The Council of Representatives met in August at APA's 2018 Annual Convention, and you in Div. 3 were actively represented by Gene Brewer, PhD, and Bruce Overmier, PhD. We shall briefly summarize some items of special importance to you as active scholars. A full set of minutes of the 32 items action items is available.
APA is initiating a new strategic planning process. The process is open to your individual input as well as input from divisions. We must participate in this open process; if we do not, we will lose out in guiding APA towards the goals we value. Do promote our science focus and valuesopens in new window in the strategic planning process.
The report and recommendations from the Presidential Workgroup on an Expanded Advocacy Model are one of the most important action items. The recommendation was for a new organizational structure that would allow for increased and expanded direct lobbying for APA members' interests; as a result, science can anticipate increased activity by APA on behalf of science, education, general applied psychology (non-health care applications), clinical/counseling practice and public Interest. More money is budgeted for each for 2019 and following years. As a result of this action, our familiar APA will going forward now have two arms: the traditional arm, known as a 501(c)(3) scientific/educational charity, and a new arm, a 501(c)(6) that is an advocacy organization that can do unlimited lobbying and advocacy. In the fall, becoming a member of APA will mean belonging to both organizations with your dues divided between them. All the rest of the familiar traditional APA's income, primarily from books, journals and digital publications, will continue to support the familiar traditional scientific educational APA just as it has in the past.
Two very time-consuming items revolved around the past external Independent Review (the so-called “Hoffman Report”), which explored whether APA supported the development and implementation of “enhanced” interrogation techniques in national security detention settings or CIA “black sites” during the George W. Bush administration. The report, just to remind you, concluded that, while APA has maintained policies against all forms of torture since 1985, there was evidence of undisclosed coordination between some APA officials and military psychologists that resulted in ethical guidance for psychologists working in national security settings that was no more restrictive than Defense Department interrogation guidelines. One action taken at this meeting was the agreement to remove the independent review webpage with the direct link to the Hoffman Report, while retaining the link on the APA website to the timeline of APA activities related to detainee welfare. The Council agreed that the timeline would also include reference to the pending legal actions that allege possible inaccuracies in the report. Based on the Hoffman Report, action at an earlier APA Council meeting upheld the ban on all military psychologists from providing services to detainees at settings deemed to be in violation of the U.S. Constitution or International law; this was based on an assumption that allowing them to provide services to detainees at these settings would open the door to improper treatment or abuse of detainees. At this meeting, an action item was considered that would have removed this ban (noting that other health professionals such as psychiatrists are continuing to serve detainees without setting restrictions); however, the motion to overturn the ban was defeated.
The Council adopted as policy a new version of Principles for the Validation and Use of Selection Procedures, jointly developed by Div. 14 (Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology) and the American Educational Research Association (AERA). While this technical manual might be thought to be noncontroversial, it was in fact challenged by some APA committees and divisions for not including guidelines for ensuring fairness to minorities. My reading of it is that it does in fact warn and discuss this challenge especially in situations with small "samples," where subgroup validations are not really possible.
Council also called for a new task force under the Board of Scientific Affairs to re-evaluate the literature on violent video games. This reassessment is requested because of some recent journal retractions of publications that claimed that such games increased violent actions. Also of concern was that some articles making the claim did not actually measure "actions" but expressions of interests on paper and pencil assessments.
Also relevant to members is the approval of a position allowing use of mature minors in research without parental permission. This, of course, affects many of us using advanced high school and college students in research.
Another action will henceforth make votes of individual Council members available for review by individual APA members.
APA continues seek ways for fully including diverse populations in all aspects of our disciplinary profession of psychology. (Indeed, there were several sessions on inclusiveness and "pipeline" challenges to n= meeting this goal.)
The APA base 2019 budget is in excess of $125,000,000 and is balanced on a three-year rolling average. This means that in some years, like the present one, there can be a budgeted deficit if made up in other years. APA is financially sound, with resources of investments of $51,000,000 as of Dec. 31, 2018, a fund for strategic psychology initiatives of $20,000,000 and renter occupied buildings with a 2019 assessed value of $259,000,000, but they have about $115,000,000 in mortgages on them as of Dec. 31, 2018.
Overall, the interests of Div. 3 and our sister divisions continue to receive attention and support at APA Council — when we ask for it.