Mitchell M. Handelsman

A Measure of College Student Course Engagement

Student engagement is considered an important predictor of student achievement, but few researchers have attempted to derive a valid and reliable measure of college student engagement in particular courses. In 2 studies, we developed and explored the validity of a measure of student engagement, the Student Course Engagement Questionnaire (SCEQ). Exploratory factor analysis revealed 4 dimensions of college student engagement that were distinct and reliable: skills engagement, participation/interaction engagement, emotional engagement, and performance engagement. We reported evidence of the convergent and discriminant validity of the measure. In particular, we found relationships between factors on the SCEQ and self-report measures of engagement, endorsement of self-theories, goal preferences, and grades.

Training Ethical Psychologists: An Acculturation Model.

This article presents an approach to graduate (and professional) training that views becoming an ethical psychologist as an acculturation process. J.W. Berrys (1980, 2003) model of acculturation strategies is used as a framework for understanding ethical acculturation, a developmental process during which students can use several types of adaptation strategies. Students enter training with their own moral value traditions and concepts but are confronted with new ethical principles and rules, some of which may be inconsistent with their ethics of origin. The article explores several applications of the framework to ethics courses, practicum supervision, and other areas of training.

Nonrational processes in ethical decision making.

Most current ethical decision-making models provide a logical and reasoned process for making ethical judgments, but these models are empirically unproven and rely upon assumptions of rational, conscious, and quasilegal reasoning. Such models predominate despite the fact that many nonrational factors influence ethical thought and behavior, including context, perceptions, relationships, emotions, and heuristics. For example, a large body of behavioral research has demonstrated the importance of automatic intuitive and affective processes in decision making and judgment. These processes profoundly affect human behavior and lead to systematic biases and departures from normative theories of rationality. Their influence represents an important but largely unrecognized component of ethical decision making. We selectively review this work; provide various illustrations; and make recommendations for scientists, trainers, and practitioners to aid them in integrating the understanding of nonrational processes with ethical decision making.

Graduate Teaching Assistants: Ethical Training, Beliefs, and Practices

This study assessed several ethical issues and judgments facing graduate teaching assistants (GTAs). Psychology GTAs judged the ethics of a number of teaching-related behaviors and rated how frequently they practiced those behaviors. Judgments of how ethical GTAs believed various behaviors to be, and the frequency with which they engaged in them, varied somewhat based on age, gender, training, and other factors. Moreover, several discrepancies were found between ethical judgments and practice. For example, most GTAs judged it unethical to teach without adequate preparation and to ignore unethical behavior of faculty, but most reported practicing these behaviors at least on occasion. These data highlight the risk for unethical behavior among GTAs and the lack of preparation for dealing with that risk.

Social Basis of Self-Handicapping The Case of Depression

This study examined the idea that psychopathology can be used to avoid responsibility for undesirable behavior. Subjects responded to vignettes describing either male or female protagonists involved in one of two situations: domestic violence or poor job performance. There were three levels of information on psychopathology: (I) no symptoms, (2) current symptoms of depression, and (3) symptoms combined with consistency information about depression. Subjects answered questions that assessed the excuse value of depression in terms of attributions, sanctions, and behavioral expectations. Depressive symptoms significantly reduced attributions of personal responsibility across situations. Symptoms led to less punitive sanctions for the female protagonist in the abuse situation, and for both males and females in the job situation. Depressed symptoms had to be accompanied by consistency information to lower behavioral expectations in the job situation. The findings are discussed in terms of the social basis for self handicapping strategies.

Empowering Students: Class-Generated Course Rules

After we gave 2 classes of introductory psychology students the syllabus, the first class (the experimental group) generated rules for classroom behavior. The instructor presented the second class (the comparison group) with the list of rules and said they were instructor generated. Students rated the rules, several aspects of the course, and the instructor. The comparison group (n = 88) reported higher frequencies of negative behavior by class members. Students in the experimental class (n = 62) rated the instructor more positively. The groups did not differ in grades, perceived fairness, or perceived importance of the rules.

Effects of readability on the impact and recall of written informed consent material.

Participants (49 women, 23 men) rated a hypothetical psychologist after (a) receiving either no informed consent information, a highly readable consent form, or a less readable form; and (b) reading a transcript of a therapy session containing either positive or negative self-involving statements. Informed consent forms had no effect on ratings; there was a trend for participants to recall less of the less readable form. Participants rated the therapist more favorably when he used positive self-involving statements. In a second study, participants (62 women, 28 men) received 1 of the 3 levels of informed consent information and a transcript with either no mention of informed consent or a brief mention at the end. Men who received the less readable consent form had poorer first impressions of the therapist and recalled less of the form. The mention of informed consent in the transcript had no effect.

When Laws and Ethics Collide: What Should Psychologists Do?

At times the laws under which psychologists function may appear to contradict generally recognized ethical values and/or good clinical care. When these circumstances arise, psychologists must determine if a conflict really exists and, if so, seek solutions that reconcile respect for the law with their ethical values. At times, psychologists may decide to follow the law despite their ethical concerns. At other times, they may determine that a conscientious objection is warranted. The authors recommend options to consider when these situations arise and offer a decision-making process.

Informed consent revisited: An updated written question format

This article presents an updated version of M. Handelsman and M. Galvins (1988) suggested written format for facilitating informed consent to psychotherapy. Significant changes in the psychotherapy profession during the past 15 years, and the revisions regarding informed consent in the American Psychological Associations (2002a) ethics code, form the rationale for this revision. Like the original, this form is a thorough list of questions that clients have a right to discuss with their psychologists. This revised version, which is intended to be illustrative rather than prescriptive, includes new questions addressing insurance/managed care issues, manualized and evidence-based psychotherapy, and psychopharmacology.

Some principles for ethics education: Implementing the acculturation model

In 2005, the authors (Handelsman, Gottlieb, & Knapp, 2005) proposed that ethics education be conducted based on a model of ethics acculturation. Here, the authors extend that work by offering some principles that support implementation of an ethics acculturation model (EAM) over the full course of professional preparation. The authors argue that ethics education should be life-long and provide students and trainees with positive, ongoing, experiential, and supportive educational environments and activities. After presenting and explaining each principle, the authors offer a detailed example showing how various exercises from the existing literature may be employed to facilitate students’ ethical development.