Organization Efforts by Asian Americans in Psychology 491spent the first 10 years of my academic career, the director of
the Clinical Psychology Program, Ned Wagner, encouraged
me to conduct research on Asian Americans. This encourage-
ment was critical because in the early 1970s, it was not alto-
gether clear that academic careers could be built on the study
of Asian Americans.
Was the study of Asian Americans “legitimate”? Research
on Asian Americans is based on a population rather than a
phenomenon or psychological process, such as learning, mem-
ory, schizophrenia, or marital interactions. Furthermore, eth-
nic research has also been characterized as being political,
applied, or pejorative rather than scientific in nature. Although
many of us approached the work as scientists and advocates,
it was difficult to convince some researchers that ethnic re-
search was within the domain of science. Additional research
problems that we encountered included the relatively small
numbers of Asian Americans and the diversity within Asian
American groups, which made it difficult to find adequate
samples on which to base studies. We were also uncertain
about the validity of many research instruments because they
had not been validated on an Asian American population.
ASIAN AMERICAN ORGANIZATIONAL EFFORTS
The problems encountered with respect to ethnic research in
general and Asian American research in particular forced us
to struggle. However, we felt strongly that Asian American
research could not only yield much needed knowledge about
this population and have policy and program implications,
but also it could provide insight into human beings in gen-
eral. It became clear that Asian American researchers would
have to systematize efforts and to have some clout. Derald
and I, along with two graduate students, decided to start the
Asian American Psychological Association (AAPA) in 1972.
We began by finding out how much interest there might be in
such an association. We looked through the thousands of
names in the APA Directory and tried to identify the Asian-
sounding names. This was a laborious task but we did not
know how else to proceed. Nearly 200 names were identified
in this manner. Letters were sent to find out if they might
be interested in joining an organization focusing on Asian
Americans. About 50 responded with interest, including a
few who indicated that despite their Asian-sounding name,
they were not Asians.
For the first several years, we did not ask for association
dues, because we were not sure how strong the membership
base was. A quarterly newsletter was sent to members. How-
ever, we needed money because of the expenses (which
several of us initially bore). At the suggestion of Robert Chin,
who was a past president of the Society for the Psychological
Study of Social Issues (SPSSI, APA Division 9) and one of
the first to join AAPA, we approached the Division and asked
for, and received, $300 to support the association. We were
quite impressed with SPSSI’s willingness to help. Over time,
more individuals became involved—Rodger Lum, Pat
Okura, Reiko True, and Marion Tinloy. Interestingly, many
who helped to start the association were later to become na-
tionally prominent for their work with Asian Americans.
Derald served as the first president and was followed by
others such as Robert Chin, Albert Yee, Harry Yamaguchi,
Herbert Wong, Kats Sakamoto, David Goh, Andy Chen,
Nolan Zane, Chris Hall, Reiko True, and Gayle Iwamasa.
Organizers of AAPA felt that it was critical to achieve
several goals:- Attaining influence in the American Psychological Asso-
ciation.We felt it was necessary to have Asian Ameri-
cans on governance structures (e.g., boards, committees,
and elected offices) of APA. We tried to help elect those
who were concerned about Asian Americans to APA
boards and committees so that APA would have to deal
with Asian American issues. Because it was necessary to
convince APA that AAPA had a solid constituency, in the
early days, we told APA that we had over 300 members,
but we did not say that most of the members were not
dues paying! Recently, AAPA has been able to celebrate
its involvement with APA by noting the prominence
of some of its members such as Richard Suinn (past
president of APA) and Alice Chang (past board of direc-
tors member of APA). - Publications in journals.Publications are important not
only for developing research careers, but also for inform-
ing others of Asian American research and issues. Some
AAPA members felt that journals were not interested in
publishing papers on Asian Americans and did not have
qualified reviewers to evaluate Asian American papers.
Therefore, another goal was to try to have Asian Americans
scholars named to editorial boards or as reviewers for
journals. - Research grants. We needed money to conduct research.
We wanted to have input into funding priorities of funding
agencies (such as NIMH and NSF), to encourage grant
applications on Asian Americans, and to have some of
our members serve on research review groups for the
agencies. Research on ethnics was largely directed to
African Americans and Latino Americans. We felt left out.
While AAPA made it clear that funding for all ethnic
groups should be increased, we were particularly
concerned about the situation with Asian Americans.