Monitor on Psychology - September 2011 - (Page 86)

Candidates answer final questions Beginning in June and continuing through this month, the five candidates for APA’s 2013 president are answering two questions in each issue of the Monitor. Balloting begins Sept. 15 and the election closes Oct. 31. For biographical information on each candidate and the candidates’ election statements, see the May Monitor. Q5 What are your plans to increase significantly the number of new members and retain current members? Q6 What steps must APA take to ensure it has a legitimate, compelling and persuasive voice before the various state and federal legislatures and courts? Steven J. Reisner, PhD Q5 Our beloved association faces a crisis. For the first time, membership has dropped significantly and young professionals are looking elsewhere. Too many psychologists are disillusioned with APA’s troubling stances on important issues: on torture, crossing union picket lines, misleading members on Practice Directorate fees. When the U.N. special rapporteur on torture asked the APA president to implement its member-passed “anti-torture” referendum, that president (running again) did not do so. After council stood up to prohibit military advertisements in APA publications after “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” APA leaders (including a current APA presidential candidate) worked to reinstate those ads. Our APA … Q6 … has wasted valuable resources providing and publicizing congressional testimony supporting sketchy clandestine intelligence operations, while legislative activism on behalf of good practice and good science is obscured. Valuable longtime members, like Mary Pipher and Ken Pope, have resigned; potential new members have stayed away. I will reinvigorate membership by restoring democracy, transparency and courage to APA. I will advocate for the integration of human health, human rights, human dignity and unbiased science in our legal, political and legislative efforts. When we return to our basic values — scientific integrity, ethics, compassion, wisdom and professionalism — we will build membership again. 86 Donald N. Bersoff, PhD, JD Q5 Current and potential APA members view other organizations (state associations, APS) as more directly relevant to their needs and willing to listen to their concerns. To counteract this trend, I would urge APA to provide more substantial support to our science members, advance the interests of those practitioners who labor on behalf of patients in their private offices, and ensure that APAGS lobbies its constituents to become full-fledged APA members. We must recruit Hispanic students (future APA members) to our graduate programs, as by 2040, non-Hispanic whites (future clients) will be in the minority in the United States. Q6 When I served as APA’s lawyer, we filed 25 amicus briefs in the U.S. Supreme Court. In a speech, the then-deputy clerk of the court specifically named APA as one of two organizations that the justices relied on for accurate information. That is because the positions APA advanced were based on valid science. APA will only have a compelling and legitimate voice before legislative and judicial policymakers if two conditions are met: 1. Its advocacy is based on sound science; and 2. What it advocates for serves not only parochial interests but, most importantly, serves the public interest. Monitor on psychology • septeMber 2011

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

Monitor on Psychology - September 2011
Letters
President’s Column
Contents
From the CEO
Supreme Court hears psychologists on prison and video game cases
Antipsychotics are overprescribed in nursing homes
New MCAT likely to recognize the mind-body connection
A $2 million boost for military and families
In Brief
GOVERNMENT RELATIONS UPDATE
On Your Behalf
Judicial Notebook
Random Sample
TIME CAPSULE
QUESTIONNAIRE
Speaking of Education
SCIENCE WATCH
An uncertain future for American workers
Advocating for psychotherapy
PRACTICE PROFILE
ETHICALLY SPEAKING
Seared in our memories
Helping kids cope in an uncertain world
APA and Nickelodeon team up
Muslims in America, post 9/11
Bin Laden’s death
‘They expect us to be there’
Answering the call of public policy
Candidates answer final questions
APA News
Division Spotlight
New leaders
AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGICAL FOUNDATION
Disaster relief training
Honoring teaching excellence
Personalities

Monitor on Psychology - September 2011