James W. Lichtenberg

When educators confront child abuse: an analysis of the decision to report.

Five scenarios of child abuse were used to study the recognition and reporting of child abuse in a sample of 664 teachers, counselors, school psychologists, principals, and district superintendents. The following results emerged: (a) Reporting tendency varied by type of abuse described, forming a 3-level hierarchy; (b) reporting tendency and reporting rate were unrelated to the gender of the victim or respondent; (c) reporting tendency was unrelated to the profession of the educator (i.e., principal, counselor, etc.), though certain types of abuse were suspected and/or reported significantly less often by classroom teachers; (d) for each scenario a linear composite of decisional items discriminated Reporters from Nonreporters with 75% to 84% accuracy. Most salient in distinguishing Reporters from Nonreporters were issues involving quality of suspicion and the respondents belief that schools should be a first line of defense against abuse and neglect; (e) educators were uniform in their high level of awareness of mandatory reporting laws; (f) educators preparedness to detect child abuse differed by profession, but most desired additional training. The implications of these findings are reviewed and suggestions made for revisions to social service policies and training for educators.

Guiding Principles and Recommendations for the Assessment of Competence

This article presents guiding principles for the assessment of competence developed by the members of the American Psychological Association’s Task Force on Assessment of Competence in Professional Psychology. These principles are applicable to the education, training, and credentialing of professional psychologists, and to practicing psychologists across the professional life span. The principles are built upon a review of competency assessment models, including practices in both psychology and other professions. These principles will help to ensure that psychologists reinforce the importance of a culture of competence. The implications of the principles for professional psychology also are highlighted.

Principles of Empirically Supported Interventions in Counseling Psychology

The authors present background on the development of principles for the identification of empirically supported interventions in counseling psychology by the American Psychological Association’s Division 17 and include an overview of guiding considerations around which these principles were developed. As a context for these principles, the authors present a brief history of the social-economic-professional context within which the sometimes contentious movement toward the recognition of empirically supported treatments has developed within professional psychology. Seven principles for the consideration of the empirical support of counseling psychology interventions are presented along with discussion of the rationale behind each principle.

Competency Assessment Models

This article describes characteristics of alternative assessment models deployed in the measurement of professional competencies across the professional life span based on the work of the American Psychological Association Task Force on the Assessment of Competence in Professional Psychology. Assessments of knowledge, decision making, performance and personal attributes, as well as integrated practice-based skills and tasks are described and compared on the basis of their validity, feasibility and practicality, fidelity, and relevance at difference stages of professional development. It is acknowledged that no single assessment can evaluate all competencies and that assessments can be combined in complementary ways. Assessments deployed in the nursing, dental, and medical professions are reviewed and contrasted with current practices in psychology. At the licensure level, differences in the assessments deployed among the 4 healthcare professions are described, and their candidate fees and number of candidates assessed annually are documented. Ideas for developing new assessments in psychology are discussed on the basis of the needs and financial resources available to psychology and the experiences of other healthcare professions.

Challenges to the Assessment of Competence and Competencies

Challenges to the assessment of competence and competencies in professional psychology are discussed in this article. These include difficulties in defining competencies in precise and measurable terms; reaching agreement within the profession about the key elements of each competence domain; establishing an armamentarium of tools for assessing all components of competence, including the knowledge base, skills, and attitudes (and their integration); determining appropriate agreed-upon minimal levels of competence for individuals at different levels of professional development and when “competence problems” exist for individuals; assuring the fidelity of competency assessments; and establishing mechanisms for providing effective evaluative feedback and remediation. But even if these challenges JAMES W. LICHTENBERG received his PhD in counseling psychology from the University of Minnesota. He is a professor of counseling psychology and the associate dean for graduate programs and research at the University of Kansas. His areas of professional interest and research include social interaction processes and dynamics, legal and ethical issues in counseling and psychotherapy, and clinical training. SANFORD M. PORTNOY received his PhD in clinical psychology from the University of Massachusetts. He is on the faculty of the Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology, where he serves as director of the Center for the Study of Psychology and Divorce, and is a member of Needham Psychotherapy Associates in Needham, Massachusetts, and of Portnoy Associates in Newton, Massachusetts. His professional and research interests include the psychology of divorce and the effects of the legal divorce process on families, couples therapy, and teaching legal professionals the skills to relate more effectively to their clients. MURIEL J. BEBEAU received her PhD in educational psychology from Arizona State University. She is a professor in the School of Dentistry at the University of Minnesota, faculty associate in the university’s Center for Bioethics, and director of the Center for the Study of Ethical Development. Her scholarly work integrates the psychology of morality with ethics and dentistry to design and validate assessment strategies and teaching methods to promote professional ethical development. IRENE W. LEIGH received her PhD in clinical psychology from New York University. She is a professor in the clinical psychology doctoral program at Gallaudet University in Washington, DC. Her presentations, research, and publications have focused on deaf people and issues related to identity, multiculturalism, parenting, attachment, depression, and cochlear implants. PAUL D. NELSON received his PhD from the University of Chicago. He recently retired as the deputy director of education and director of graduate and postdoctoral education and training for the Education Directorate of the American Psychological Association. His focus has been on graduate

Counseling Psychology's Focus on Positive Aspects of Human Functioning

The Major Contribution aims to provide interrelated articles that examine how counseling psychologys past and the complex world we live and work in bear on our professional understanding of human strengths and positive life outcomes. In this article, the authors examine the historical underpinnings of the positive in psychology, analyze the focus on the positive in counseling psychology scholarship through the decades (via a content analysis), and review scholarship that has shaped the strength-based work of professionals throughout applied psychology. The content analysis of a random selection of 20% (N = 1,135) of the articles published in the Journal of Counseling Psychology (JCP), The Counseling Psychologist (TCP), theJournal of Career Assessment (JCA), and theJournal of Multicultural Counseling and Development (JMCD) revealed that about 29% have a positive focus. This article calls attention to the positive in counseling psychology, and the authors encourage its members to reaffirm its unique positive focus by focusing more on strength in practice and research.

Archival Description of Counseling Psychology

Counseling psychology is a general practice and health service–provider specialty in professional psychology. It focuses on personal and interper sonal functioning across the life span and on emotional, social, vocational, educational, health-related, developmental and organizational concerns. Counseling psychology centers on typical or normal developmental issues as well as atypical or disordered development as it applies to human experience from individual, family, group, systems, and organizational perspectives. Counseling psychologists help people with physical, emotional, and mental disorders improve well-being, alleviate distress and maladjustment, and reslove crises. In addition, practitioners in this professional specialty provide assessment, diagnosis, and treatment of psychopathology.

Compromise in Career Decision Making: A Test of Gottfredson's Theory.

Abstract The present study tested Gottfredson’s revised theory of circumscription and compromise. Consistent with the theory, it was predicted that individuals engaging in a low degree of compromise would place greatest importance on interests followed by prestige, and then sex-type. In a moderate degree of compromise situation, it was expected that individuals would place greatest importance on prestige followed by interests, and then sex-type. For individuals engaging in a high degree of compromise, sex-type was hypothesized to be most important followed by prestige, and then interests. Using a heterogeneous sample of 119 university students, partial support for Gottfredson’s (1996) revised theory was found. Participants engaging in a low degree of career compromise placed greatest importance on interests, followed by prestige, and then sex-type. However, within the moderate and high compromise conditions, there were no significant differences between prestige and sex-type, although both were significantly greater than interests. It was concluded that more research investigating these changes is needed.

Ideographic concept mapping in counseling psychology research: Conceptual overview, methodology, and an illustration

This article provides an overview of the research approach called concept mapping at conceptual, methodological, and practical levels. The relevance of the approach to counseling psychology research is discussed, and the approach is located conceptually in the realm of qualitative methods available to counseling psychology researchers. To illustrate ideographic concept mapping, the authors collect, present, and discuss data from 2 psychologists regarding their conception of the scientist-practitioner construct.

Stability and Change in Counseling Psychologists' Identities, Roles, Functions, and Career Satisfaction Across 15 Years

The authors examined changes in the profession of counseling psychology by comparing results of similar surveys of Society of Counseling Psychology (SCP) members administered 15 years apart (in 1985 and 2000). The authors found the roles and settings of SCP members were relatively stable across this period but observed that notably fewer respondents were engaged in vocational counseling or vocational assessment and that the proportion of women SCP members nearly doubled over this time period. Year 2000 data also included the responses of counseling psychologists who were not SCP members. Numerous differences emerged from a comparison of SCP members and nonmembers. For example, members were more likely than nonmembers to (a) be employed in university settings, (b) identify as academics, (c) be either an American Psychological Association (APA) fellow or an American Board of Professional Psychology (ABPP) diplomate, and (d) publish in professional outlets.