American Psychological Association
The
American Psychological Association (
APA) is a professional organization representing
psychology in the
US. It has around 150,000 members and an annual budget of around $70m. The APA
mission statement is to "advance psychology as a science and profession and as a means of promoting health, education, and human welfare".
The APA was founded in July
1892 at
Clark University by a group of 26 men. Its first president was
G. Stanley Hall. There are currently 54 professional divisions in the APA. It is affiliated with 58 state and territorial and Canadian provincial associations.
APA policy on the use of the title
psychologist is contained in the General Guidelines for Providers of Psychological Services: "Psychologists have a doctoral degree in psychology from an organized, sequential program in a regionally accredited university or professional school" and suggests "refer[ence] to master's-level positions as counselors, specialists, clinicians, and so forth (rather than as 'psychologists')." A definition of
psychology is offered: "the study of the mind and behavior."
[APA: About Us].
Due to the dominance of
clinical psychology in APA, several research-focussed groups having broken away from APA. These include the
Psychonomic Society in
1959 (with a primarily cognitive orientation), and the
Association for Psychological Science (which changed its name from the
American Psychological Society in early
2006) in
1988 (with a broad focus on the science and research of psychology). Within APA, the
Science Directorate provides support and voice for psychological scientists.
APA is perhaps best known for
APA style, a writing style and formatting standard widely used in the social sciences (especially psychology), and is occasionally confused with the
American Psychiatric Association (who also use the acronym APA).
When it emerged that psychologists are advising interrogators in
Guantánamo and other US facilities on improving the effectiveness of
torture, the Association refused to advise it's members not to participate in such interrogations.
[Break them down: Systematic use of psychological torture by US forces (PDF; Physicians for Human Rights); Stephen Soldz: Psychologists, Guantánamo, and Torture: A Profession Struggles to Save Its Soul (ZNet)] Rather than make a new blanket statement about psychologists involved in military intelligence gathering operations, APA's
Ethics Office advised psychologists to continue to follow the ethics rules set forth over the years in order to respect individual rights and the good of society.
[ Ethics and interrogations: Comparing and contrasting the American Psychological, American Medical and American Psychiatric Association positions]*
APA style*
American Psychiatric Association*
American Psychoanalytic Association*
Association for Psychological Science*
Council on Higher Education Accreditation*
Educational psychology*
Environmental psychology*
Nationally recognized accrediting agencies in the United States*
Psychonomic Society*
School accreditation*
US Department of Education*
Rind et al.*
Website of the APA*
Professional divisions of the APA
