for Providers of Psychological Services to Diverse
Populations and the American Psychological Asso-
ciation’s Guidelines for Practice with Girls and
Women.
Ethical Standards
One yardstick by which to measure the maturity
of a profession is its commitment to a set of
ethical standards. Psychology was a pioneer in
the mental health field in establishing a formal
code of ethics. The APA published a tentative
code as early as 1951; in 1953, it formally
published the Ethical Standards of Psychologists
(American Psychological Association, 1953).
Revisions of these standards appeared in 1958,
1963, 1968, 1977, 1979, 1981, 1990, 1992, and
most recently, 2002.
The 2002 version of theEthical Principles of
Psychologists and Code of Conduct presents five
generalprinciplesaswellasspecificethicalstan-
dards relevant to various activities of clinical
psychologists—assessment, intervention, therapy,
research,forensicactivities,andsoon(American
Psychological Association, 2002). Web site 3-7
provides a link to the complete document online
with 2010 amendments.
The general principles include the following:
■ Beneficence and non-maleficence: Psychologists
strive to benefit those they serve and to do no
harm.
■ Fidelity and responsibility: Psychologists have
professional and scientific responsibilities to
society and establish relationships characterized
by trust.
■ Integrity: In all their activities, psychologists
strive to be accurate, honest, and truthful.
■ Justice: All persons are entitled to access to and
benefit from the profession of psychology;
psychologists should recognize their biases and
boundaries of competence.
■ Respect for people’s rights and dignity: Psychologists
respect the rights and dignity of all people and
enact safeguards to ensure protection of these
rights.
Although these general principles are not tech-
nically enforceable rules, they serve to guide psy-
chologists’actions. The specific ethical standards,
however, are enforceable rules of conduct. Accep-
tance of membership in the APA commits the
member to adherence to these standards, several
of which are discussed in the following sections.
Of course, actual clinical practice and its day-
to-day demands can generate ethical decisions and
dilemmas that would tax the judgment of the wisest
in the field. Also, changes in our culture over time
can provide a shifting ground that challenges a clin-
ical psychologist’s judgment. Take, for instance, the
example in Box 3-5.
We now focus our discussion on several key
areas of the ethical standards.Competence
Issues ofcompetencehave several important aspects.
First, clinicians must always represent their training
accurately. Thus, master’s-level clinicians must
never lead anyone to believe they possess the
Ph.D. Simply ignoring the fact that someone
keeps referring to such a person as“Doctor”will
not suffice. If a clinician is trained as a counseling
psychologist, that is how he or she must be
presented—not as a clinical psychologist. Clini-
cians have an obligation to “actively” present
themselves correctly with regard to training and
all other aspects of competence. This also means
that clinicians should not attempt treatment or
assessment procedures for which they lack specific
training or supervised experience. When there is
any doubt about specific competencies, it is wise
to seek out supervision from more experienced
clinicians.
It is equally important that clinicians be sensi-
tive to treatment or assessment issues that could be
influenced by a patient’s gender, ethnic or racial
background, age, sexual orientation, religion, dis-
ability, or socioeconomic status. Finally, to the
extent that clinicians have personal problems or86 CHAPTER 3