Monitor on Psychology - December 2011 - (Page 42)

educatIon leadershIp conFerence ‘enormous change’ F Such changes mean or Linda B. Smith, PhD, psychology departments the transformation of have to change, too. “We’re the department she in the midst of a period of chairs at Indiana University enormous change in our in Bloomington from discipline,” said Smith. “We “psychology” to “psychological ignore it at our peril.” and brain sciences” is just Her own department one sign of an increasingly changed its name in 2003, multidisciplinary world. after three years of discussion It also symbolizes a future and a new strategic plan in which psychology continues that called for growth in to thrive by bringing all sorts of both cognitive neuroscience psychological work under one and molecular and cellular roof, Smith told participants neuroscience within the at APA’s 2011 Education department. Leadership Conference. The department also In an alternative future, she decided to reorganize so warned, psychology could let that decision-making is its many different subspecialties department-wide and the spin off into other departments traditional area structure and cease to exist as a is weakened, which enables department itself — just as more cross-area training straight biology departments and research. That means no longer exist on many major Just about every other field is doing psychological research, much more than colleagues research campuses. said Dr. Linda B. Smith. working on research projects Already, she said, “strong, together. It also means graduate students are no longer centrifugal forces” are threatening to pull psychology as recruited to work in particular areas. Instead, any five faculty a discipline apart. “Just about everybody” is now doing members can recommend that a student be accepted; once in, psychological research, she said, citing as examples physicists, students receive training by committees rather than faculty in a philosophers, even roboticists. “We’re not our own guild particular area. anymore,” she said. Similarly, all hiring is now done department-wide rather That dispersal is also apparent in the journals that than by specialty area. And new hires don’t necessarily have now count the most in tenure and promotion decisions. psychology doctorates, said Smith, noting that the department Psychologists are trained to think of Psychological Review as now has faculty from medicine, biology, biomedical engineering the most important journal in psychology, she pointed out, but and computer science and informatics. it’s only read by psychologists. To really make an impact, she Said Smith, “We have to think of psychology as being the argued, researchers need to publish in the widely read online hub or integrator discipline, bringing together all levels of journal PLoS ONE. Similarly, interdisciplinarity has become the analysis relevant to behavior.” n buzzword at the National Institutes of Health, National Science —R.A. ClAy Foundation and other funding agencies. Monitor on psychology • DeceMber 2011 Charles Votaw A time of 42

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Monitor on Psychology - December 2011

Monitor on Psychology - December 2011
Letters
President’s Column
Contents
From the CEO
Willpower Pioneer Wins $100,000 Grawemeyer Prize
Single-Sex Schooling Called Into Question by Prominent Researchers
Maternal Depression Stunts Childhood Growth, Research Suggests
For Boys, Sharing May Seem Like a Waste of Time
Good News for Postdoc Applicants
In Brief
Treatment Guideline Development Now Under Way
Government Relations Update
Psychologist Named Va Mental Health Chief
The Limits of Eyewitness Testimony
Judicial Notebook
Random Sample
Time Capsule
Deconstructing Suicide
Questionnaire
A Focus on Interdisciplinarity
A Time of ‘Enormous Change’
The Science Behind Team Science
Good Science Requires Good Conflict
A New Paradigm of Care
Speaking of Education
Science Directions
New Labels, New Attitudes?
Psychologist Profile
Early Career Psychology
Unintended Consequences
Better Options for Troubled Teens
Saving Lives, One Organ at a Time
New Journal Editors
APA News
Division Spotlight
Guidelines for the Conduct of President-Elect Nominations and Elections
American Psychological Foundation
Personalities

Monitor on Psychology - December 2011