after licensure
Depth in assessment, psychotherapy, or psychological testing
You can write clinical reasoning clearly enough for another psychologist to follow it
Contract and pay
$90 to $155/hr, paid weekly via Stripe. Your rate is set from your experience, not negotiated down after you start.
Remote and fully async. No fixed hours.
Minimum 10 hours per week, no maximum. Scale up or down week to week.
No screen recording, no keystroke monitoring, no idle timers.
Independent contractor. Ongoing project work rather than single task batches.
How our hiring process works
Apply at /apply/psychologist-expert. About five minutes. Resume plus a few structured questions.
Resume review. Every application gets read against a published rubric and gets a decision.
Written assessment. You may be asked to take a written assessment for further placement.
Onboarding. Sign the contractor agreement, connect Stripe, and get platform access.
Project match. You're matched to live work in your specialty, usually within a week of onboarding.
About AfterQuery
AfterQuery is an expert data lab. We build the evaluation and training data that frontier AI labs use to measure what their models can and can't do in real professional work. Our contributors are practicing professionals, not annotators, and the work is credited, reviewed, and paid at professional rates.
How long hiring takes
Across the AI training platforms we refer candidates to, the median gap between referral and hire is about 30 days. It varies by platform and role, so treat it as a rough guide for this one.
Why this role
At $122/hr, this Psychologist Expert position compensates Psychology expertise on its own terms, the kind of rate that would otherwise only show up inside a law firm, hospital, or research lab.
Talent pool
We're light on Psychology candidates
We've matched 33 people with a Psychology background against 373 Psychology listings we've tracked, so most go out without one. Set up a profile and we'll consider you for a role like this one.
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Common questions
How long do AfterQuery projects last?
Typically 2 to 3 weeks at 10 to 20 hours a week. There's no guaranteed follow-on work once a project closes, so treat it as a high-pay burst contract rather than steady income. AfterQuery does re-hire specialists for new campaigns, but that depends entirely on what AI labs are training at the time.
When does AfterQuery pay contractors?
On a per-contract schedule, typically net-15 to net-30 from invoice submission rather than the weekly payouts some platforms offer. Confirm the exact terms in your contract, and ask your project contact directly if payment timing affects your cash flow.
What does the day-to-day workload look like for elite-expert AI training roles?
Slow and deep, not fast and repetitive. A single task can take 45-60 minutes of researching citations or verifying complex calculations. Quality is what's being measured here, not throughput.
Is AI training work the same as traditional consulting?
No. Instead of client deliverables, you're given complex scenarios to evaluate: grading the AI's logic, correcting its hallucinations, and supplying expert-level reasoning it doesn't have on its own. The job is closer to teaching than consulting.
What does Psychology work look like for a Psychologist Expert?
Tasks here are scoped to Psychology, not generic labeling. As a Psychologist Expert, expect to draw on real domain judgment (evaluating outputs, correcting errors, or providing expert reasoning specific to Psychology) rather than following a one-size-fits-all rubric. If you don't have hands-on Psychology background, this is likely not the right listing to start with.
What specific skills does this listing call for?
Expert is named directly in the listing. If you don't have hands-on experience with this, expect the screening process to test for it directly rather than accepting adjacent experience as a substitute.
How much does this specific role pay?
This listing is posted at $122/hr, an hourly rate. Pay can change between when we last checked the listing and when you apply, so confirm the current number on the platform's own application page before committing time.
What happens when I click Apply on this listing?
You'll be taken to Afterquery's external site to complete your application there. This listing links through a referral, but the process is identical to applying directly; the link just routes you correctly. Create an account on their site and follow their onboarding steps.
Is a PhD required?
For this specific role, yes, or near-equivalent professional depth. The credential gate is enforced at the assessment stage, not just on paper. That said, active PhD candidates and people with equivalent published research have qualified without a formal degree. The assessment is the real filter.
Can I apply from outside the United States?
This specific role is open only to people based in the United States. If you are somewhere else, applying is unlikely to lead to an offer even if you pass the assessment, because the restriction is usually about where the work can legally be contracted rather than your skills. Read the full description for any tax-residency or right-to-work caveats before you apply.