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Sunday, March 29, 2015

Ethics, self-disclosure and our everyday multiple identities

APA’s Ethics Code speaks to our psychologies — and our clients’ psychologies — on many levels.

By Stephen Behnke, JD, PhD, MDiv
March 2015, Vol 46, No. 3
Print version: page 70

Here is an excerpt:

Here our profession's rather rigid history with multiple relationships may get in the way of good ethical thinking. The belief that all multiple relationships are unethical may lead a student to conclude that a rigid demarcation among identities is preferable or necessary. Of course, such demarcations are not possible and attempting to behave as though they are is futile, counterproductive and painfully distracting. Although a psychologist who is a parent is not parenting during psychotherapy, such a psychologist nonetheless remains a parent during the session. Standard 3.05 offers a way to think about this intra-psychic conundrum.

The entire article is here.