Using accountability mechanisms more intentionally: A framework and its implications for training professional psychologists.

Accountability plays an essential though underexplored role in ensuring quality psychology training. This article considers the accountability of not only training programs but also the people who are involved as faculty, supervisors, and trainees. It discusses the essential processes and purposes of accountability and then suggests a framework that might guide more intentional use of accountability mechanisms.

Expertise in psychotherapy: an elusive goal?

It has been argued that psychotherapy is a profession without any expertise (Shanteau, 1992). We examine the validity of this claim, reviewing the literature on expertise, clinical decision making, and psychotherapeutic outcome assessment, and find it a reasonable assessment. There is no demonstration of accuracy and skill that is associated with experience as a therapist.

Childhood adversity, poly-substance use, and disordered eating in adolescent Latinas: mediated and indirect paths in a community sample.

Objective: Although many studies have identified associations between childhood maltreatment and later substance use and disordered eating, few have examined causal or explanatory pathways, and whether victim characteristics predict the development of one versus the other of these outcomes remains uninvestigated. Furthermore, relatively little childhood maltreatment research has examined Latino samples. To address these gaps, this study examined among Latina adolescents the effects of sexual abuse, physical/emotional abuse, neglect, disconnection from family, and parental alcohol problems on poly-substance use and disordered eating, and whether five individual characteristics explain or differentiate these outcomes.

Feedback in psychotherapy.

Feedback is defined as a response to an action that shapes or adjusts that action in subsequent performance. Though its pervasiveness in human behavior is noted, feedback in clinical practice is a deliberate psychological intervention that has two essential functions, information and influence. Feedback can be descriptive, evaluative, emotional, and interpretive.

Voices of the five doctoral training councils in psychology: seeking common ground on Combined-Integrated doctoral training in psychology.

Doctoral training programs in psychology are accredited by the American Psychological Association in four areas: Clinical, Counseling, School, and Combined-Integrated (C-I) psychology. Each area of doctoral preparation in psychology has its own council, which represents its interests within the field and to external constituents. Despite the fact that Combined-Integrated training programs have existed since the mid-1970s, the Consortium representing this area's interests only formed in the past two years.

Childhood experiences and psychosocial influences on HIV risk among adolescent Latinas in southern California.

This study determined how adverse childhood experiences influenced risky sexual behavior in a community sample of Latina adolescents in Los Angeles (N = 904) within a modified ecodevelopmental perspective. Psychosocial, sociocultural, and environmental mediators of the relations between childhood experiences and risky sexual behavior were tested. Many direct and mediated paths were revealed using structural equation modeling.