Practicing School Psychology While Impaired: Ethical, Professional, and Legal Issues

Emery B. Mahoney, Richard J. Morris
Journal of Applied School Psychology 
Vol. 28, Iss. 4, 2012
DOI:10.1080/15377903.2012.722180

Abstract

Studies on impairment in psychologists and other mental health practitioners began appearing in the literature 30–35 years ago. Since then, research and related scholarly writings have continued to be published to more fully understand this concept and its components. In school psychology, however, little has been written regarding school psychologists’ delivery of psychological services while they are impaired. This is true even though the provision of such services violates numerous ethical principles and standards of professional conduct in the ethics code of the National Association of School Psychologists and the American Psychological Association. In this article, the authors review the prevalence and incidence data regarding impairment, as well as definitional issues regarding what constitutes impairment. Ethical and legal issues associated with practicing while impaired are also discussed, followed by a discussion of assessing risk for impairment in school psychologists and the presentation of a self-administered risk assessment scale on the basis of empirical and other literature in the area of ethics and professional standards in the practice of psychology. Future directions for developing an agreed-upon definition of impairment within the field of school psychology and future directions for research on assessing and predicting impairment in school psychologists are discussed.

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It is unfortunate that there is a paucity of research investigating impairment issues as applied specifically to school psychologists. As a result, on the basis of empirical research and risk assessment models developed with psychologists practicing in mental health clinics, private practice, and hospital settings, we have presented in Figure 1 the Instrument for Monitoring Psychologists’ Awareness of Impaired Responding (IMPAIR).

The entire article is here.

Social media, big data and the next generation of e-health interventions

By Professor Helen Christensen
MAPS, Executive Director
Black Dog Institute and Professor of Mental Health, University of New South Wales

The Internet is a place where we, as psychologists, can quickly learn about new developments in our area, source research papers, publish research, connect with our colleagues and clients, undertake online training, manage accounts, and keep records. For those who use our services, we can also learn about useful apps or websites that offer online assessments, psychoeducation, self-help and supplementary therapies. However, as ordinary people in everyday life, we use the Internet far more frequently. We make social connections, keep in touch with our families, pay bills, upload our exercise data from our Jawbones and Fitbits, send out invitations, make appointments, read the news, text our family members, look at television programs we missed over the past week and even check the rain radar before we walk to work. Internet enabled activities are ubiquitous in Australia, as they are in almost all countries, and we can’t get enough of them.

The entire article is here.