APA 2023-Top-Trends

psychology
monitor on
COMMUNICATING PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE 3
EMERGING TAKING AIM AT MISINFORMATION 8
TRENDS PSYCHOLOGICAL RESEARCH IS CHANGING 13
in P S YC H O LO GY
EDI ROLES ARE EXPANDING 18
WORKER WELL-BEING IS IN DEMAND 23
YOUTH MENTAL HEALTH CRISIS 29
ADVANCING THE FIELD THROUGH PARTNERSHIPS 35
NEW TRENDS IN SUICIDE PREVENTION 40
FACULTY ARE EXITING ACADEMIA 46
VENTURE CAPITALISTS SHIFT FOCUS 51
REBRANDING THE FIELD 55

SPECIAL REPORT
11 EMERGING TRENDS FOR 2023

What’s ahead for psychologists and the field?
In 2023, psychological science will be at the core of addressing pressing societal issues. The future of work, the
mental health of the nation’s youth, and large-scale change will all depend on the work of psychologists and
collaboration with others.
2 M O N I TO R O N P S YC H O LO G Y ● 2023
2 0 2 3 TREND S REPORT
Communicating
Psychological
Science
to a Wider
Audience
Driven by a sense of purpose, psychologists are finding
new ways to get research and clinical advice to those who
need it
BY HELEN SANTORO
BEASTFROMEAST/GETTY IMAGES
Communicating psychological science to the public is vital, and an increasing number
of psychologists are reaching beyond their patient base, academic circles, research
labs, and other traditional workplaces to broaden their impact. Psychologists are
hungry for this immediacy—to deliver psychology and psychological research to the
public on their own and often during their personal time.
Some workplaces or professions may A GROWING INTEREST her work. “It helps to break down access
encourage this, while others have yet IN SOCIAL MEDIA barriers to mental health care. It helps to
to understand the value of supporting With social media platforms—from improve equity in care so that the public
staff in using psychology to immediately Facebook to Instagram to TikTok—there mental health information can be shared
improve people’s lives. are more ways than ever to communicate through a cultural lens, not only through
“It’s very unlikely that people beyond with the public. As of 2021, 72% of U.S. a white ivory tower research lens.”
those who publish their work in a adults use social media. That’s an increase However, not all psychologists have
scientific journal will read psychology from half of all adults who used social been taught how to communicate with the
research,” said psychologist Jonathan media in 2011, according to the Pew public in a direct or absorbing way. Inger
Wai, PhD, who studies educational pol- Research Center. Mewburn, PhD, director of research train-
icy through the lens of psychology at the Scientists are also embracing more ing at Australian National University, wrote
University of Arkansas and is a science social media in their professional lives. in a blog post titled “Why Academic Writ-
communicator. “It’s crucial, therefore, During the pandemic, especially, many ing Sucks (and How We Can Fix It)” that
to write about this academic work in an scientists quickly discovered that infor- “academic writing, as a genre, is ritualised,
easy-to-understand way.” mation could be disseminated more peculiar, archaic and does almost as much
In recent years, increasing num- efficiently and to a far broader audience to hide knowledge as it does to share it.”
bers of psychologists have pushed for than it could in scientific journals. Part of This type of writing strangles public
more science communication training, this push to use social media may come engagement with the material. “If we’re
support, and permission within the field from the significant and startling gap not clear and engaging, then editors and
of psychology (Perspectives on Psycholog- between citizens’ and scientists’ opinions the general public simply won’t read us,”
ical Science, Vol. 16, No. 6, 2021). This on key scientific topics, as was highlighted Wai and David Miller, PhD, a psy-
includes psychologists taking to social in another Pew Research Center survey. chologist and senior researcher at the
media to share their clinical advice and “One of the gifts of social media is American Institutes for Research, wrote
scientific findings with a broader audi- that it can help us access hard-to-reach in an article for The Conversation. “The
ence. There has also been an uptick in audiences,” said Regina Koepp, PhD, a first step in improving academic writing
psychology podcasts, with hosts finding clinical psychologist based in Atlanta is to learn to reduce the jargon academics
new and innovative ways to pull listeners who specializes in working with aging use and express concepts clearly. And this
in and provide them with new and valu- adults and their families and uses social has forced us to distill our thinking to its
able information. media platforms like LinkedIn to share absolute core.”
M O N I TO R O N P S YC H O LO G Y ● 2023 4
CO M M UN ICAT ING PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE
Luckily, Koepp has noticed an researches eating disorders (ED), body “In a world where the majority
increasing number of psychologists par- image, and social attitudes has more than of people are using social media and
ticipating in this work (see January 2021 45,000 followers on Twitter. Through this accessing health and mental health
Monitor). “Many psychologists are actu- platform, she can share valuable insights information through the internet and
ally more and more curious about this into her scientific work and personal social media, I might invite psycholo-
now,” she said. “I’ve even been invited to experiences. “My experience in treatment gists to think about what our role is,”
do some talks on things like social media for anorexia is the driving force behind my said Koepp. “Are we as psychologists
ethics and talks on how to ensure as research. Many friends from treatment are going to be a part of that conversation,
psychologists that we balance our respon- still in the ‘revolving door of ED treat- or are we going to keep ourselves out of
sibility in the field and to our clients.” ment,’ and some have died,” she wrote in it? Is our absence in these spaces help-
This includes clinical psychologists a tweet. “We must take these conditions ful? I don’t think it is.”
like Julie Smith, PhD, who specializes seriously and help to improve treatment
in anxiety and depression and has taken options for those suffering.” THE RISE OF PSYCHOLOGY
to TikTok to reach a broader audience. More and more psychologists have PODCASTS
“Depression is not always obvious,” she also noticed that communicating with Social media isn’t the only way psychol-
said in a TikTok video. “Sometimes it’s the public through social media is crucial ogists are reaching a wider audience.
invisible. Even if people can’t see your in breaking down stereotypes about what Podcasts are also emerging as a popular
pain, and they can’t understand it, that “typical” psychologists look like. Many way to disseminate scientific and clinical
pain is still real.” people still think of psychologists as information—and more and more people
Jaclyn A. Siegel, PhD, a social psychol- older White men with beards, and this nationwide are tuning in. In fact, back in
ogist at San Diego State University who needs to change, Koepp said. 2006, only 22% of the adult population
CO M M UN ICAT IN G PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE
in the United States was aware of pod- This will definitely get listeners to wellness of Black women and girls. In
casts, according to Statista. By 2021, tune in, but there are plenty of psychol- addition to a Twitter account with a fol-
78% of adults listened to podcasts, and ogists who are creating podcasts that lowing of more than 40,500 people and
it’s estimated that podcast listeners will aren’t so stirring and action packed but a blog, Bradford hosts a popular mental
surpass 160 million in 2023. are still reaching wide audiences. Koepp, health podcast that focuses on making
Podcasts that discuss topics related to for example, has a podcast called Psychol- mental health topics more relevant and
science seem to scratch a particular itch ogy of Aging that shares insights every accessible for Black women.
for listeners. Researchers found that from other week on mental health and aging, Each week, Bradford focuses on a new
2010 to 2018, the number of science dementia, caregiving, and end of life. mental health topic, from Black women
podcasts available on topics like biology, This work became very pertinent during in academia to myths about sex. She
chemistry, and physics grew exponen- the pandemic because older adults are introduces each episode as a “weekly con-
tially, with 65% of these series hosted by more likely to get sick from COVID-19 versation about mental health, personal
a scientist and 77% targeted to public and require hospitalization and intensive development, and all the small decisions
audiences (MacKenzie, L. E., Royal Soci- care. Since the start of the pandemic, we can make to become the best possible
ety Open Science, Vol. 6, No. 1, 2019). more than 200,000 residents and staff in versions of ourselves.”
This work is also being done by clin- long-term care facilities have died from Making a podcast—or engaging with
ical psychologists. Jason Luoma, PhD, the virus, according to a Kaiser Family the public through social media—takes a
hosts the Research Matters Podcast in Foundation article. significant amount of time and often must
which he interviews leading researchers “Long-term care communities were be done between busy research, teaching,
in psychology and other social sciences really struggling, and families with loved or clinical schedules. But more and more
to understand what they do that makes ones in these facilities were really strug- psychologists seem to be discovering the
them productive. Psychotherapist Esther gling,” said Koepp. benefit of this work, said Koepp.
Perel, PhD, started a podcast called Another example of someone doing Wai hopes to see even more psychol-
Where Should We Begin? that attracts tens this work is Joy Harden Bradford, PhD, ogists engaging in this work in the years
of thousands of listeners. In each episode, a psychologist in Atlanta who created to come. “There is still some hesitancy
Perel counsels real couples as they reveal Therapy for Black Girls, an online space when it comes to writing or talking about
intimate and personal details. dedicated to encouraging the mental science to the public,” he said. “But psy-
chology as a field has a long history of
encouraging researchers to disseminate
their findings. This work will continue to
greatly benefit the broader public and psy-
chologists and scientists themselves.” n
Are we as psychologists
going to be a part of that FURTHER READING
conversation, or are we Public engagement is key for the
going to keep ourselves future of science research
Pham, D.
out of it? Is our absence npj Science of Learning, 2016
in these spaces helpful? How scientists engage the public

Pew Research Center, 2015
I don’t think it is.” Public engagement with science—
Origins, motives and impact in

REGINA KOEPP, PHD, CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGIST
academic literature and science policy
Weingart, P., et al.
PLOS ONE, 2021
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M O N I TO R O N P S YC H O LO G Y
023 7 ●
may apply
TAKING AIM AT
MISINFORMATION
Conspiracy theories and other forms of dis- and

misinformation continue to worm their way into the
American psyche—but psychologists are deploying
powerful strategies to fight them
MIKE HILL/GETTY IMAGES
BY TORI DEANGELIS
P sychologists are ramping up efforts to fight the
many-headed Hydra of misinformation, drawing on decades
of psychological research to help people think more soundly
when presented with information telling them that hurricanes
are a scam perpetrated by climate change activists or that
COVID-19 vaccines can make you sick with the COVID virus.
Included in psychologists’ efforts to

expose these and more subtle fabrications
are massive online campaigns that teach
people how to spot and analyze mis-
information, research aimed at finding
the most effective anti-misinformation
strategies, and efforts to teach kids criti-
cal thinking skills so they’re equipped to
fend off sketchy information.
“We’ve been pushing, push-
ing, and pushing,” said University of
Cambridge professor Sander van der
Linden, PhD, a social psychologist who
is running some of the world’s largest
anti-misinformation interventions. “And
we seem to have some momentum now
to change things.”
The work is important for obvious
reasons as well as more indirect ones,
van der Linden added. “Not only can
Protesters carry signs opposing COVID-19 vaccine mandates on Sept. 13, 2021, in New York City.
misinformation lead to direct harm, for
example, to people’s physical health or to
election outcomes,” he said. “But it can psychologist Gale M. Sinatra, PhD, vaccine-hesitant community, you might
erode our trust in each other, in society, coauthor with Barbara K. Hofer, PhD, go along with those views because you
and in our institutions.” of Science Denial: Why It Happens and don’t have the time, interest, or ability to
What to Do About It (Oxford University evaluate vaccine safety directly,” she said.
WHY PEOPLE TRUST FALSEHOODS Press, 2021). (Sinatra also chaired an “So, you just look at your Facebook group
There is strong and growing evidence APA task force on climate change whose and see what they say.” Psychologists
for why people believe misinforma- 2022 report, Addressing the Climate Crisis: also know a great deal about emotional
tion and resist correcting those views. An Action Plan for Psychologists, suggests motivators that fuel beliefs in fake news
Reasons include confirmation bias— multiple ways psychologists can help or conspiracy theories, including fear
seeking out information that confirms educate the public in an area dogged by and anger, she noted. In addition, studies
SPENCER PLATT/GETTY IMAGES
prior beliefs—and motivated reason- misinformation.) show that when people encounter fake
ing, that is, “reasoning toward a desired Research also finds that people news when they’re in a state of height-
conclusion rather than an accurate one,” believe misinformation because it ened emotions—whether positive or
explained University of Southern Cali- fits easily into their identity or world negative—they’re more likely to believe
fornia (USC) professor and educational view, Sinatra added. “If you’re part of a it and less able to discern fake from
TA KIN G A IM AT MISINFORMATION
real news (Martel, C., et al., Cognitive Royal Society Open Science, Vol. 7, 2020; England, has some serious research
Research: Principles and Implications, Vol. and Hopp, T., et al., Human Communica- chops behind it. Eight intervention leads
5, 2020). tion Research, Vol. 46, No. 4, 2020). from three countries are overseeing each
In a research summary on the topic, intervention and deciding how it should
University of Western Australia cogni- A LARGE-SCALE APPROACH be implemented, while additional teams
tive psychologist Ullrich K. H. Ecker, These and other related findings are will choose the stimuli to be tested and
PhD, and colleagues also point to informing a wealth of new research and then program, gather, and analyze the
studies showing that when people see interventions in the area. data. Supporting the effort are more than
the same false information multiple Starting in fall 2022, a large group 80 misinformation experts who helped
times—a phenomenon amplified by of researchers began testing eight decide which interventions to test and
social media—the information becomes anti-misinformation interventions with who will provide feedback as the project
lodged in and throughout memory and 30,000 U.S. adults to ascertain which continues. (The project is funded by
becomes difficult to unseat even when are most effective and why. Strategies the Social Science Research Council’s
new information is presented. Research- they’re investigating include pre-bunking Mercury Project, a global consortium
ers call this phenomenon the “illusory (inoculating people against the misin- of researchers dedicated to countering
truth effect” (Nature Reviews Psychology, formation “virus” in the first place) and misinformation.)
Vol. 1, 2022). debunking (providing ways to correct Besides seeing how each interven-
Still other studies find that some misinformation once people have con- tion fares in general, the researchers plan
people are more susceptible to misin- sumed it), as well as accuracy nudges, additional studies to see which interven-
formation than others. These include social norms interventions, warning tions are more effective or less effective
frequent users of social media, those who labels, and other approaches. Each par- with different demographic groups, Fazio
are less educated, people less likely to ticipant in the study is assigned to one of noted.
employ reflective thinking and analytical the interventions or to a no-intervention The project also includes two major
reasoning, and people on the politi- control. follow-up activities. One will test the
cal extremes, especially but not limited The project, headed by cognitive psy- effectiveness of the most successful
to those on the extreme right (see, for chologists Lisa Fazio, PhD, of Vanderbilt intervention on YouTube. The second is a
example, Scherer, L. D., & Pennycook, University, David G. Rand, PhD, of tool kit that will highlight the strengths
G., American Journal of Public Health, Vol. MIT, and Stephan Lewandowsky, PhD, and weaknesses of each approach so that
110, No. S3, 2020; Roozenbeek, J., et al., of the University of Bristol in Bristol, social media platforms and civil soci-
ety groups can choose the approaches
that best fit their mission and resources,
whether that’s a nonprofit organization
focused on increasing youth voting or a
website encouraging people to get the
COVID vaccine, Fazio explained.
In another recent effort, van der
Linden and colleagues have successfully
tested a pre-bunking intervention that
they hope to scale up in a big way. They
partnered with Google to place short,
fun animated videos on YouTube that
educate users to spot and analyze five
common misinformation techniques,
such as spouting deliberate incoherence
and scapegoating others. The videos
ROB LEVER/GETTY IMAGES
feature humorous examples of these

strategies using characters from popular
A deepfake—a manipulated video—changes the words spoken by former presidents Barack television shows and films like Family
Obama and Donald Trump to deceive viewers. Guy and Star Wars. (The videos can be
viewed at https://inoculation.science/).
In an article in Science Advances
(Vol. 38, No. 34, 2022), University of
Cambridge social psychologist Jon
Roozenbeek, PhD, van der Linden,
and colleagues shared results involving
6,464 participants randomized to one
of the videos or a neutral control video,
and 22,632 online users who saw one
of the two videos in an actual YouTube
ad campaign. Those who watched the
experimental videos were significantly
better able to recognize manipulation
techniques, to discern trustworthy from
untrustworthy content, and to share
material with greater discrimination than
those who didn’t watch them. The effects
held up across the political spectrum and
with people of varying education levels
and personality types. As COVID-19 raged across Los Angeles County in January 2022, schools tried to protect
Eventually, the team hopes to embed students with masking and testing requirements.
these videos into actual ad spaces on
YouTube, said van der Linden. “The find- in College Park, Maryland, launched reading. Instead of opening a single
ings provide proof of concept that the a 4-year science-education project in science or social studies article on the
principle of psychological inoculation can September 2022 with investigators at computer desktop and reading down the
readily be scaled across hundreds of mil- Maryland and five other sites, including page, students open additional windows
lions of users worldwide,” he said. Google Sinatra at USC and investigators at Tem- and read other material related to the
seems to agree: In August, Google’s ple University, the University of North piece that probes the credibility of the
Jigsaw platform rolled out a campaign Georgia, TERC (formerly the Technical article’s author and sources, the sound-
in Poland, Slovakia, and the Czech Education Research Center), and the ness of the science promulgated in the
Republic to fight misinformation about Planetary Science Institute. Funded by article, and whether other reputable
Ukrainian refugees using the Cambridge the National Science Foundation, it’s the scientific organizations agree with the
team’s methodology. third phase of a project that is examining information, for example. Along the
aspects of an instructional strategy called way, the team will test the impact of this
EFFECTIVE TOOLS FOR KIDS the model-evidence link (MEL) diagram, methodology on students’ understanding
Other psychologists are taking aim at a which is designed to promote students’ of the fundamental scientific, social, and
root cause of people’s difficulty in fight- ability to critically evaluate alternative civic phenomena underlying the material
ing misinformation: a lack of sufficient explanations and increase their ability to they’re reading about.
education in science and critical thinking understand complex scientific concepts, In another educational effort, Western
in the first place. “The whole process of Lombardi explained. (See Lombardi, D., Kentucky University associate profes-
science has to be taught better, with a et al., Discourse Processes, Vol. 59, Nos. sor Jenni Redifer, PhD, uses debunking
focus on what is evidence, how science 5–6, 2022, for a description of the meth- strategies to help preservice teachers in
knows what it knows, and why it doesn’t odology and results from the first two her educational psychology classes dis-
FREDERIC J. BROWN/GETTY IMAGES
know what it doesn’t know,” Sinatra phases of the project.) mantle discredited beliefs about learning
commented. The team will work with some 100 and embrace more empirically supported
In one such effort, educational psy- teachers and 1,000 students in middle learning strategies.
chologist Doug Lombardi, PhD, who and high schools in Philadelphia and Many future teachers enter her
heads the Science Learning Research Georgia to help students learn a crit- classroom believing that everyone has
Group at the University of Maryland ical evaluation method called lateral a learning style that suits them best,
for example, auditory, kinesthetic, or fact. Some of the statements were pre- doctoral student working with Panayiota
visual. But research has resoundingly sented over multiple days while others Kendeou, PhD, at the University of
shown that this is not the case—that were shown only once. At the end of the Minnesota, presented data showing
people learn best using a combina- study, participants received a final test that liberals and conservatives trusted
tion of approaches that best fit the asking them to rate the strength of their scientific or partisan sources of COVID
context of the material being taught. belief in a given statement. In keeping vaccination claims in different ways
What is more, the learning styles myth with previous research, the more often depending on their belief systems. In
tends to affect people’s motivation and that people received a message, the more the study, she and colleagues randomly
self-efficacy, because people believe that likely they were to believe it, the team assigned 133 people identifying as
their style is the only way that they can found (Journal of Experimental Psychology: liberals and 354 as conservatives to a
learn effectively, she said. That said, the General, Vol. 151, No. 10, 2022). variety of statements, each purportedly
older idea still holds considerable sway: However, early repetitions had a from either a liberal source, a conser-
In an article in Psychology Learning & stronger effect than those that came vative source, or a scientific institution,
Teaching (Vol. 18, No. 3, 2019), Steven later, the team also discovered, implying for example, MSNBC, Fox News, or the
R. Wininger, PhD, Redifer, and col- “that initial repetitions are more strongly World Health Organization.
leagues found that 80% of the main 20 encoded in memory,” Fazio said. “So, if Liberals whose belief systems
educator-prep textbooks discussed the you can’t employ pre-bunking strategies, included a higher need for evidence
learning styles theory. Half defined it the sooner you can nip a new piece of tended to trust scientific sources the
as a preference or approach, while the misinformation in the bud, the better.” most, liberal media sources second, and
other half defined it as the way an indi- Others are examining more closely conservative media the least. But liberals
vidual is best able to learn. who’s more likely to believe misinfor- who had less of a need for evidence had
To combat these beliefs, Redifer uses mation and why. In a paper presented at the same level of trust in all three source
strategies in which she replaces the mis- the 2022 APA Annual Convention and types. Meanwhile, conservatives stat-
information with new, research-backed now under review, Victoria Johnson, a ing a higher need for evidence trusted
information and delivers it in a manner scientific and conservative sources of
that doesn’t threaten or attack students’ information the same, while those
identity or worldviews. requiring less evidence trusted all three
“The good news is that you can learn FURTHER READING sources equally.
in any style,” she tells students. “So, you “The results show that vaccine mis-
Misinformation: Susceptibility,
don’t have to worry about giving your spread, and interventions to
trust is not a conservative-only issue,”
students a learning styles inventory or immunize the public Johnson said. “There are definitely liber-
having separate lessons for auditory and van der Linden, S. als who aren’t considering science above
visual learners.” Students catch on and Nature Medicine, 2022 all other sources, as well.” Such findings
are better equipped to teach their own suggest the need to better understand
The psychological drivers
students in the future, she said. of misinformation belief and
subgroups of people and how their
its resistance to correction reactions to misinformation differ, she
KEEPING THE BALL ROLLING Ecker, U. K. H., et al. noted.
Because the field is hot, many other Nature Reviews Psychology, 2022 Because of misinformation’s many
researchers are tackling pieces of the mis- potential harmful effects, psychologists
Science denial: Why it happens
information puzzle as well. As just one and what to do about it
need to keep addressing it from multiple
example of the work taking place, Fazio Sinatra, G. M., & Hofer, B. K. angles, Fazio added.
and colleagues recently studied an aspect Oxford University Press, 2021 “Misinformation is a really multifac-
of the “illusory truth effect,” examining eted problem,” she said. “But if we make
in a real-world context how frequency of How to combat health misinforma- lots of smaller changes—changes by
tion: A psychological approach
messaging affects the strength of people’s Roozenbeek, J., & van der Linden, S.
the [social media] platforms, changes to
beliefs. American Journal of Health policies, changes to individual behavior,
For 15 consecutive days, 435 partic- Promotion, 2022 changes in education, changes to the
ipants received five text messages, each media environment—I think there is
containing a different true or false trivia room for progress.” n
PSYCHOLOGICAL Driven by a push to produce
RESEARCH
more equitable research that
benefits the public good, the
field is revamping how science
IS CHANGING
is conducted and embracing a
broader range of scholarship
BY HELEN SANTORO
PSYCH O LO G ICAL RESEARCH IS CHANGING
P
sychologists are challenging traditional thinking about research—reevaluating
how research terms are defined, how research is conducted, who is doing it,
and what kinds of research are rewarded.
This includes making sure one’s research With regard to all these changes, A PUSH FOR MORE
questions consider historically mar- there are still many challenging conver- INCLUSIVE RESEARCH
ginalized groups and the entire human sations to be had, but “when it comes to Psychology has a long history of being
experience, along with keeping in mind how we think about psychology research, led primarily by White men and includ-
who is conducting the research and how we’re moving in the right direction,” ing mainly White study participants. A
that impacts study bias. said Mitch Prinstein, PhD, chief science 2010 analysis of articles published in six
Psychology journals are also under- officer at APA. “We’re starting to make of the field’s leading journals showed that
going incremental changes. Specifically, some efforts to diversify our science and 95% of all samples came from what the
more and more publications are noticing think differently about the way to con- authors called WEIRD societies—West-
the need for diversity, equity, and inclu- duct science.” ern, educated, industrialized, rich, and
sion in their scientific content and are
taking steps to remedy decades of deeply
racist and prejudiced practices that leave
out key voices.
The field is also reevaluating how
it views qualitative research—long
considered to be less rigorous or robust
than quantitative research. Historically,
quantitative research with its measurable
and empirical data has been thought of
as more vital to the field than qualita-
tive research. Yet this methodological
approach can in fact be myopic and harm
marginalized populations.
“I truly believe that qualitative data
can provide insight that quantitative sim-
ply cannot,” said Lucy Arellano, PhD, an
educational psychologist at Texas Tech
University. Arellano has written papers
about qualitative research and pointed DRAFTER123/GETTY IMAGES; PREVIOUS PAGE: DRAFTER123/GETTY IMAGES
to the fact that quantitative research

tends to maintain the status quo, thwart
critiquing, and further underscore mis-
conceptions of deficits in marginalized
populations (Education Sciences, Vol. 12,
No. 2, 2022).
“In order to make transforma-
tional change, people need to hear
the story. They need to connect on a
human-emotion type of level that can
only be conveyed via qualitative data,”
Arellano said.
“In order to make transformational change, people need to hear

the story. They need to connect on a human emotion type of level
that can only be conveyed via qualitative data.”
LUCY ARELLANO, PHD, EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGIST AT TEXAS TECH UNIVERSITY
democratic (Henrich, J., et al., Behav- at APA. Specifically, psychologists with They are asking harder questions at the
ioral and Brain Sciences, Vol. 33, No. 2–3, privileged identities are starting to beginning of their research projects,
2010). have more uncomfortable yet necessary Gaines said, including: What groups of
This trend has continued throughout conversations about how they can help people have been historically left out of
the years. An analysis of 26,000 empirical change these harmful research practices this type of research? What can we do
articles on cognitive, developmental, and that leave out a diverse range of people. early on to make sure they are included
social psychology published from 1974 “I’ve mentored two White men, and so that this research is more generalizable
to 2018 found that questions of race tend they were very forthright on want- and can benefit a larger group of people?
to be largely forgotten and most journal ing to be better and having honest and
publishers are White. Additionally, the thoughtful conversations about race,” CHANGING PUBLICATION
studies that do take race into consid- Smith-Bynum said. “This gives me hope. GUIDELINES
eration are usually written by White I didn’t really see this happening in the Like psychologists and their study
scientists and employ few participants of first 10 or so years of my career. People participants, the realm of publishing of
color (Roberts, S. O., et al., Perspectives on are now looking for content, skills, and psychology journals has also long been a
Psychological Science, Vol. 15, No. 6, 2020). guidance on how to do better.” homogenous and close-minded process.
However, psychologists are starting Rebecca Gaines, a PhD candidate in To help remedy this, APA’s publish-
to embrace the need for change when counseling psychology at the University ing program is implementing equity,
DRAFTER123/GETTY IMAGES
it comes to how research is planned of Denver, has also observed that more diversity, and inclusion (EDI) initiatives.
and conducted, according to Mia psychologists who are entering the field This framework, which was developed
Smith-Bynum, PhD, senior director for are talking about the need for intersec- in 2018, advocates for equitable con-
science equity, diversity, and inclusion tionality and inclusivity in their research. tent that is representative of all people
and communities; inclusive science to an article written this year in Nature The journal was founded in partnership
that addresses inequities in psychology Magazine. By gathering data on journals’ with the Society for Qualitative Inquiry
research; a diverse community of authors, contributors, the hope is that publi- in Psychology, a section of APA’s Div. 5
editors, and readers; and an inclusive cations can better grasp where they (Quantitative and Qualitative Methods),
publishing industry that promotes a currently stand in regard to diversity and which had focused on only quantitative
more equitable experience for underrep- what vital work still needs to be done. methods in the past.
resented scientists. Arellano has also noticed that
The Asian American Journal of Psy- MORE QUALITATIVE STUDIES teachers and researchers in higher
chology is one of the publications taking Psychologists are also starting to question education positions have become more
charge in this regard. “Research on Asian the power of quantitative versus qual- critical of qualitative metrics. Specifi-
American populations is so overlooked itative studies. Quantitative research cally, Quantitative Critical Race Theory,
in many other areas of psychology,” said methods have historically been thought or QuantCrit, articles are on the rise.
June Kim, PhD, who edits the journal. of as more objective and “better” science. This is a rapidly developing research
“At AAJP, researchers don’t have to justify But in fact, these quantitative methods approach that aims to both challenge
why it’s important to study the psycho- can be harmful to marganilized commu- and improve the use of statistical data in
logical processes of a specific racial or nities (Arellano, L., Education Sciences, social research by applying the insights
minoritized group. We take it as a matter Vol. 12, No. 2, 2022). of Critical Race Theory (Castillo, W.,
of course that research about Asian “Systematically rejecting qualitative & Gillborn, D., EdWorkingPapers, No.
Americans is important.” research limits research questions that 22-546, 2022).
This work, however, doesn’t mean can help minoritized populations,” said The work of QuantCrit rests on five
publishing studies that simply compare Prinstein. “Sometimes research requires a key principles: racism is at the center of
people of color with White people. “We different perspective with different meth- scientific research, numbers are not neu-
don’t expect researchers to treat the psy- odologies.” Qualitative research can also tral, categories are not natural, data cannot
chological processes of Asian Americans unearth new psychological experiences speak for itself and instead requires voices
in contrast to other groups,” said Kim. and constructs in ways that quantitative and insight, and social justice and equity
“That is, expecting a comparison of Asian methods do not, Smith-Bynum noted. must be considered in research.
Americans versus White Americans, or Luckily, change is afoot. “In the past “It is appearing more in the schol-
something like that, where the psycho- 10 years, the content in PsycArticles— arship. I’m still hoping that those
logical processes of Asian Americans which includes all the APA published perspectives translate into graduate pro-
exist in contrast to psychological pro- journals and the English language gram curricula in the next decade or so,”
cesses of other groups.” Hogrefe journals—that has the meth- said Arellano. n
Instead, Kim and her colleagues odology index term “qualitative” has
have dedicated specific issues to focus quadrupled,” said Rose Sokol, PhD, a
readers’ attention on Asian American social psychologist and publisher of jour-
FURTHER READING
science. “Special issues have been a way nals at APA. “More journals are referring
to spotlight specific subfields within specifically to qualitative methodology in Equity, diversity, and inclusion
Asian American psychology to provide their scope statements.” in APA journals
additional focus and attention to that APA has also created numerous APA, 2021
specific subfield,” she said. These include resources to help individuals who wish
Race without racism: How higher
the issues “The Growth of Filipino/x/a to engage in qualitative science, Sokol education researchers minimize racist
American Psychology” and “Promoting noted. These include the Essentials of institutional norms
Health and Well-Being in Forcibly Dis- Qualitative Methods Series; an article Harper, S. R.
placed Asian Populations.” on reporting standards for qualitative The Review of Higher Education, 2012
Additionally, in an effort to track primary, qualitative meta-analytic, and
Research methods for social justice
diversity in science publications, more mixed methods research in psychology; and equity in education
than 50 publishers representing 15,000 and the peer-reviewed journal Qualita- Strunk, K. K., & Locke, L. A.
journals across the globe plan to ask tive Psychology, which started in 2014 in Palgrave Macmillan, 2019
scientists a list of questions about their order to feature research that employs
race, ethnicity, and gender, according qualitative and mixed methods designs.
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Universities, nonprofits, and

businesses are increasingly
looking for expert leadership
around equity, diversity, and
inclusion—and psychologists
are stepping up
BY STEPHANIE PAPPAS
Educational psychologist Dr. Yuma Tomes

is chair of diversity, equity, accessibility,
and inclusion at The Phillips Collection art
museum in Washington, D.C.
E DI ROLES ARE EXPAND ING
After the social justice protests of 2020, many universities, between September 2019 and September
2020, a 56.3% increase. The work is found
businesses, and nonprofits were shaken out of a certain in both corporate settings and academia
complacency around equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI). (Indeed Career Guide, 2022).
“Certainly after 2020, the call-in and
This shift in focus has led to the spread inclusion at Trinity College in Connecti- callout of addressing issues of anti-Black
and deepening of EDI roles—roles that cut, had been doing EDI work for many racism really spurred a lot of universities
psychologists are increasingly stepping years without “diversity” in her title. to take a second look at their EDI efforts
into. In fact, many have been doing the She never wanted a role with a diversity and say, ‘How are our efforts really chang-
work for years, but are finding that the title, she said, feeling it might limit the ing the conditions that Black students
opportunities have expanded around breadth and impact of the work. “But I find themselves in?’” said psychologist
them. realized with the formalization of these Anneliese Singh, PhD, the chief diversity
“Two years ago, the short-term titles comes the ability to institutionalize officer at Tulane University.
requests diminished, and the longer-term the work, build infrastructure, and advo- Some universities have also been
requests ramped up,” said Kumea cate for resources,” she said. moving toward different models of
Shorter-Gooden, PhD, a clinical/ What has changed, psychologists EDI planning. For instance, instead
community psychologist who runs a working in equity roles say, is the depth of handing down goals from a central
Washington, D.C.–based EDI consult- and breadth of EDI work. Job posting administrative committee, the University
ing business. “I experienced a fivefold statistics suggest that roles exclusively cen- of Michigan developed its 5-year EDI
increase in requests for services.” tered on EDI have proliferated: According plan by flipping the process, asking every
Though a psychology background to statistics from the job listing site administrative unit to create a personal-
is not a requirement for doing EDI Indeed, EDI job openings rose from 140 ized plan, yielding 2,800 separate action
work, psychologists are well trained in jobs per million to 219 jobs per million items, Sellers said. The university also
the sorts of skills that are crucial, from
doing assessments to synthesizing data
to facilitating tough conversations. As
organizations look for far more compre-
hensive EDI overhauls than they have
in the past, these skills are even more
important.
A DEEPER ENGAGEMENT
EDI, sometimes abbreviated DEI or
PHOTO BY JOHN MARINELLI/COURTESY OF TRINITY COLLEGE; PREVIOUS PAGE: SCOTT SUCHMAN

expanded into DEIB (which adds
“belonging” to the list of priorities) or
DEAI (which highlights “accessibil-
ity”), is not a new field. Nor is it unusual
to have psychologists taking the lead.
Robert Sellers, PhD, a social psychol-
ogist who served as the chief diversity
officer at the University of Michigan
until August 2022, stepped into the
university-wide role after chairing the
psychology department, where he spent
years focusing on recruiting psychologists
from underrepresented backgrounds to
the field. Anita Davis, PhD, a clini-
Dr. Anita Davis (right) of Trinity College has found that collaboration around equity,
cal/community psychologist and the diversity, and inclusion (EDI) work has increased as academia begins to view EDI work
vice president for diversity, equity, and more comprehensively.
E DI RO LES ARE EXPAND ING
Dr. Yuma Tomes’s equity and inclusion work at The Phillips Collection is integrated into every department of the museum, including
finance, curation, conservation, and human resources.
developed a centralized plan to tackle “I didn’t know a Renoir from a Rem- government of the District of Colum-
projects that could be handled at only the brandt, but I knew that I understood bia, where she was appointed by Mayor
university level, such as training. At the DEAI work,” Tomes said. It is unusual Muriel Bowser to the brand-new role of
time, he said, this was an unusual tack, for a museum to have a full-time position chief equity officer in 2021. Counseling
but doing the planning from the bottom devoted to this work, he said, though psychology emphasizes how humans
up helped ensure the process was more some integrate EDI with part-time staff interact with systems, Hewitt said, and
relevant to everyone and gave individual or use outside consultants. It is an area to government is one of those systems.
departments a greater sense of responsi- watch for more growth, he said. Much of Hewitt’s work revolves around
bility over the outcomes, Sellers said. The way Tomes’s role is positioned involving communities in decisions about
“More and more universities are now within the organization also represents policy, including running public engage-
doing a more distributed approach to a positive trend for effective EDI work. ment forums to get residents’ input on
planning,” he said. “But I would say we Instead of working in an isolated team Washington, D.C.’s first-ever racial
were amongst the first.” tasked with its own agenda, his work equity action plan.
Psychologists are also increasingly is integrated into the overall structure. Political change can affect the EDI
finding work in new corners. Yuma “DEAI is interconnected to every single field directly. Kizzy Parks, PhD, an
Tomes, PhD, an educational psychologist, department that we have,” he said. “We industrial/organizational psychologist
spent 20 years working his way up the influence finance, we influence curation, and the head of K. Parks Consulting
academic administration ladder before we influence conservation, we influence in Florida, consults mostly for federal
joining The Phillips Collection, an art HR, we influence the director’s office. government agencies. In the federal
museum in Washington, D.C., as its chair It is imperative for DEAI work to be government, presidential administra-
of DEAI. He now does internal work- carried throughout every department to tions have their own priorities that
shops and communications, consults with become institutionalized and systemic.” set the tone for the kind of services
the museum board about issues of diver- For Amber Hewitt, PhD, the path consultants need to provide, Parks said.
SCOTT SUCHMAN
sity, and oversees the museum’s internship to EDI work wound from counseling Shifts happen with every election, but
and fellowship programs to ensure partici- psychology to an APA Congressional the change from the Trump adminis-
pants come from a variety of backgrounds. Fellowship to health advocacy to the tration to the Biden administration was
E DI ROLES ARE EXPAND ING
particularly stark, she noted. In Sep-

tember 2020, then-president Donald
How do we help individuals navigate in a complicated
Trump issued an executive order ban- world where oppression exits? Let’s not just be
ning diversity training deemed divisive.
During this time, Parks said, most of
downstream fishing out people who’ve been pushed
the work her company did for the fed- into the water. Let’s go upstream, see what’s going on,
eral government focused on soft skills
training, leadership training, or meeting
and change those conditions.”
the requirements of a certain law or reg- KUMEA SHORTER-GOODEN, PHD, SHORTER-GOODEN CONSULTING,
ulation. “The actual requests for diversity WASHINGTON, D.C.
and inclusion training were quite low or
nonexistent,” she said.
The Biden administration reversed that ESSENTIAL SKILLS Shorter-Gooden said—all skills that
executive order and made diversity and A psychology background can be a boon many clinical and community psycholo-
equity a priority. The result, Parks said, has for EDI work, which requires both peo- gists have spent years cultivating.
been a bevy of requests ranging from ana- ple skills and analytical skills. “There are The day-to-day of an EDI job
lytics to training. The work also requires a lot of transferrable skills that psycholo- depends on the organization. An aca-
having one’s finger on the pulse of federal gists have in our training,” Hewitt said. demic chief diversity officer may work
regulations. For instance, Parks said, in These include critical thinking, an to create big-picture programs and
August 2022, NASA held its first vendor understanding of human behavior and initiatives, consulting with upper admin-
equity forum geared toward encour- cognition, and qualitative research train- istration as well as departments across
aging LGBTQ+-owned businesses to ing, Hewitt said, the latter of which is the university. EDI at a college or uni-
work with the federal agency. This move helpful when synthesizing themes from versity is highly collaborative, Davis said.
might indicate that in the future, the public engagement forums. Psychologists Recruiting diverse talent requires work-
federal government will require a certain also have valuable training in qualitative ing with human resources, and inclusive
proportion of contractors to hold this cer- and quantitative research methods, from housing goals require close partnerships
tification, just as the government currently developing assessments to collecting data with residential life staff, for example.
sets aside work for women-owned and to analyzing and interpreting that data, This type of collaboration has increased
veteran-owned businesses. Shorter-Gooden said. On the soft skills as academia begins to view EDI more
“It opens up more options as far as the side, EDI work often involves facili- comprehensively, Davis said. “We’ve
type of work to go after as well as the type tating groups, managing conflict, and moved from focusing predominantly on
of companies to partner with,” Parks said. making space for tough conversations, students, to students and faculty, to now
being mindful of our staff,” she said. “All
members of our community and their
experiences matter.”
Consulting for nonprofits can involve
assessments and interventions similar to
those in academia, said Shorter-Gooden,
who has worked in both spheres. But
nonprofits are often smaller and more
nimble than large universities, so change
sometimes comes faster.
Psychologists, by virtue of their back-
STEPHANIE NATOLI/THE DIAMONDBACK
grounds, can bring a particular flavor of

mental health awareness to EDI work.
Tomes helps curators at The Phillips
Collection consider how art that deals
Dr. Kumea Shorter-Gooden runs a Washington, D.C.–based equity, diversity, and inclusion with challenging topics might affect
consulting business and has recently seen an increase in demand for her services. museum visitors.
E DI RO LES ARE EXPAND ING
COPING WITH CHALLENGES

Even as EDI work becomes more prev-
alent, people in the field are coping with
politicized backlash. The past couple of
years have brought increased attention to
issues of equity and diversity, Sellers said,
and often in extremely polarizing ways.
This can be stressful for people doing the
work. “Our DEI leads are often on the
front lines,” he said.
One oft-repeated concern among psy-
chologists in EDI is that political forces
might stifle their efforts. Many states are
increasingly pushing back against educa- Dr. Robert Sellers helped launch a 5-year EDI plan at the University of Michigan designed to
tion around diversity and inclusion. Most give individual academic departments a greater sense of responsibility over the outcomes.
of these efforts are focused on K–12
public education, but some attempts promising that we will see more chief that they see need to be done without
reach beyond public schools. In Virginia, diversity officers or similar positions in there being some grumbling or negative
for example, Governor Glenn Youngkin museums,” he said. “But I also have some repercussions.”
excised the word “equity” from the state’s bit of concern regarding the efforts states A psychology background is helpful for
education system and from state offices, are making to limit the concerns that understanding these dynamics and coping
changing the title of the state’s chief come into DEI work.” with them, Sellers said. At the University
diversity, equity, and inclusion officer to People working in EDI also expe- of Michigan, he worked to ensure DEI
chief diversity, opportunity, and inclusion rience individual pushback. Change is leads had social support and opportunities
officer. In Florida, the “Stop WOKE difficult, Shorter-Gooden said; even for well-being and attempted to set realis-
Act” banned workplace trainings that those who hire an EDI consultant may tic expectations for change.
teach that individuals are inherently rac- balk at having the status quo challenged. “Making sure that people have a cogni-
ist or sexist, even unconsciously, or that “Turnover is high,” Nickerson agreed. “At tive frame for understanding what change
might cause an individual to feel guilt for a mid- and upper-administrative level it’s looks like and what to expect is import-
historical wrongdoings. (In August 2022, very difficult for people to do the things ant,” Sellers said. “Sometimes increased
a Florida judge blocked the act as a viola- resistance is the best indicator of change.”
tion of the First Amendment following a Though the in-groups and out-groups
lawsuit from three private businesses. The may shift, an understanding of human
American Civil Liberties Union has filed behavior and group dynamics suggests
a separate suit on First Amendment and
RESOURCES EDI work will always be necessary, Parks
academic freedom grounds.) Leadership that endures: Embedding said. And psychologists doing the work
“When I began my training in the equity, diversity, inclusion, say the rewards are worth the stressors.
’80s and all the way up to now, I had & belonging in your organization In clinical work, it is sometimes diffi-
never seen an all-out assault on some- APA’s Office of Continuing Education cult to see individual patients struggle
in Psychology, 2022
thing that was clearly evidence-based against a world that marginalizes them
and would benefit the country as what and contributes to their problems,
MICHIGAN PHOTOGRAPHY/UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
The business case for diversity

has been happening,” said Kim Nicker- backfires: Detrimental effects of Shorter-Gooden said.
son, PhD, a clinical psychologist and the organizations’ instrumental diversity “How do we help individuals navigate
assistant dean of diversity, equity, and rhetoric for underrepresented group in a complicated world where oppression
members’ sense of belonging
inclusion at the University of Maryland. exists?” she said. “Let’s not just be down-
Georgeac, O. A. M., & Rattan, A.
This kind of pushback is frustrat- Journal of Personality and Social stream fishing out people who’ve been
ing for those doing EDI work and Psychology, 2022 pushed into the water. Let’s go upstream,
could slow the expansion of EDI into see what’s going on, and change those
new areas, Tomes said. “I feel that it is conditions.” n
Worker
Well-Being
Is in
Demand
In the wake of the pandemic, organizational culture
is shifting to better value employee physical and
psychological health
BY HEATHER STR IN GER
WO RKE R WE LL- BEING IS IN D EMAND
T
he pandemic and its shock waves pandemic forced employers to recognize
continue to disrupt the work- that they must pay more attention to the
place, according to the 2022 mental health of employees, and that
Gallup World Poll. Stress among the conditions in the work environment
workers throughout the globe is at an can either exacerbate or prevent mental
all-time high since Gallup began survey- health challenges,” said Leslie Hammer,
ing adults in 2005. Forty-four percent of PhD, a professor in the Oregon Institute
workers reported that they experienced of Occupational Health Sciences at
significant stress the previous day and Oregon Health & Science University.
more than one fifth experienced signif- The fact that more organizations are
icant anger or sadness the previous day, acknowledging the important connec-
according to data collected from more tion between workplace conditions and
than 160 countries throughout 2021. well-being is an encouraging shift for
“People realized that their jobs and researchers who study this relationship.
lives could change overnight, and it Workers have more leverage than ever
will take time and effort from orga- to demand that employers evolve by
nizations to rebuild trust and reduce creating an environment that values their
uncertainty and fear going forward,” well-being, said L. Casey Chosewood,
said Mindy Shoss, PhD, an industrial MD, MPH, director of the Total Worker
and organizational (I/O) psychologist at Health® program, which is part of the
the University of Central Florida who National Institute for Occupational Safety
PREVIOUS PAGE: THOMAS BARWICK/GETTY IMAGES; MOMO PRODUCTIONS/GETTY IMAGES; LUIS ALVAREZ/GETTY IMAGES; MAKIKO TANIGAWA/GETTY IMAGES; KT IMAGES/
studies the changing nature of work on and Health (NIOSH) at the Centers for
GETTY IMAGES; MEGAN BREWER/GETTY IMAGES; LIM WEIXIANG - ZEITGEIST PHOTOS/GETTY IMAGES; COROIMAGE/GETTY IMAGES; THOMAS BARWICK/GETTY IMAGES;
employee well-being and behavior. Disease Control and Prevention.

Attitudes about employee men- “Employees have more power due to
tal health have dramatically shifted. the relative shortage of workers and the
Historically, the onus was on employees robust job market,” he said. “The orga-
to reduce their level of stress by taking nizations that are the most nimble and
advantage of company benefits such creative in managing changes will lead
as mindfulness seminars and health the way in attracting talent.” Psychologists
coverage for therapy, but that trend is are poised to help employers throughout
changing, according to psychologists the world transform how they lead their
who focus on workplace behavior. “The teams and support workers.
“The organizations that are the most nimble

KELVIN MURRAY/GETTY IMAGES; MOMO PRODUCTIONS/GETTY IMAGES
and creative in managing changes will lead

the way in attracting talent.”
L. CASEY CHOSEWOOD, MD, MPH, TOTAL WORKER HEALTH,®
CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION
M O N I TO R O N P S YC H O LO G Y ● 24
WO RKE R WELL- BEING IS IN D EMAND
LEADING BY EXAMPLE
APA’s 2022 Work and Well-Being Survey
confirmed that employee expectations
related to mental health support are
AI in Hiring: shifting, with 71% of workers reporting
More Research Required that they believe their employers are more
concerned about employees’ mental health
than in the past. More than 80% agreed
As more companies turn to artificial intelligence (AI) technology to that how employers support mental health
streamline hiring, industrial and organizational (I/O) psychologists will be an important consideration for
are raising concerns about the privacy, fairness, and accuracy of them when they look for future work.
the tools. Chosewood is part of a team that
AI has the potential to help large companies more efficiently developed a questionnaire to assess
sift through thousands of applications because it uses statistical people’s quality of working life, circum-
techniques to identify candidate information in résumés and job stances outside of work, and physical
interview transcripts to predict future job performance. and mental health status. While many
But some AI vendors are making claims about accuracy without well-being questionnaires ask about
research to back up the claims. “The tools are frequently developed sleep, anxiety, and depression, NIOSH’s
by software engineers who are unfamiliar with how to psychometri- WellBQ combines this with questions
cally, legally, and ethically validate an assessment tool,” said Richard about the workplace climate, supervision
Landers, PhD, an I/O psychologist at the University of Minnesota experience, benefits policies, and other
who works with consulting firms that are using AI tech for hiring. aspects related to the work context.
The importance of testing the technology surfaced when Amazon “We used psychological metrics
started using AI to review résumés to search for top talent. The com- that have been proven to be predic-
puter model was trained to evaluate candidates based on résumés tive of well-being,” said Chosewood.
submitted in the previous 10 years, most of which were from male The survey, which was released in April
applicants. As a result, the algorithm started to screen out entries on 2021, includes questions about whether
CVs that were associated with being a woman, such as attending an employees feel they can rely on super-
all-female school or playing a sport like field hockey that is tradition- visors for support, find their work
ally associated with women. This led to an unexpected bias against meaningful, and want to go to work.
PREVIOUS PAGE: MASKOT/GETTY IMAGES; MOMO PRODUCTIONS/GETTY IMAGES; REZA ESTAKHRIAN/GETTY IMAGES
female candidates. NIOSH also offers resources to address
To guide developers and users of AI assessment tools, APA’s issues identified by the survey, such as
Div. 14 (Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology) tool kits to help organizations minimize
launched a task force on AI in 2021. “I/O psychologists have been injuries, reduce sitting time at work, and
involved in hiring and psychometric measurement for decades, and build communication skills.
we need more psychological auditors involved in forming standards Hammer’s research has shown that
for the tools,” Landers said. well-being improves when supervisors
The task force is developing guidelines for using AI-based value aspects of life outside of work, such
assessments during the hiring process, said Christopher Nye, PhD, as employees’ family and sleep needs.
of Michigan State University and head of the task force. Although She has developed and studied 1-hour
there is excitement in the business world about leveraging AI for hir- computer-based training interventions
ing, it is too early to use these tools to replace existing assessments. aimed at teaching supervisors how to ask
“Based on the evidence so far, it seems that AI tools will be more open-ended questions, actively listen to
effective when they supplement the existing hiring tools rather than employee responses, and pay attention to
replace them,” Nye said. potential family or sleep-related problems.
In the training, leaders also learn how to
model the importance of life outside work
by taking time off. In one of the inter-
ventions, the training led to increased job
WO RKE R WE LL- BEING IS IN D EMAND
satisfaction, reduced turnover intentions, more creative and innovative solutions,

and improved personal well-being among and engage more in quality improve-
employees (Journal of Occupational Health ment work.”
Psychology, Vol. 26, No. 6, 2021).
Although these strategies may con- A CANDIDATE-DRIVEN MARKET
flict with a manager’s instinct to project The continued high rate of resignations
confidence and competence, research- among workers is another sign that
ers are discovering that leaders who are employees are less willing to continue
willing to be open and vulnerable can in organizations that fail to value their
increase the level of psychological safety well-being. “Over the past 12 months,
on their teams without jeopardizing their the Great Resignation has continued,”
reputations as competent. Constantinos said Anthony Klotz, PhD, who coined
Coutifaris, MBA, an assistant professor of the term in 2021 when millions of
management at the University of Texas at workers were quitting their jobs because
Austin, was intrigued by an article about of the pandemic. “People are reflecting
a tech executive who shared areas of on their lives and asking why they are
improvement from her own performance spending so much time in jobs that are
review with the employees who directly stressful.”
reported to her. Coutifaris and Adam Labor participation is now close
Grant, PhD, an organizational psychol- to pre-pandemic levels because
ogy professor at the Wharton School of employees are not actually leaving the
the University of Pennsylvania, decided workforce—they are seeking better
to study the effects of that type of sharing options, said Klotz, an associate pro-
at a health care company and a financial fessor of organizational behavior at the
company. In a field experiment, some University College London School of
managers sought feedback from team Management. “They are moving to roles
members about their own performance, that offer remote work, increased wages,
while others shared their development and benefits that cover college educa-
areas from their most recent reviews with tion, parental leave, and sabbaticals.”
JOHNNYGREIG/GETTY IMAGES; LUIS ALVAREZ/GETTY IMAGES; FG TRADE/GETTY IMAGES; THOMAS BARWICK/GETTY IMAGES
team members. The data revealed that Doug Reynolds, PhD, executive
a year later, the psychological safety in president of DDI, a leadership devel-
teams at both companies improved when opment and assessment company in
leaders openly shared their own develop- Pittsburgh, is seeing the effects of the
ment areas, but this did not happen when candidate-driven market in his company.
leaders had simply sought feedback from Prior to the pandemic, he recruited in
team members (Organization Science, Vol. Pittsburgh for his product development
33, No. 4, 2021). team, which includes 80 software engi-
Follow-up interviews showed that neers, I/O psychologists, and analytics
the leaders who shared their own devel- specialists. Now that remote work is
opment areas with employees helped an option, he is hiring people from
team members feel safe to share their throughout the United States, India,
own challenges. “This enhanced the level Europe, and other countries. “People
of psychological safety because vulner- do not want restrictions and rules, and
ability was normalized into the team they want to decide where and when to
culture,” said Coutifaris. “Considerable work,” he said.
research has found that when employees But hires who are new to the
feel like they can take more risks with- workforce have shared with him that
out being penalized, they are more likely there are drawbacks to remote work
to voice their own opinions, generate that employers will need to address.
M O N I TO R O N P S YC H O LO G Y ● 26
WO RKE R WELL- BEING IS IN D EMAND
“They miss the peer mentoring that

often occurs casually in the office,” said
Reynolds. Considerable research has found that
Companies are also reexamining
how they select leaders, especially with when employees feel like they can take
an eye toward increasing diversity at
higher levels, said I/O psychologist more risks without being penalized,
John Scott, PhD, chief operating offi-
cer of APTMetrics, a human resources
they are more likely to voice their own
consulting firm in Connecticut. One
of the barriers diverse candidates
opinions, generate more creative and
can face as they apply for leadership innovative solutions, and engage more
positions is lack of previous experi-
ence in upper-level supervisory roles. in quality improvement work.
“Historically, hiring practices for lead-
ership roles have been based on the idea
that past behavior is the best predictor
of future behavior, but past behavior is The company is now surveying workers between two possible futures. “There is
a function of the opportunities people more frequently and trained local man- an opportunity here to increase work-
have been given,” Scott said. To increase agers to meet with their teams regularly place safety or continue the trends of
equity in hiring, his company developed to gather feedback. “If employees are vulnerable work,” she said. “I hope this
a simulation tool that assesses leader- feeling strained, leaders can respond recognition will lead to more advocacy
ship skills. Applicants participate in by changing scheduling procedures and public policy to address job quality
an immersive online simulation, such and making sure workers are allocating and safety.” n
as a scenario in which a company’s energy to the things that matter most,”
new CEO (the candidate) must guide said Glickman.
C-suite leaders toward agreement on Psychologists hope that the momen-
how the company should grow. tum to improve working conditions, pay,
and benefits for people in service jobs FURTHER READING
SUPPORT FOR will continue long after the pandemic.
VULNERABLE WORKERS In a recent study, Shoss and colleagues Auditing the AI auditors: A framework
for evaluating fairness and bias in
Psychologists say companies are also investigated why jobs that were pre- high stakes AI predictive models
viewing essential workers differently viously stigmatized by society, such as Landers, R. N., & Behrend, T. S.
post-pandemic; the global crisis ele- roles in food service and public trans- American Psychologist, 2022
vated the importance of employees who portation, were elevated to “hero” status
staff grocery stores, childcare centers, during the pandemic (International Getting outdoors after the workday:
The affective and cognitive effects of
hospitals, and manufacturing facilities. Journal of Hospitality Management, Vol. evening nature contact
“Companies that focused on promot- 93, 2021). One reason for the new status Klotz, A. C., et al.
ing a good culture thrived, and those was the media’s message that “we are in Journal of Management, 2022
that didn’t lost employees,” said I/O this together,” which united typically
psychologist Heidi Glickman, PhD, stigmatized workers with society at Has the COVID-19 pandemic
accelerated the future of work or
who specializes in providing executive large, according to the study. changed its course? Implications for
coaching and consulting to organiza- “The public recognized the threats research and practice
tions experiencing significant change. and challenges these workers face and Ng, M. A., et al.
She worked with a grocery chain in the the need to take action to protect them, International Journal of Environmental
Northeast that was struggling to retain such as making sure they have sick pay or Research and Public Health, 2021
workers, and Glickman helped lead- other benefits that white-collar workers
ers improve employee engagement by enjoy,” she said. With this heightened
increasing communication with staff. awareness, Shoss sees the world teetering
Real answers
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MAKING A
DENT IN TH
E
YOUTH
MENTAL
HEALTH
CRISIS
Youth in the United States
are facing record-high levels
of anxiety and depression.
Psychologists are expanding
efforts to implement research
and make an impact.
BY ZARA ABRAMS
Schools are a key place to help children.

Psychologists are increasing efforts to
develop resources and interventions to
support students onsite.
YO UTH MENTAL H E A LT H
The COVID-19 pandemic era ushered in a new set of challenges for youth in the United
States, leading to a mental health crisis as declared by the United States surgeon general
just over a year ago. But U.S. children and teens have been suffering for far longer.
In the 10 years leading up to the pan- and teens faced, many also lost caregivers the biological, social, and structural con-
demic, feelings of persistent sadness to COVID-19, had a parent lose their job, tributors to the current situation, they are
and hopelessness—as well as suicidal or were victims of physical or emotional developing and disseminating solutions
thoughts and behaviors—increased by abuse at home. to families, in schools, and at the state
about 40% among young people, accord- All these difficulties, on top of grow- level. They’re exploring ways to improve
ing to the Centers for Disease Control ing concerns about social media, mass clinical training and capacity and working
and Prevention’s (CDC) Youth Risk violence, natural disasters, climate change, to restructure policies to support the most
Behavior Surveillance System. and political polarization—not to mention vulnerable children and teens.
“We’re seeing really high rates of the normal ups and downs of childhood Psychologists were also behind new
suicide and depression, and this has been and adolescence—can feel insurmountable mental health recommendations from
KENT NISHIMURA/GETTY IMAGES; PREVIOUS PAGE: MARSBARS/GETTY IMAGES
going on for a while,” said psychologist for those who work with kids. the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force,
Kimberly Hoagwood, PhD, a professor “The idea of a ‘mental health crisis’ a group of volunteer health professionals
of child and adolescent psychiatry at is really broad. For providers and par- who evaluate evidence on various preven-
New York University’s Grossman School ents, the term can be anxiety-provoking,” tive health services. The task force now
of Medicine. “It certainly got worse said Melissa Brymer, PhD, who directs recommends regular anxiety screenings for
during the pandemic.” terrorism and disaster programs at the youth ages 8 to 18 and regular depression
In addition to the social isolation and UCLA–Duke University National Center screenings for adolescents ages 12 to 18.
academic disruption nearly all children for Child Traumatic Stress. “Part of our “I see these trends in children’s mental
role is to highlight specific areas that are health problems as being critical, but there
Girls, LGBTQ+ youth, and those who have critical in this discussion.” are solutions,” Hoagwood said. “If we
experienced racism were more likely
to have poor mental health during the Across the field, psychologists are refocus our efforts toward those solutions,
pandemic. doing just that. In addition to studying we could see some of these tides turn.”
YO UT H MENTAL H E A LT H
SOURCES OF STRESS
Across the United States, more than
200,000 children lost a parent or primary
caregiver to COVID-19 (“COVID-19
Orphanhood,” Imperial College Lon-
don, 2022). In the face of those losses,
families had to curtail mourning rituals
and goodbye traditions because of social
distancing requirements and other public
health measures, Brymer said. Many chil-
dren are still grieving, sometimes while
facing added challenges such as moving
to a different home or transferring to a
new school with unfamiliar peers.
The CDC also reports that during the
pandemic, 29% of U.S. high school stu- Developmental changes in early puberty
dents had a parent or caregiver who lost drive young people to seek attention and
approval from their peers. Social media can
their job, 55% were emotionally abused foster positive connections or exacerbate
by a parent or caregiver, and 11% were negatives ones.
physically abused (Adolescent Behaviors
and Experiences Survey—United States, and knowing what to do about them
January–June 2021, CDC). (Eckert-Lind, C., et al., JAMA Pediatrics,
“Schools are crucial for keeping kids Vol. 174, No. 4, 2020). In early puberty,
safe and connecting them with services, regions of the brain linked to emotions
but the pandemic completely disrupted and social behavior are developing more
those kinds of supports,” Brymer said. quickly than regions responsible for the and lack of access to health care and
Those extreme disruptions didn’t cognitive control of behavior, such as the educational opportunities, can lead to
affect all young people equally. Echoing prefrontal cortex, Ethier said. stress-response patterns that are known
pre-COVID-19 trends, the CDC also Those developmental changes drive to underlie mental health challenges.
found that girls, LGBTQ+ youth, and young people to seek attention and “Even in very young children,
those who have experienced racism were approval from their peers. For some, prolonged stress can trigger a cycle of
more likely to have poor mental health using social media fulfills that need in a emotion-regulation problems, which
during the pandemic, said social psychol- healthy way, providing opportunities for can in turn lead to anxiety, depression,
ogist Kathleen Ethier, PhD, director of connection and validation to youth who and behavioral difficulties,” Hoagwood
the CDC’s Division of Adolescent and may be isolated from peers, geographi- said. “These things are well established,
School Health. cally or otherwise. but we’re not doing enough as a field to
Contributing factors likely include For others, negative messages— address them.”
stigma, discrimination, and online including online bullying and unrealistic
THE WASHINGTON POST/GETTY IMAGES; JUSTIN PAGET/GETTY IMAGES
bullying, Ethier said. Female students standards around physical appearance— BUILDING CAPACITY IN SCHOOLS
also report much higher levels of sexual appear to have a detrimental effect, but The biggest challenge facing mental
violence than their male peers, which can more research is needed to understand health care providers right now, experts
further harm mental health. who is most at risk. say, is a shortage of providers trained to
As much hardship as COVID-19 “There is clearly some aspect of young meet the mounting needs of children and
wrought, it’s far from the only fac- people’s online life that’s contributing [to adolescents.
tor contributing to the current crisis. the mental health crisis], we just don’t “There’s a growing recognition
Biology also appears to play a role. The know exactly what that is,” said Ethier. that mental health is just as import-
age of puberty has been dropping for Finally, structural factors that affect ant as physical health in young people’s
decades, especially in girls, likely leading millions of U.S. children, including development, but that’s happening just
to difficulty processing complex feelings poverty, food insecurity, homelessness, as mental health services are under
YO UTH MENTAL H E A LT H
extreme strain,” said clinical psycholo-

gist Robin Gurwitch, PhD, a professor
in the Department of Psychiatry and
Behavioral Sciences at Duke University
Medical Center.
Schools, for example, are a key way
to reach and help children—but a 2022
Pew Research Center survey found that
only about half of U.S. public schools
offer mental health assessments and even
fewer offer treatment services. Psychol-
ogists are now ramping up efforts to
better equip schools to support student
well-being on-site.
Much of that work involves chang-
ing policies at the school or district level
to provide more support for all students.
For example, school connectedness—the School connectedness—the degree to which young people feel that adults and peers at school
degree to which young people feel that care about them and are invested in their success—is a key contributor to mental health.
adults and peers at school care about them
and are invested in their success—is a key research on social-emotional learning, students themselves. Given that preteens
contributor to mental health. Youth who behavioral regulation, mental health liter- and teenagers tend to seek support from
felt connected during middle and high acy, trauma, and more (“Evidence-Based their peers before turning to adults, the
school have fewer problems with sub- Components of Classroom WISE,” National Child Traumatic Stress Net-
stance use, mental health, suicidality, and NCSMH, 2021). work (NCTSN) created conversation
risky sexual behavior as adults (Steiner, R. “We’re using evidence-based prac- cards to equip kids with basic skills for
J., et al., Pediatrics, Vol. 144, No. 1, 2019). tices from child and adolescent mental talking about suicide. The advice, avail-
Through its What Works in Schools health but making these strategies readily able in English and Spanish, includes
program, the CDC funds school districts available for teachers to apply in the class- how to ask about suicidal thoughts, how
to make changes that research shows room,” said clinical psychologist Nancy to listen without judgment, and when to
foster school connectedness. Those include Lever, PhD, codirector of NCSMH, who seek guidance from an adult (“Talking
improving classroom management, imple- helped develop Classroom WISE. About Suicide With Friends and Peers,”
menting service-learning programs for The course incorporates the voices NCTSN, 2021).
students in their communities, bring- of students and educators and teaches While training people across the
ing mentors from the community into actionable strategies such as how to create school population to spot and address
schools, and making schools safer and rules and routines that make classrooms mental health concerns can help reduce
more supportive for LGBTQ+ students. feel safe and how to model emotional the strain on mental health professionals,
Psychologists are also building train- self-regulation. The strategies can be used there will always be a subset of students
ing programs to help teachers and other by anyone who interacts with students, who need more specialized support.
MEDIANEWS GROUP/LOS ANGELES DAILY NEWS/GETTY IMAGES
school staff create supportive classrooms from teachers and administrators to Telehealth, nearly ubiquitous these
and aid students who are in distress. school nurses, coaches, and bus drivers. days, is one of the best ways to do that. In
Classroom WISE (Well-Being Infor- “What we need is to build capacity South Carolina, psychologist Regan Stew-
mation and Strategies for Educators), through all of the systems that are part of art, PhD, and her colleagues co-launched
developed by the Mental Health Tech- children’s lives—in families, in schools, in the Telehealth Outreach Program at the
nology Transfer Center Network and the the education of everybody who interacts Medical University of South Carolina in
University of Maryland’s National Center with children,” said psychologist Ann 2015. Today, nearly every school in the
for School Mental Health (NCSMH), is Masten, PhD, a professor of child devel- state has telehealth equipment (Wi-Fi
a free, flexible online course and resource opment at the University of Minnesota. and tablets or laptops that kids can use
library that draws on psychological Other training efforts focus on the at school or take home) and access to
YO UT H MENTAL H E A LT H
providers (psychology and social work from community agency leaders and clini- “Making community health work
graduate students and clinicians trained cians who provide services to children and into a viable career can also increase
in trauma-focused cognitive behavioral their families. diversity among mental health workers
therapy). Students who need services, Hoagwood, in collaboration with a and help us address structural racism,”
which are free thanks to grant funding or consortium of family advocates, state Hoagwood said.
covered by Medicaid, meet one-on-one officials, and researchers, also helped Pediatricians are another group that
with their clinician during the school day build and test a state-approved training can provide a first line of defense, draw-
or after hours (American Psychologist, Vol. model and credentialing program for ing on their relationships with parents to
75, No. 8, 2020). family and youth peer advocates. The destigmatize mental health care.
“We learned a lot about the use of peer advocate programs help expand the “Pediatricians are in many ways
technology during the pandemic,” Ethier mental health workforce while giving uniquely positioned to help address the
said. “At this point, it’s very much a mat- families access to peers who have similar mental health crisis in youth,” said Janine
ter of having sufficient resources so more lived experience (Psychiatric Services, Vol. A. Rethy, MD, MPH, division chief
school districts can access those sources 71, No. 5, 2020). of community pediatrics at MedStar
of care.” Youth peer advocates are young adults Georgetown University Hospital and
who have personal experience with sys- an associate professor of pediatrics at
EXPANDING THE WORKFORCE tems such as foster care, juvenile justice, Georgetown University School of Med-
Limited resources are leaving families or state psychiatric care. They work within icine. “We have the privilege of building
low on options, with some young people care teams to provide basic education long-term relationships with children
making multiple trips to the emergency and emotional support to other youth, and their families over many years,” with
room for mental health–related concerns such as giving advice on what questions at least 12 well-child checkups in just the
or spending more than 6 months on a to ask a new mental health practitioner first 3 years of a child’s life, followed by
waiting list for mental health support. and explaining the differences between annual visits.
That points to a need for more trained psychologists, psychiatrists, and social During these visits, they can watch
emergency responders and psychiatric workers. Youth peer advocates in New for warning signs of social and behav-
beds, psychologists say, but also for better York can now receive college credit for ioral problems and screen for maternal
upstream screening and prevention to their training in peer specialist work. depression and other issues in parents,
reduce the need for intensive care. which is now recommended by the Amer-
“Just as we need more capacity for ican Academy of Pediatrics. Several new
psychiatric emergencies in kids, we also resources provide guidance for integrating
need an infusion of knowledge and ordi- mental health care into pediatric practices,
nary strategies to support mental health FURTHER READING including the Behavioral Health Integra-
on the positive side,” Masten said. Science shows how to protect kids’
tion Compendium and the Healthy Steps
In New York, Hoagwood helped mental health, but it’s being ignored program. But most pediatricians need
launch the state-funded Evidence Prinstein, M., & Ethier, K. A. more education on mental health issues in
Based Treatment Dissemination Cen- Scientific American, 2022 order to effectively respond, Rethy said—
ter in 2006, which offers free training yet another area where psychologists may
How pediatricians can help mitigate
on evidence-based practices for trauma, the mental health crisis
be able to help. Psychologists can provide
behavioral and attention problems, anxiety, Rethy, J. A., & Chawla, E. M. direct consultations and training to pedi-
depression, and more to all mental health Contemporary Pediatrics, 2022 atricians through the Pediatric Mental
professionals who work with children in Health Care Access program.
state-licensed programs, which include Review: Structural racism, children’s “The more we can weave mental
mental health service systems, and
foster care, juvenile justice, and school set- recommendations for policy and
health knowledge, capacity, and check-
tings, among others. The center provides practice change points into places where parents feel
training on a core set of tools known as Alvarez, K., et al. comfortable—like the doctor’s office
PracticeWise (Chorpita, B. F., & Daleiden Journal of the American Academy of and at school—the better,” Masten said.
E. L., Journal of Consulting and Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 2022 “All professionals who work with young
Psychology, Vol. 77, No. 3, 2009). It also people really need the knowledge that’s
offers tailored training based on requests being generated by psychologists.” n
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Advancing
the Field
Through
Partnerships
Psychologists are joining forces with
other professions, communities, and
each other to tackle big societal
problems, from childhood mental
health to police violence
SPENCER PLATT/GETTY IMAGES; POOL/GETTY IMAGES; SPENCER PLATT/GETTY IMAGES; NURPHOTO/GETTY IMAGES
BY STEPHANIE PAPPAS
Collaboration between psychologists and other fields has the

potential to make bigger impacts in communities.
M
any of the mental health and behavior challenges that psychologists explore
have a huge societal component. Poverty, exposure to violence and racism,
inequities in education and the justice system, and international conflicts such
as the war in Ukraine affect mental health in ways that span geographical, societal, and
professional boundaries.
So perhaps it’s no surprise that, going “There is power in numbers,” said in countries where mental health is
into 2023, psychologists are increasingly Amanda Clinton, MEd, PhD, senior underresourced. The key to tackling these
tackling complex social issues and working director for the Office of International big problems with international part-
toward effective solutions by coming to the Affairs at APA. “There is power in voice. ners, Clinton said, is to avoid coming
table with each other and other profession- There is power in finding where we over- in as though the United States has all
als, and even reaching across borders. lap and how we can share that.” the answers. In fact, the value often
These efforts, among others, include flows from less-resourced countries to
supporting refugees and victims of war, PARTNERING WITH OTHER more-resourced ones.
combating police violence, advocating for PSYCHOLOGISTS “If we want to have really meaning-
gun control, and fighting misinforma- Clinton and her team have connections ful benefits for humanity, these kinds of
tion and disinformation. To do the work, all over the globe: psychologists fighting interactions with other people outside of
psychologists are partnering with other climate change, psychologists working North America are going to provide us
mental health and medical professionals, with war refugees, and psychologists try- better insights into the challenges that
journalists, policymakers, and each other. ing to nurture professional development humanity is facing,” Clinton said.
A DVA NCING THE FIELD THROU GH PARTNERSH IP S
For example, the Office of International and behavioral health, Bossolo said.
Affairs has had a long-standing relation- APA representatives attend National
ship with psychological scientists in Ukraine PTA conventions, run Mental Health
through the Global Psychology Alliance Awareness Month virtual events, and pro-
(GPA), a network of psychological associations vide mental health experts to create content
from 70 different countries. When Russian for PTA’s newsletters and podcasts. After
forces invaded their country, Ukrainian psy- the elementary school shooting in Uvalde,
chologists were able to broadcast their needs: Texas, in May 2022, these preexisting
At first, APA provided resources from Div. 19 relationships enabled APA, the PTA, and
(Society for Military Psychology) for fam- seven other organizations representing
ilies separated by military service, and then educators and mental health professionals
later provided support for scientists within to respond rapidly with an open letter to
Ukraine trying to preserve their research in legislators demanding action against gun
the middle of war. Meanwhile, members of violence in paid advertising space in USA
the GPA from nearby countries had needs of Today. Normally, making that kind of joint
their own. Psychologists in Romania, Poland, statement and policy ask would be a slow
and Germany requested resources for multi- process, Bossolo said.
cultural education as refugees arrived at their “It’s really a huge commitment on
borders, and colleagues from nations that have multiple levels. You’re making a financial
recently experienced war responded with their commitment, you’re making a huge public
hard-earned expertise. statement, and your organization is taking
“It was like a stone-in-the-water sort of rip- a huge public stand on a major issue,”
ple effect,” Clinton said. “We could help many she said. But the strong emotions around
of our partners, and they could inform us.” Uvalde and the preexisting relationships at
play made the move frictionless.
PARTNERING WITH NONPROFITS “It must have been within two hours
Relationships are also at the heart of APA’s that I was able to get to someone and say,
collaborations with fellow organizations, said ‘We want to do this,’ and they said yes,”
Luana Bossolo, senior director of strategic Bossolo said.
public engagement and community outreach Long-standing relationships helped
at APA. APA works with a variety of organi- psychologists have a voice in the legisla-
zations that have strategic goals overlapping tive response to Uvalde. The passage of
CHET STRANGE/GETTY IMAGES; ALLISON DINNER/GETTY IMAGES; JORDAN VONDERHAAR/GETTY IMAGES

APA’s, from Sesame Workshop, which pro- the bipartisan Safer Communities Act in
duces Sesame Street, to the Born This Way June 2022 was the first comprehensive gun
Foundation, which has a mission of supporting violence prevention legislation passed by
youth mental health. APA is also working on a Congress in nearly 30 years, said Kather-
variety of projects combating misinformation ine McGuire, the chief advocacy officer at
and disinformation with partners such as the APA. “To get the bipartisan act across the
American Public Health Association and the finish line, we joined forces with long-term
National Press Club. partners, including former Congresswoman
One long-running and fruitful collabora- Gabby Giffords’s organization, American
tion—since 2013—has been with the National Academy of Pediatrics, Brady Campaign,
Parent Teacher Association (National PTA), American Foundation for Suicide Preven-
Bossolo says. “PTA’s been really wonderful for tion, and Sandy Hook Promise, to name a
us in terms of reaching that audience of parents few,” McGuire said. “Our collective goal
and teachers” with APA’s expertise on mental was to ensure that Congress addresses gun
Psychologists’ long-standing relationships with lawmakers and other professions gave
them a voice in the legislative response to the elementary school shooting in Uvalde, Texas,
and the passage of the bipartisan Safer Communities Act.
ADVA N C I N G T HE FIE LD T H RO UGH PARTNERSHIPS
violence as a public health issue and does efforts and was the glue that held the coalition
not stigmatize mental illness.” together,” she said.
The final bill included expansion
and funding of mental health services PARTNERSHIPS IN ACADEMIA
within communities and schools, as well Many students, especially students of color, get
as enhancing federal background checks, their start in community colleges, but for those
funding extreme risk protection order laws, aiming for graduate degrees, the deck is often
and tightening firearm bans for domestic stacked against them. Increasingly, partnerships
abusers. The coalition effort helped break between these institutions are ensuring that
through the congressional logjam around students have an easier time getting credit for
gun legislation, McGuire said, creating the work they’ve done, ensuring their credits
a space for lawmakers to drop their “all transfer from 2-year to 4-year colleges.
or nothing” stances and instead embrace Arizona state universities, for example,
incremental, science-informed change. work with community colleges through artic-
APA members sent nearly 3,000 messages ulation task forces—including faculty from
to members of Congress advocating for the universities and community colleges. Task
the bill. force members discuss curricula to ensure the
In 2023, APA’s Advocacy office and community college courses meet the 4-year
the Board for the Advancement of Psy- college standards, and that the 4-year colleges
chology in the Public Interest (BAPPI) will honor the credits upon transfer. Without
are partnering with outside organiza- partnerships like this, many 2-year students
tions such as Mental Health America have had to retake core courses, costing them
and the Eating Disorders Coalition to hard-earned money, making them ineligible to
replicate that win with the Kids Online work in labs, and putting them at a disad-
Safety Act, or KOSA (S. 3663). KOSA is vantage in competing for admittance to PhD
another bipartisan bill that would address programs.
NURPHOTO/GETTY IMAGES; ROBERT ALEXANDER/GETTY IMAGES; BRANDON BELL/GETTY IMAGES; JACKSON STATE UNIVERSITY/GETTY IMAGES
the safety of minors. The goal, McGuire Only 13% of psychology doctoral degrees
said, is to increase online parental con- are awarded to Latinx students, 8% to Black
trols and reporting mechanisms, tighten students, and 0.5% to Native American/Alaska
default privacy and security rules, and Native students (APA Center for Workforce
allow researchers more access to social Studies, Data Tool: Degrees in Psychology).
media data to study the mental health But 51% of community college students iden-
effects of these networks. The provisions tify as non-white, according to the College
are informed by science out of Div. 14 Board (Research Brief, 2016). Supporting these
(Society for Industrial and Organiza- student’s success will be important moving for-
tional Psychology) and Div. 46 (Society ward, especially as universities strive to increase
for Media Psychology and Technology), diversity in their ranks. Right now, those ranks
and the effort has also been guided by a are homogenous in many ways: A recent study
2019 Council Resolution on Children and found that 80% of all U.S.-trained professors
Adolescent Mental Health, McGuire said. hail from just 20% of universities (Wapman, K.
APA and collaborating organizations are H., et al., Nature, September 2022).
pushing for the bill to reach the Senate Across the country, many instructors in
floor for a vote in 2023. psychology programs are working to make
“In this instance, psychological science required courses such as research methods
was the driver that other partners used available to community college students, and
as a foundation for their own advocacy sometimes in creative ways. For example, at
Partnerships between 2- and 4-year colleges can ease an often difficult transition
by improving the probability of transferring credits, providing important research
opportunities, and more.
A DVA N CIN G T H E F IELD THROU GH PARTNERSHIPS
Miami Dade College in Florida, psychol- The resolution calls specifically for a new initiative, the Justice Navigator
ogy faculty spearheaded the creation of collaboration between psychologists, (www.justicenavigator.org), which acts as a
a multidiscipline social science research communities, and police departments clearinghouse for data from participating
methods course to get around concerns in altering policing strategies, including police departments around the country.
that a psychology-specific course wouldn’t identifying functions carried out by police These data allow for analyses about racial
be in high enough demand. The course, that may be more effectively carried out disparities in things like use of force, traffic
launched in 2022, gives associate degree by other professionals and researching stops, and other police encounters. CPE
students an opportunity to craft their own and developing training that encompasses works with community partners to use
research questions and hypotheses. (See anti-bias and racial equity strategies, among the analyses to reveal and correct policing
September Monitor, “Reducing Barriers for other efforts. Separately, the APA Presiden- inequities.
Community College Students Majoring in tial Task Force to Reduce Police Violence There are four public assessments
Psychology”). Against African Americans is working on available from the Justice Navigator so far:
The psychology faculty also work closely guidelines for police organizations, with Norman, Oklahoma; Sacramento, Califor-
with the school’s humanities and natu- input by community organizations and nia; San Diego, California; and San Diego
ral sciences faculty to craft courses and police department leaders. County, California. Each has found that use
research opportunities. “It really brings a Collaboration between scientists, com- of force against Black people is 3 to over 4
different layer of not only expertise but munities, and police has a long history, says times higher than against White people,
inquisitiveness to the student that prepares Phillip Atiba Goff, PhD, a social psycholo- taking into account neighborhood crime
them well for either the bachelor’s level or gist and cofounder and CEO of the Center rates, poverty, and share of the population.
to start thinking, ‘What can I add to my for Policing Equity (CPE), which brings The work can be slow, and the envi-
experience at a 2-year institution that will data and tools to communities trying to ronment polarizing. Goff and his team
help me later?’” says Trinidad Argüelles, make changes to public safety. Goff stresses are sometimes criticized both by those
EdD, the current psychology convener for that the psychologists aren’t the saviors in who dislike any pushback against law
the college. the system; he and his team come in to enforcement and by those who think their
provide tools, but the real effort comes from approach does not go far enough. This
PARTNERING ON PUBLIC SAFETY community members who know, from the kind of criticism goes with the territory of
One of the most pressing areas for collabo- inside out, how their neighborhoods work. tackling hard social issues, Goff said, but
ration in 2023 is combating the inequitable The increased public awareness of vio- making real policy progress is still possible.
policing of racial and ethnic minorities. lence by police, especially against people of “Don’t be cowed by the people who are
The Washington Post Police Shootings color, has brought a lot of new interest to going to say that the doing of this work is
Database shows that police in the United interventions, Goff said. But it’s important always far inferior to the imagining of this
States killed 1,039 people between October to step carefully into this type of work, he work,” Goff said. “Because the problem is,
2021 and October 2022. Black people are added. Poorly thought out interventions the people who make that critique only ever
killed at twice the rate of White peo- can backfire, worsening the problem. For imagine.” n
ple, according to an analysis of that data. example, granting money to police depart-
APA’s Resolution on Psychology’s Role ments for new training might sound like a
in Addressing the Impact of, and Change great idea, Goff said, but if those trainings
Required With, Police Use of Excessive aren’t effective, the end result is that “you FURTHER READING
Force Against People of Color and Other just gave more money to the people engag-
Collaborating with the enemy:
Marginalized Communities in the United ing in the problem.” How to work with people you don’t
States, passed in August 2022, is an exam- “These problems are hard,” Goff said. agree with or like or trust
ple of an effort to spur more partnerships “And we should show up with the humil- Kahane, A.
to turn these numbers around. The resolu- ity knowing that generations of folks Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2017
tion’s writing group was led by the BAPPI have tried to solve them and have not yet
Collaboration in psychological
and reviewed by Div. 18 (Society for Police succeeded.” science: Behind the scenes
and Public Safety), Div. 48 (Society for the CPE does not take money from law Zweigenhaft, R. L., & Borgida, E. (Eds.)
Study of Peace, Conflict, and Violence), enforcement organizations or community Worth Publishers, 2017
and the Committee on Ethnic Minority groups, maintaining strict financial neutral-
Affairs. ity. In late 2021, the organization launched
NEW TRENDS IN
SUICIDE
SUICIDE
PREVENTION
Psychologists are at the forefront of finding
new ways to tackle a national crisis
BY R EB EC CA A. C L AY
N E W T RE N DS IN SU ICID E PREVENTION
H
istorically, psychologists have viewed suicide primarily as a symptom of mental illness and
have often sent patients who even mention the word “suicide” straight to the emergency
room. Now that is starting to change, as psychologists on the front lines find new ways to
identify individuals at risk, address the full complexity of suicide, and enlist new sources of help.
Their goal? To lower a national suicide rate that is still shockingly high.
After 15 years of steadily increasing rates, screening and are developing interven- Bryan, who directs the Suicide Prevention
the overall number of suicides in the tions that can help health care systems Program at The Ohio State University
United States dropped 5% between the overcome their fears of being over- College of Medicine. “We keep zeroing
2018 peak and 2020, according to provi- whelmed by the number of people who in on one small piece of the puzzle, then
sional data from the Centers for Disease screen positive for suicidal ideation and scratching our heads that . . . we’re not
Control and Prevention (CDC). behavior. And in the face of a nationwide bending the curve.” This misconception
But that progress was not shared shortage of mental health professionals, has led to focusing on mental health treat-
equally. While the overall rate dropped, psychologists are training the public in a ment as the primary method of preventing
White men and women accounted for CPR-like suicide prevention intervention suicide. Bryan and a growing number
much of the decline, with the suicide rate and harnessing technology’s power to of psychologists believe that practi-
for White men dropping 3% between provide support. tioners should instead look at the broader
2019 and 2020 and the rate for White “With COVID-19 and everything problems, such as financial struggles,
women dropping 10%. In addition to else happening lately, people are paying relationship problems, discrimination, and
racial disparities, the overall decline greater attention to mental health,” said other factors, that put people at risk.
obscures important changes by age. For Jill Harkavy-Friedman, PhD, senior vice “Because we’ve thought of suicide as a
individuals ages 10 to 34, for instance, president of research at the American mental health problem—something inside
rates were higher in 2020 than in 2019. Foundation for Suicide Prevention. people—we say, ‘You suffer from depres-
And young people are increasingly con- sion and need to go to treatment,’” said
sidering suicide. Suicide is already the RETHINKING SUICIDE PREVENTION Bryan. “But therapy and medications won’t
second most common cause of death for For Craig Bryan, PsyD, ABPP, author of pay your bills, won’t help you have a boss
young people, but in 2020, emergency Rethinking Suicide: Why Prevention Fails, who treats you with dignity and respect,
room visits for suspected suicide attempts and How We Can Do Better (Oxford Uni- won’t change the neighborhood you’re
increased 31% for adolescents ages 12 to versity Press, 2021), the reason suicide in.” Psychologists, said Bryan, need to go
17, according to the CDC (Morbidity and rates have remained stubbornly high for beyond mental health, empower patients,
Mortality Weekly Report, Vol. 70, No. 24, decades is the outdated notion that men- and become advocates for better jobs,
2021). For girls, visits were almost 51% tal illness is what causes suicide. housing, and nondiscrimination policies.
higher than in 2019. “We have decades of research that that Such efforts are already underway,
In confronting these numbers, psychol- core assumption—the bedrock of preven- with the suicide prevention field paying
ogists are making the case for increased tion efforts nowadays—is wrong,” said more attention to factors like the role
There’s a common myth that if you ask someone about suicide,

PREVIOUS PAGE: DRAFTER123/GETTY IMAGES
it puts the idea in their head; but research shows just the opposite:
Asking produces relief and lowers anxiety and stress.”
PAUL QUINNETT, PHD, EXECUTIVE CHAIRMAN OF THE QPR INSTITUTE
structural racism plays in racial and eth- and Intervention: Best Practices and Policy about screening in adults. But kids—and
nic disparities in suicide rates. Implications (Springer, 2022). “We need to adults—can’t wait for that research, said
Looking at suicide data as a whole be giving people tools to reduce their risk Horowitz. “We can’t wait 5 more years
masks important differences, said Kiara before a crisis.” for those studies to come out, because
Alvarez, PhD, an assistant professor of For Ackerman, that means going into kids are dying from suicide right now,”
health, behavior, and society at the Johns schools with an evidence-based program she said. “We have to screen young peo-
Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public called Signs of Suicide. The program ple so that we can identify those at risk
Health (American Journal of Psychiatry, teaches middle and high school students who may not be discussing their suicidal
Vol. 179, No. 6, 2022). Rates of suicidal how to respond to a friend in crisis while thoughts with anyone else.”
behavior have increased disproportion- also training the adults in the school, A screening tool Horowitz and
ately among young people of color over including lunchroom staff, coaches, and her team developed called the Ask
the last few decades, with Black girls in bus drivers. “We want everyone equipped Suicide-Screening Questions (ASQ) takes
particular reporting the highest rates of to respond to warning signs of suicide,” just 20 seconds (JAMA Pediatrics, Vol.
suicide attempts, said Alvarez. And very said Ackerman, who has worked with 166, No. 12, 2012). Critics of universal
young Black children between 5 and 12 65,000 schoolchildren in almost 250 Ohio screening often conflate screening and
have almost twice the suicide rate of their schools. Ackerman is now working with assessment, Horowitz explained, but the
White counterparts, said Alvarez, point- the program’s developer to create a pro- screening instead represents a rapid way to
ing to research (Bridge, J. A., et al., JAMA gram aimed at third to fifth graders. flag someone who needs further attention
Pediatrics, Vol. 172, No. 7, 2018) cited in Until recently, Ackerman added, and is the first step in a clinical pathway
the U.S. surgeon general’s 2021 advisory schools were reluctant to introduce sui- (Academic Pediatrics, Vol. 22, No. 2, 2022).
Protecting Youth Mental Health. cide prevention programming. “Talking “Screening is the way you start the conver-
Yet, said Alvarez, prevention efforts about young people ending their lives is sation,” said Horowitz. “It’s an opportunity
have focused on supposedly universal an uncomfortable topic,” he said, “but the to reach out before it’s too late.”
risk and protective factors without being data are very, very clear that young kids Behind the resistance to universal
customized for individual populations. are considering suicide and acting on it.” screening lies the fear that such screen-
And structural racism is apparent in the ing means opening Pandora’s box, said
response to crises, she said, with young THE CASE FOR SCREENING Edwin Boudreaux, PhD, a professor of
people of color more likely to be tagged One ongoing controversy in the field con- emergency medicine, psychiatry, and quan-
with behavioral rather than mental cerns universal screening for suicide risk, titative health sciences at the University
health problems and funneled from especially within health care settings.
school suspension all the way to the juve- “The majority of adults and kids
nile justice system. who have died by suicide have visited
“Just bringing mental health services a health care provider in the months,
into school misses the boat when it comes sometimes even weeks, before they die,”
to suicide prevention,” said Alvarez. “You said Horowitz, senior associate scien-
need to address who has access—who is tist in the National Institute of Mental
being treated as someone needing mental Health Intramural Research Program.
health support instead of behavioral man- “What that presents is an incredible
agement and discipline.” opportunity—you might even argue
Prevention efforts are also moving responsibility—to detect people at risk
upstream to target entire populations, and be the bridge to getting them help.”
said John Ackerman, PhD, who directs Not everyone agrees. In May 2020,
the Center for Suicide Prevention and the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force
Research at Nationwide Children’s issued a draft recommendation statement
Hospital in Columbus, Ohio. “Not all of noting insufficient evidence to recom-
our suicide prevention efforts should be mend for or against suicide risk screening
TJASA/GETTY IMAGES
done at the point of crisis,” said Ack- in asymptomatic children and adoles-
erman, coeditor with Lisa Horowitz, cents, for example. In September, the
PhD, MPH, of Youth Suicide Prevention task force issued a similar draft statement
of Massachusetts Chan Medical School.

“They argue that if they don’t have the
capacity to intervene, that screening is not
really going to help,” said Boudreaux.
Not all of our suicide prevention efforts
What Boudreaux has found is that should be done at the point of crisis.
universal screening catches many who
would otherwise be missed. In a large We need to be giving people tools to
multisite study, he and colleagues found
that universal screening of adult emer-
reduce their risk before a crisis.”
gency department patients almost JOHN ACKERMAN, PHD, COEDITOR OF YOUTH SUICIDE PREVENTION AND
doubled risk detection, going from just INTERVENTION: BEST PRACTICES AND POLICY IMPLICATIONS
under 3% to almost 6% (Contemporary
Clinical Trials, Vol. 95, 2020). That num-
ber is still low enough that hospitals do Even something as simple as calling leaders and bartenders, to do lethal means
not have to worry about being inundated patients post–emergency room discharge counseling—assessing whether someone
with at-risk patients, he said, especially can reduce suicide, Boudreaux has found. who is suicidal has access to firearms,
if hospitals put in place protocols that In a multicenter study that focused on prescription medicine, or other potentially
are sensitive to patients’ severity of risk. adults with recent suicidal ideation or lethal items and working with the person
Some patients with lower levels of acute attempts, the researchers found that and family members to limit access to
risk, for example, may not need a full patients who received follow-up phone those items during a crisis. “Folks who die
psychiatric workup or safety precau- calls and discharge resources had 30% by firearm are less likely to engage with
tions such as searching their belongings fewer suicide attempts than patients who health care,” said Anestis. “Training others
for potentially lethal items or assigning received treatment as usual (JAMA Psy- to have these conversations is a way to
someone to watch them constantly. chiatry, Vol. 74, No. 6, 2017). move upstream and shift societal norms.”
Plus, said Boudreaux, there are things Limiting access to lethal means—
health care systems can do to make the especially firearms—is also key, said EXPANDING ACCESS TO HELP
most of existing resources instead of the Michael Anestis, PhD, executive direc- Other efforts aim to increase the amount
traditional—and costly—response of tor of the New Jersey Gun Violence of training on suicide that psychologists
sending patients who mention suicide to Research Center at Rutgers University. receive. The vast majority of psychologists
the emergency room. Firearms accounted for 53% of suicides and other mental health professionals are
The UMass Memorial Health system, in 2020, according to the CDC (Keg- not routinely trained in suicide preven-
for instance, made changes based on the ler, S. R., et al., Morbidity and Mortality tion, according to a policy paper by the
tenets of Zero Suicide—the now predom- Weekly Report, Vol. 71, No. 19, 2022). American Foundation for Suicide Pre-
inant model, which calls for overhauling The demographics are changing, vention. As a result, a growing number
entire systems to address suicide instead however. “There has been an unprece- of states are mandating such training as a
of merely training individual practi- dented surge in firearm sales—not just in condition for licensure. Eleven states now
tioners. The UMass system now does deep red states,” said Anestis. That means require training in suicide prevention or
universal screening of patients ages 12 psychologists must broaden their idea of suicide assessment, management, and
and older, then stratifies them by risk who is at risk beyond veterans and other treatment, while an additional four states
level, with high-risk patients receiving traditional high-risk groups. People who encourage such training.
evidence-based interventions. Safety bought firearms during the COVID-19 New hotline numbers help ensure
planning, for example, is an easy inter- pandemic, Anestis has found, are more that individuals in crisis can connect with
vention in which the patient and clinician likely to report past-month, past-year, and sources of help.
work together to identify risk factors lifetime suicidal ideation than people who In July 2022, the National Suicide
and warning signs plus ways of coping have never purchased firearms or pur- Prevention Lifeline changed its name
with them. A revamped electronic health chased them before the pandemic (JAMA to 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline and
record system helps ensure patients do not Network Open, Vol. 4, No. 10, 2021). introduced a 3-digit number designed to
fall through the cracks as they transition The next frontier is to train people out- be as easy to remember as 911. Instead
to the appropriate level of care. side of health care, such as military unit of dialing the old 10-digit number,
Prevention hotlines
for specific issues
Because many suicidal acts are impulsive, suicide prevention hotlines can play a crucial
role in de-escalating crises and saving lives. The 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, formerly
the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, is a key resource for people who are suicidal or
experiencing other mental health crises. The lifeline’s new 3-digit number (988) is as easy
to remember as 911. (See APA Services’s “What Psychologists Should Know About 988.”)
In addition to 988, these hotlines can help individuals in high-risk populations:
AgriStress Helpline (833-897-2474) provides support to farmers and ranchers in

Missouri, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, and Wyoming. Agricultural workers are among the
top five industry groups with the highest suicide rates, according to a 2020 study by the
U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
National Maternal Mental Health Hotline (833-9-HELP4MOMS) offers help before,

during, and after pregnancy. Suicide accounts for up to 20% of maternal deaths, making
suicide deaths more common than deaths by postpartum hemorrhage or hypertensive
disorders, according to a 2022 report by 2020 Mom, a nonprofit group that aims to
improve maternal mental health care.
Physician Support Line (888-409-0141) offers peer support to medical students and
physicians, who faced a higher risk of suicide than individuals in other professions even
before the intense stressors of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Trans Lifeline (877-565-8860) provides peer support and advocacy for the trans
community. Forty-five percent of LGBTQI+ youth have seriously considered suicide in the
last year, with the percentage trending upward over the past 3 years, according to a 2022
Trevor Project survey.
DRAFTER123/GETTY IMAGES
callers who are suicidal or experiencing Hotline, sponsored by the U.S. Health said Coppersmith. The next generation
other mental health crises can now dial Resources and Services Administra- of smartphone tools are the just-in-time
988 to connect with trained counselors tion, provides free support in English adaptive interventions Coppersmith and
at crisis centers nationwide. In the first and Spanish at 833-9-HELP4MOMS others are developing. These technol-
week after the new number’s launch before, during, and after pregnancy. ogies assess risk, whether by sending
in July, the lifeline saw a 66% increase Given the shortage of mental health users a smartphone survey or passively
in volume compared to calls to the professionals, there has also been a move monitoring data like their physical
old number in the same week in 2021, to train nonprofessionals to intervene. activity through wearable sensors. If
according to the lifeline’s administrators. About 6 million people over the past these data reveal heightened suicide
“When someone’s in distress, they’ll two decades have learned the Question, risk, the technologies make strategies
get specialized mental health help Persuade, and Refer (QPR) gatekeeper from evidence-based practices like safety
related to suicide prevention instead of intervention developed by Paul Quinnett, planning or cognitive behavioral therapy
having to go to the emergency room,” PhD, executive chairman of the QPR easily accessible.
said Harkavy-Friedman of the Ameri- Institute, which aims to make QPR as Such interventions are still a work in
can Foundation for Suicide Prevention, common as CPR. progress, said Coppersmith, who predicts
which advocated for 988’s creation and “QPR is an intervention that lances a that the technology could be available
now lobbies for increased funding. psychic boil and allows pain to dissi- within 5 years. “There’s a lot of discussion,
Other efforts focus on connecting pate by sharing it with a compassionate debate, and excitement,” he said. “This is
particularly high-risk populations with other person,” said Quinnett. “There’s a where the field is hoping to go.” n
help. Physicians, for example, are at common myth that if you ask someone
higher risk of suicide than those in other about suicide, it puts the idea in their
professions. Even before the stressors head; but research shows just the oppo-
brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, site: Asking produces relief and lowers
1 in 15 physicians had considered taking anxiety and stress.” FURTHER READING
their own lives in the past year (Law- The institute has now developed
How to assess and intervene with
rence, E. C., Mayo Clinic Proceedings, Vol. advanced training aimed at creating a patients at risk of suicide
96, No. 8, 2021). To help change that, the new workforce of certified crisis respond- Clay, R. A.
Physician Support Line at 888-409-0141 ers who can offer help in rural areas, Monitor on Psychology, 2022
offers confidential physician-to-physician developing countries, and other places
How to talk to your patients about
support to medical students and physi- where clinicians are scarce.
firearm safety
cians. The AgriStress Helpline, developed Once new research comes to fruition, Clay, R. A.
by a nonprofit group called the AgriSafe individuals contemplating suicide will be Monitor on Psychology, 2020
Network, provides 24-hour support to able to get help from technology, too.
another high-risk group—farmers and Most suicide interventions are not Ring the alarm: The crisis of Black
youth suicide in America
ranchers. Specially trained crisis support accessible when people need them most,
Congressional Black Caucus
specialists use a “care navigation” process points out Daniel Coppersmith, a doc- Emergency Taskforce on Black Youth
to get callers in Missouri, Pennsylva- toral candidate in psychology at Harvard Suicide and Mental Health, 2019
nia, Texas, Virginia, and Wyoming the University (Psychiatry: Interpersonal and
assistance they need, whether it is a Biological Processes, online first publica- Understanding suicide risk among
children and preteens: A synthesis
risk assessment, emotional support, or tion, 2022). New technology is making it
workshop
referrals to help in their communities. possible to deliver such interventions at National Institute of Mental Health,
All callers receive a follow-up call within the very time individuals need them. 2021
24 hours. Another specialized service is Earlier technological innovation led
the Trans Lifeline, which provides peer to the use of smartphones for momen- Understanding the characteristics of
suicide in young children
support for the trans community. Run tary ecological assessments, which
National Institute of Mental Health,
by and for trans individuals, the lifeline revealed that individuals’ suicide risk 2021
goes beyond direct services to include can change rapidly. “We need interven-
advocacy to combat oppressive systems. tions that can accommodate and adapt
The National Maternal Mental Health to the rapid nature of those changes,”
FACULTY The pandemic
ARE EXITING exposed the critical

need to change
working conditions
ACADEMIA
on campuses
BY HEATHER STRINGER
In a national survey of more than 170 provosts,

48% reported that faculty turnover was
significantly higher or somewhat higher in 2022
compared with previous years.
M
olly Metz, PhD, an assistant teaching professor of psychology at the University of
Toronto in Canada, worked tirelessly throughout the COVID-19 pandemic to adapt
to online learning and to support students who were struggling with COVID-related
stressors. In June 2022, she took a few weeks off for the first time since the onset of the pandemic,
“but a few weeks doesn’t compensate for 2 years of working beyond my limits,” said Metz.
Metz feels burned out, but admitting well-being. They are less willing to engaged, and connected. Membership
this to colleagues and leaders at the continue in positions with oversized in social media groups for profession-
university feels risky because burnout workloads, salaries that do not keep up als who are leaving higher education
in academic circles is often viewed with inflation, and inflexible policies. is swelling, including Facebook’s The
as an acknowledgement of failure. In a national survey of more than Professor Is Out group. Formed in
“Burnout is a systemic problem in uni- 170 provosts, 48% reported that 2020, the group is growing daily and
versities with individual consequences, faculty turnover was significantly now has more than 26,000 members.
so the solution cannot be solely on the higher or somewhat higher in 2022 Although the statistics of faculty
individual,” Metz said. compared with previous years (2022 turnover are sobering, psychologist
Conversations on campuses and Survey of College and University Chief June Gruber, PhD, an associate pro-
social media suggest that increasing Academic Off icers, Inside Higher Ed fessor of psychology and neuroscience
numbers of graduate students and and Hanover Research). In the same at the University of Colorado Boul-
faculty are feeling similarly disen- survey, 83% of provosts reported that der, hopes that the escalating sense
chanted by the academic career path they believe faculty at their institution of discontent will build momentum
and reevaluating whether their jobs are would say they do not have the right to instigate long-overdue reforms in
worth the high cost to their personal resources and tools to feel supported, higher education. “Faculty burnout is
ANNA SEMENCHENKO/GETTY IMAGES; OLGA UBIRAILO/GETTY IMAGES
Conversations on campuses and social

media suggest that increasing numbers
of graduate students and faculty are
feeling similarly disenchanted by the
academic career path and reevaluating
whether their jobs are worth the high
cost to their personal well-being.
a significant problem, and it is an ideal populations. She helps to develop had COVID. “I could refer them to
time to address this issue,” she said. assessments and evaluations to test resources for mental health support,
“We need to redirect the narrative of the effectiveness of the organization’s but I was not convinced that they
how faculty are supported on campus programs. She enjoys the job and the were getting what they needed from
if we hope to retain them and help value placed on work-life balance by the university,” Leighton said. “I felt a
them thrive.” her new employer. All employees stop responsibility to pick up the slack.”
receiving internal notifications after 6
MAKING DIFFICULT DECISIONS p.m., are encouraged to take vacations, THE PSYCHOLOGY
In the case of Gabrielle Filip-Crawford, and have opportunities to share input OF ACADEMIC DEPARTMENTS
PhD, her university’s response to with senior leaders. To begin to understand the mental
faculty concerns during the pandemic For professors who are staying in health needs of the University of Col-
soured her experience so much that she their jobs, some are sharing that their orado Boulder faculty, Gruber recently
left her tenured position as an assis- experiences during the pandemic have joined the university’s Center for
tant professor of psychology. “It felt changed the way they approach work. Teaching and Learning as a fellow. She
like the work we were doing was not Dana Leighton, PhD, a professor of is developing a survey with colleagues
being seen or valued,” she said. Faculty psychology at Texas A&M University– at the center to assess faculty mental
wanted to be included in the admin- Texarkana, closed his research lab in health and provide guidance for pro-
istration’s discussions about policies fall 2022 because the administration fessors about how to support students
related to enrollment, curriculum, and was not addressing faculty concerns, who are experiencing mental health
salaries, but she felt that faculty input such as low student graduation rates issues.
was unwelcome. In the spring of 2022, and plummeting faculty morale. “I was To better support educators, uni-
she resigned after nearly 6 years at exhausted and starting to lose a sense versities and colleges also need to
St. Catherine University in St. Paul, of meaning and purpose in my work,” create environments that welcome
Minnesota, but she quickly confronted he said. “I needed to cut back some- openness about mental health within
another problem. “Being an academic where, and the lab was the only viable departments, said Sarah Victor, PhD, a
is an identity, and it was a very isolat- option because I needed to continue clinical psychology professor at Texas
ing process to reconceptualize who I teaching.” He had opened the lab in Tech University in Lubbock. She
was,” she said. “There is a widespread 2018 to help undergraduates learn to noticed that professors and students
perception that you only leave if you conduct research, but this work was were often passionate about breaking
are not good enough to make it.” voluntary and not a required part of down stigma related to mental illness
To connect with others who were in his job. in the public, but the subject was
a similar situation, she started Recov- Leighton’s main source of stress somewhat taboo within psychology
ering Academics, a private social media during the pandemic was feeling departments. “There has been a belief
support group for people interested in ill-equipped to support students who that people who have these strug-
transitioning out of higher education. approached him for help when they gles may not be in a position to help
She now works as a research man- confronted difficulties. Many were others,” she said. “There is a fear of
ager at Benefits Data Trust, a national low-income, first-generation students judgment.”
nonprofit organization based in Phil- who were struggling in class because Victor reviewed the literature and
adelphia that is increasing access to family members were ill, child- discovered a striking lack of research
health and food benefits for vulnerable care options were limited, and many on mental health difficulties among
Research has shown that people are more motivated, creative, and productive
when their psychological and material needs are met, and it’s time to be more
responsive to the needs of the people in higher education.”
MOLLY METZ, PHD, ASSISTANT TEACHING PROFESSOR OF PSYCHOLOGY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO
applied psychologists. In 2021, she United Kingdom when
surveyed 1,700 faculty and graduate she began experiencing
students in clinical, counseling, and work burnout in 2020.
school psychology programs in the She started skipping
United States and Canada, and 89% of meals and becoming
graduate students and 71% of faculty angry with family mem-
reported experiencing a mental health bers more frequently as
difficulty. Depression, generalized she worked long hours
anxiety disorder, and suicidal thoughts to continue submitting
or behaviors were the most commonly grants, teaching classes,
reported difficulties (Perspectives on and training more than
Psychological Science, Vol. 17, No. 6, 20 new graduate students
2022). during the pandemic. An administra- Expectations of funding, productivity,
After Victor began the study, gradu- tor at the university informed Muñoz leadership activity, and other competing
ate students started talking to her more that she needed to be more involved in demands have been a source of extreme
stress among some faculty.
frequently about their struggles. One leadership activities to be promoted to
of the problems they faced was lack a professor, which prompted Muñoz
of access to affordable mental health to launch new diversity and inclu- so many hours to keep the university
care that could guarantee anonymity. sion programs within the psychology going during the pandemic,” she said.
The students did not feel comfortable department. Several months later, she She began questioning her lead-
seeking help because local clinics were received a notice that the university ership and grant-writing abilities,
often training sites or were staffed by would be laying off faculty who were and Muñoz struggled with suicidal
alumni. not securing enough grant money, and ideation. Then she saw a post on
Doctoral students and faculty who she was in that category. “I was disil- Facebook about a 4-week course on
were parents during the pandemic lusioned because the administrators burnout led by a professor who had
also confronted untenable demands were doing this after we had sacrificed exited academia. During the course,
for research and publishing, said Jes- she was relieved to discover that she
sica Leveto, PhD, whose Facebook was not alone in feeling exasperated,
group Ph.D. Mamas grew from 2,000 inadequate, and defeated. Muñoz
members before the pandemic to FURTHER READING resigned from her role at the university
more than 16,000 members in recent in summer 2021, and now she coaches
months. Leveto, an associate profes- Common academic experiences no people—including many academics—
sor of sociology and criminology at one talks about: Repeated rejection, who are in life transitions.
impostor syndrome, and burnout
Kent State University in Ohio, sur- Jaremka, L. M., et al.
veyed hundreds of academic parents Perspectives on Psychological HOPE FOR QUELLING BURNOUT
and caregivers in 2020 and 2021, and Science, 2020 To reduce the risk of increasing faculty
in 2022 she started interviewing study resignations and decreasing morale
participants. “Graduate students are Leveraging the strengths of among those who stay in their jobs,
psychologists with lived experience
making conscious decisions not to go of psychopathology
psychology researchers urge insti-
into academia because they saw how Victor, S. E., et al. tutions to question long-standing
difficult and inflexible systems were Perspectives on Psychological systems of doing work and business—
during the pandemic,” Leveto said. “It Science, 2022 rather than defining the problem as
is still largely a publish or perish world a personal issue that employees are
Pandemic issues: Faculty value
YULYA BORTULYOVA/GETTY IMAGES
in higher education. alignment and burnout

expected to resolve on their own. “The
Funding expectations have also Chin, E. G., & Clubbs, B. H. causes of burnout are usually chronic
been a source of extreme stress among Journal of Educational Research and job stressors,” said researcher Christina
faculty. Luna Muñoz, PhD, was a Practice, 2022 Maslach, PhD, a professor emerita of
deputy director of research in clini- psychology at the University of Cali-
cal psychology at a university in the fornia, Berkeley.
According to the World Health work) (The Burnout Challenge: Manag- childcare on campus, affordable housing
Organization, occupational burnout ing People’s Relationships With Their Jobs, and health care for graduate students,
is characterized by three dimen- Harvard University Press, 2022). leave policies that are more flexible, and
sions: feelings of energy depletion or Although some people experience other changes.
exhaustion, feelings of cynicism or high levels of all three dimensions of Envisioning and implementing
detachment from the job, and a sense burnout, most people in an organization changes will require time, money, col-
of ineffectiveness. Maslach has found are usually high in one or maybe two, laboration, and persistence, but the cost
that people who report high levels of said Maslach. If this holds true for aca- of continuing the status quo is too high,
all three dimensions, or high levels of demic institutions, then there are likely said Metz, who is continuing in her
cynicism in particular, experience the many faculty who are not completely role at the university. “The number of
greatest mismatch with their jobs in burned out but are still struggling. amazingly skilled and talented people we
the areas that lead to engagement and “Improving the work environment will have leaving academia at all career stages
well-being at work (Burnout Research, help everyone, not just those who are is going to be devastating to academic
Vol. 3, No. 4, 2016). The six areas of experiencing full burnout,” Maslach said. life and scientific development,” she said.
a work environment that support And academics are voicing com- “Research has shown that people are
psychological health and job satisfac- mon themes in their ideas about how to more motivated, creative, and productive
tion are sustainable workload, sense improve the work environment. Many when their psychological and material
of control, reward (positive feedback), agree that governance needs to include needs are met, and it’s time to be more
supportive workplace community, more faculty voices so they can advo- responsive to the needs of the people in
fairness, and values (the meaning of cate for increased access to subsidized higher education.” n
Cambridge Health Alliance (CHA is clinics, an urgent care site and two full
seeking Full-time or Part-time doctoral service hospitals based in Cambridge,
level (Ph.D or Psy.D) Psychologists. Somerville, and Boston’s metro-north
We are searching for energetic candidates communities.
who are interested in contributing to a Full-time or Part-time Psychologist
department that is dedicated to research, Opportunities:
development and implementation of
• Adult Outpatient
cutting-edge evidenced-based practices
in population-based behavioral health. As • Pediatric Neuropsychology
a leader in behavioral health for more than • Pediatric Inpatient Psychology
20 years, CHA’s psychiatry teams provide Assessment
compassionate care to our diverse patient
• Adult Neuropsychology
population. CHA is comprised of an
established network of ambulatory clinics, • Primary Care Behavioral Health
an urgent care site and two full service Integration
hospitals based in Cambridge, Somerville, CHA is a teaching affiliate of Harvard
Psychology and Boston’s metro-north communities.
As a leader in behavioral health for more
Medical School (HMS) and academic
appointments are available commensurate
Opportunities than 20 years, CHA’s psychiatry teams

provide compassionate care to our diverse
with medical school criteria.
CVs may be sent directly to Melissa
patient population. CHA is comprised of Kelley, Provider Recruiter at
an established network of ambulatory providerrecruitment@challiance.org.
CHA is an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without
regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability status, protected veteran
status, or any other characteristic protected by law.
AFFILIATED WITH
As Funding Cools,
Venture Capitalists
Shift Focus
Venture capital funding for mental health apps
is undergoing a market correction, but new
investments are heavily focused on youth and
other subpopulations, as well as on platforms that
incorporate coaching and artificial intelligence
BY TORI DEANGELIS
M
MOONNIITO
TORR O
ONN PPSSYC
YCHHO
OLO
LOGGYY ●● 22002233 5511
In 2020 and 2021, venture capital funding for mental health apps and related
technologies was at an all-time high, the result of soaring mental health needs during
the COVID-19 pandemic, a shift toward telehealth, and reduced stigma around mental
health services (see “Mental health, meet venture capital,“ January 2022 Monitor).
Today, that pace has slowed (see box), but

investment remains robust: “I don’t think
funders’ excitement is necessarily cooling,
but I think they’re getting a bit more Through the third quarter of 2022, mental health funding still
realistic in their expectations and more topped all other health care areas in venture capital funding, though
thoughtful about the ‘value added’ of a numbers were down significantly from 2021. The slowdown probably
given product,” said Stephen M. Schueller, reflects a normal market correction of a highly “frothy,” or overvalued
PhD, associate professor of science and area, experts say.
informatics at the University of Califor-
nia, Irvine, and executive director of One
Mind PsyberGuide, a nonprofit Consumer
Reports–style website that evaluates the
credibility, user experience, and transpar-
ency of digital mental health tools.

In general, this means investors want
to see more data on how an entrepre-
neur’s app or other technology platform

provides a return on investment (ROI)—
how it reduces symptoms, health care
claims, and costs, for example—while
expanding access to care, said Paula
Wilbourne, PhD, cofounder and chief
science officer at Sibly, a behavior change
and mental health coaching service. “You
didn’t necessarily need to have that data
when things were so frothy [inflated, in
venture capital speak] two years ago,” she
said, “but if you’re going to survive, you
have to have that data now.”
Although the area is still evolving,
the trend toward greater discernment is
good news for psychologists who want to
get involved in this space, said psychol-
ogist Grin Lord, PsyD, ABPP, founder
and chief executive officer of mpathic,
a venture capital–backed startup that
uses a range of artificial intelligence
(AI) technologies to improve commu-
nication so it is delivered with greater Source: Rock Health
empathy. With psychologists’ expertise in
evidence-based treatments, data analy- health technologies,” the report says.
sis, and clinical knowledge, they’re in a From another angle, funders appear
perfect position to pitch solutions with a increasingly interested in technologies
chance for success, she said. that cover a broad spectrum of mental
“Psychologists are really adaptable; we health problems rather than specific
are generalists,” she said. “So, it’s much ones, though there are exceptions to
easier to teach us the business side of that rule, Schueller added. “The feeling
these ventures than it is to take someone is that there can be only so many niche
coming out of business school and teach products, because people are whole
them the clinical side.” people,” he said. Because apps are seen
That said, venture capital and technol- as part of a continuum of care—part
ogy remain areas that some psychologists of a stepped process toward greater
are reluctant to enter, noted APA Director involvement in the care system if and
of Operations and Innovation Nicole as needed—funders are seeing greater COACHES, AI, AND OTHER TRENDS
Owings-Fonner. But it’s in their and con- value in well-designed apps that cover a Sibly’s design highlights two other
sumers’ interest to get involved, she said. wide range of problems, he said. trends that are currently shaping the
“If psychologists can take advantage of That’s the strategy Wilbourne is market: partnering with employers and
these technologies and use them to reach using at Sibly. The app allows members other payers and using paraprofessional
more patients—rather than seeing them with any degree of emotional or psy- coaches to deliver services.
as a replacement for or competition with chological distress—whether a difficult For instance, Wilbourne and
traditional therapy—it will benefit the breakup or clinical depression—to tap Sibly cofounders Moe AlKadi
public and the field as a whole,” she said. into a team of trained coaches 24/7, text and Omar AlEisa began Sibly as a
them about their problem, and get an direct-to-consumer app when they
GROWTH AREAS immediate response. If the person is in launched the company in 2016. “But it
AND INNOVATIONS crisis or needs more help, Sibly coaches soon became clear that most health care
While funders are becoming choosier in quickly refer them to a PhD-level expert and mental health services are paid for
their investments, there are new areas of on the team who can vet the problem by organizations,” Wilbourne said. They
growth and innovation that investors seem and refer them to additional help. pivoted so that Sibly now contracts with
keen on supporting, Schueller noted. So far, the model appears to be a range of companies and organizations.
One area is apps and platforms working: In a claims analysis of a For- Hiring and training coaches has been
geared to specific subpopulations, tune 50 company contracted with Sibly, another key to Sibly’s growing success,
including youth, people of color and Sibly showed that using the interven- helping to cut costs, improve quality, and
Indigenous people, LGBTQI+ indi- tion reduced health care claims by 14%. address the dearth of doctoral-level pro-
viduals, and people with serious mental As it becomes clearer which products viders by training paraprofessionals to
illness. The venture capital firm Telosity, best serve people’s mental health needs, take on counseling roles. The company
SERHII BOLSHAKOV/GETTY IMAGES; PREVIOUS PAGE: BOHDAN SKRYPNYK/GETTY IMAGES
for example, has been funding a bur- there are likely to be more mergers trains these well-vetted and consistently
geoning number of youth-focused apps and acquisitions, as well, Schueller supervised mental health workers in
and technologies, recently releasing a added. For example, two giants in the evidence-based cognitive behavioral and
report describing this booming land- space—Headspace, which trains people motivational interviewing techniques and
scape for those interested in developing in mindfulness and meditation tech- supports them with AI tools designed
or investing in these products. The report niques, and Ginger, which provides by psychologists to help them maintain
states that by 2027, technologies and on-demand mental health care as an high fidelity to the evidence-based tech-
startup companies in the youth mental employment benefit—made a $3 billion niques. This process enables Sibly to meet
health space will be worth $26 billion; deal to merge in 2021. (The company is demand, at scale, with a quality interven-
in the past 4 years alone, investment has now called Headspace Health.) tion, Wilbourne said.
increased 15-fold. “Investors and startup “I think some of this trend is Other companies, too, are integrat-
founders . . . can meet the insatiable an appreciation by funders that ing AI, machine learning, and natural
market demand and a massive oppor- one-pointed solutions are not going to language processing—computer pro-
tunity for youth wellness and mental be profitable in the long term,” he said. gramming that can process and analyze
large amounts of natural language at Toronto Metropolitan University and with director-level roles at places like
data—into mental health platforms. founder of the virtual startup company Modern Health and Amazon,” she said.
Examples include chatbots or AI soft- Nellie Health, which offers a commu- Finally, technology as a means of
ware that mimic the role of a therapist, nity of expert therapists and a platform delivering mental health care is undoubt-
AI that provides feedback to therapists to facilitate science-backed prac- edly here to stay, said Schueller, so
about their clinical skills, and AI that tices for the range of stress- and avoiding it means that psychologists are
helps clients with clinical homework. trauma-related conditions. missing out on a huge, growing aspect of
Such technologies are central to Nellie, which also uses technology care delivery.
Lord’s mpathic platform, which uses nat- strategies such as AI to provide feedback “The most innovative platforms,”
ural language processing to automatically to clinicians and gamification to increase he predicted, “will take the best of
analyze voice- and text-based conversa- engagement in services, is limited to technology and the best of traditional
tions to identify common factors skills North America, but Monson eventually psychology practices and bring those
such as empathy, alliance, trust, and wants to take a version of it overseas. together.” n
rapport, and to reduce employee and “There’s a huge market of people outside
other forms of turnover by automatically of North America who have mental
correcting problems as they occur, Lord health problems and don’t have good
explained. access to care, and other places with RESOURCES
Mpathic is innovative in another hardly any mental health care at all,” she AND READING
way: It is taking these methodologies commented.
out of the therapy room and into the real In addition, psychologists can ensure Therapists in Tech
A digital community that promotes the
world—for example, to help employers that these products are data driven, ethical development of ethical digital mental
gain a better track record in recruiting for consumers, don’t oversell their value, health leaders
and retaining employees and insur- and enhance rather than replace therapy. www.therapistsintech.com
ance adjusters to display more empathy “These technologies tend to be most use-
toward customers (mpathic uses these ful when they are thoughtfully integrated Society for Digital Mental Health
www.societydmh.org
same methods to give therapists feed- into clinical care pathways,” Schueller
back on therapy interactions). said. “We have to make sure that we’re Training the next generation of
The overarching goal, Lord added, involved so that someone else doesn’t take behavioral medicine scientists to
is prevention: “The somewhat extreme what we’re doing and use it in a way that accelerate digital health
stance I took with [mpathic] was to ask, reflects poorly on the field.” Sweet, C. C., et al.
Translational Behavioral Medicine,
How many people can we train in empa- Owings-Fonner added that there’s 2022
thy skills to support each other where a huge opportunity for psychologists
they work and live before they have to in research and academia to share their
enter the funnel of the actual mental research-based tools and treatments in
health care system?” she said. tech capacities, but that they need to ACCELERATOR PROGRAMS
partner with industry to make these tools
engaging and marketable. WELL (for female entrepreneurs)
WHY SHOULD PSYCHOLOGISTS
www.well-women.org/accelerator
GET INVOLVED? Getting involved in these areas can
If these innovations aren’t inspiration also be lucrative, said Lord, and even On Deck
enough, consider the many other reasons psychologists who aren’t super savvy in www.beondeck.com
to enter this space, said other psychol- these skills can learn what they need
ogists working in tech, venture capital, to. In 2020, she founded a group called Andreessen Horowitz’s
a16z START program
and related areas. Therapists in Tech, devoted to help- https://a16z.com/programs-a16z-start/
The biggest reason remains need: ing mental health professionals get
Millions of people aren’t getting ade- the knowledge and training they need Y Combinator’s Y Startup School
quate mental health care, so becoming to succeed in this arena. Some of its www.startupschool.org
tech savvy is a vital way to expand the members who first transitioned from
reach of quality services, said Candice academia and clinical work into tech as
Monson, PhD, professor of psychology late as 2020 “are now leaders in the field,
REBRANDING
THE FIELD
The Big Tent of
Behavioral Health
Psychologists are expanding the

one-to-one therapy approach to
interventions that can improve and
strengthen psychological health
across entire populations
BY KIRSTEN WEIR
RE B RAND ING THE FIELD
P
sychology is thinking bigger, as a growing number of psychological scientists
and clinicians seek to “rebrand” the field. Experts are finding innovative new
ways to reach more people and take a more preventive approach by shifting
away from the perception of psychology as the practice of diagnosing and treating
mental health disorders and broadening the lens of behavioral health.
In February 2022, APA’s governing evidence-based treatments—and the one-to-one therapy model to enhance
Council of Representatives adopted a need is only increasing. “To make a dif- scalability or accessibility,” she said. “That
policy calling on psychologists to take ference at the population level, we need default has to change. We have to start
a population health approach, working to create a more agile mental health sys- without those assumptions regarding
across and within systems to improve tem that includes multiple levels of care what treatments or supportive programs
the health of entire communities, taking and multiple contact points at moments can look like, where they can be, and how
into account such factors as income, of need,” Schleider said. To help solve people can access them.”
education, culture, and environment that problem, her Lab for Scalable Men- In the effort to expand the reach of
(Psychology’s Role in Advancing Population tal Health is developing what she calls behavioral health, increasing the scale of
Health, 2022). “light-touch, single-session interven- impact is critical—but it’s just one side
“We’ve been stuck for too long in this tions” that are either delivered digitally or of the coin, Dodge said. “The second
narrow idea that the only way we can have by lay providers. prominent feature of this goal is a trend
a positive impact on people is through In one example, she and her col- toward prevention,” he added. To make
one-on-one psychological interventions,” leagues tested single-session, online an impact in preventing mental health
said Kenneth Dodge, PhD, a professor interventions in adolescents with ele- problems, he’s proposed a simple yet
of psychology and public policy at Duke vated depression symptoms who accessed radical idea: mental health primary care.
University. The field is positioned to make the self-guided 30-minute sessions “In physical health, we take our babies
a bigger impact on policy, on educa- through social media. They found that to the pediatrician for well-baby visits;
tion, and on so many areas of population
health, he added. “It’s not that the days of
psychotherapy are over. That’s still there. If we begin to think about a primary-care model
But there is a broader contribution that
we as psychologists—both researchers and
for mental health, it leads to all kinds of different
practitioners—can make.” interventions—it broadens the contribution that
It’s a mental leap for a field built
on the shoulders of face-to-face psy-
psychological science could make to society.”
chotherapy. But it’s a necessary one, KENNETH DODGE, PHD, PROFESSOR OF PSYCHOLOGY
added Jessica Schleider, PhD, a clinical AND PUBLIC POLICY AT DUKE UNIVERSITY
psychologist and assistant professor at
Stony Brook University. “We’ve hit the both a behavioral activation intervention we don’t wait for them to get sick,”
ceiling in terms of what high-intensity, and an intervention based on teach- he said. “If we begin to think about a
individual-level interventions can accom- ing that traits are malleable improved primary-care model for mental health,
plish,” Schleider said. “If we want to 3-month depressive symptoms compared it leads to all kinds of different inter-
reduce the burden of mental illness for with a supportive control session, even ventions—it broadens the contribution
individuals and for society, the status quo during the high-stress COVID-19 pan- that psychological science could make
is not going to cut it.” demic (Nature Human Behaviour, Vol. 6, to society.”
No. 2, 2022). In his own research, he developed the
POPULATION AND PREVENTION “Most clinical psychologists think of Family Connects program, which works
Only a fraction of the people who psychology first, and many assume that with families beginning at birth to reduce
need mental health support receive we can build adaptations around that early child abuse and promote infant
RE BRAND ING THE FIELD
health and healthy psychological devel- adopted by several cities and is being Of course, the idea that psychological
opment. In the community of Durham, rolled out across the entire state of Ore- science can inform prevention efforts
North Carolina, the program reaches out gon. “I didn’t think of this as primary isn’t new. One of the field’s most visible
to all families having new babies, regard- care when we started, but it really func- success stories may be the widespread
less of their income, education level, tions like primary care for parenting,” adoption of social-emotional learning
or background. Nurses visit participat- Dodge said. (SEL) curricula in schools. According to
ing families up to three times to screen a national report by Tyton Partners, 95%
parents for mental illness, substance use, BEHAVIORAL HEALTH FOR YOUTH of K–12 districts have adopted SEL in
and domestic violence, in addition to A similar mental health primary‑care some way. Some 73% of those districts
asking about their parenting skills, access model could be used across the lifespan, have adopted SEL curricula, while
to social support, and material goods Dodge said. It’s easy to imagine the 70% incorporate SEL into professional
such as cribs and formula. From there, benefit for couples who receive relation- development (Finding Your Place: The
participants are connected to whatever ship counseling before getting married, Current State of K–12 Social Emotional
resources and support they might need. or older adults having someone who can Learning, 2020).
Randomized trials showed Fam- support their emotional and cognitive Yet with rates of mental health dis-
ily Connects resulted in fewer cases of health as they prepare for retirement. orders rising among the nation’s youth,
maternal depression or anxiety, more “Life transitions, like the birth of a child, researchers continue to study how best
community connections, and fewer child school entry, marriage, retirement, can all to intervene to promote well-being on a
abuse investigations (JAMA Network bring challenges like anxiety but can also larger scale. In one encouraging devel-
Open, Vol. 2, No. 11, 2019). It has been afford opportunities,” he said. opment, the U.S. Preventive Services
CIENPIES/GETTY IMAGES
RE B RAND ING THE FIELD
Task Force recommended in October

that primary-care physicians should
screen all children older than 8 for
anxiety, in an attempt to improve diag-
nosis and treatment of a disorder that’s
already been diagnosed in some 5.8 mil-
lion American children. It’s a promising
start—yet there is much more that the
field can do.
It’s time for us to focus our
“We can’t wait until people are talents and energies and
suffering to apply what we know,” said
Alexis Harris, PhD, a research assistant
expertise on building additional
professor of education at Youth-Nex, systems of support. It’s a both/
the University of Virginia Center to
Promote Effective Youth Development,
and, not an either/or.”
and the project director for the Com- JESSICA SCHLEIDER, PHD, STONY BROOK UNIVERSITY
passionate Schools Project.
With Compassionate Schools, Harris
and her colleagues are studying a curric-
ulum that builds on SEL by integrating
concepts of mindfulness, compassion,
body awareness, healthy eating, and
exercise. The study is taking place in 45
schools with some 20,000 children and
provides strategies to support educator
well-being as well. This kind of holis-
tic, mind-body approach is a trend in FIXING BROKEN SYSTEMS compound those negative outcomes. In
prevention science, she added. “After Increasingly, psychologists are taking aim a current project, Metzger is integrating
decades of research, it’s evident that at those larger systems, said Isha Metzger, practices from racial socialization with
there are common root causes and com- PhD, a clinical psychologist and assistant trauma-focused cognitive behavioral ther-
mon protective factors that underlie a professor at Georgia State University. “The apy (TF-CBT). Then, she’s using social
variety of mental, emotional, and behav- things we experience in our environments, media and podcasts to provide psycho
ioral problems,” she said. “Starting there, our communities, our day-to-day lives education to Black youth and connect
we can have a broader impact.” impact our mental health and ability to them with evidence-based resources for
As the field sets its sights on broad- function in society as a whole,” she said. trauma and stress. Some of those efforts
ening and strengthening its prevention “People can’t focus on their mental health include using social justice activities such
efforts, there’s also a call to move away when they have larger social and structural as peaceful protests as a means of behav-
from a predominant focus on individual issues to contend with.” ioral activation.
choices and behaviors. To start addressing those issues, “Black families are already utilizing
“In many approaches that are focused Metzger’s research applies racial social- cultural and family strengths to over-
on promoting adaptive skills and pos- ization (the conversations and practices come experiences with discrimination,”
itive behavioral trajectories, a lot of caregivers use to build youth’s identity, she said. “Using social justice work as
responsibility is placed on the indi- esteem, and coping) to reduce the impact behavioral activation has mental health
vidual. We see that so much with the of racial stress and trauma. Daily exposure outcomes such as reducing hopelessness,
attention placed on self-care, for exam- to racism and discrimination are asso- helplessness, anxiety, and depression and
ple,” Harris said. “That obscures the fact ciated with worse physical, emotional, has a positive impact on society as well.”
that we need to pay more attention to and behavioral outcomes among Black Such efforts to address racism and
the conditions in the systems that indi- youth. Other racial traumas, such as the discrimination are important ways for the
viduals are functioning within.” experience of witnessing police brutality, field of psychology to improve mental,
RE BRAND ING THE FIELD
or disseminate digital interventions to

the public. And few clinical psychology
Brain Science as a Brand programs are designed to train providers
to think in these broader ways.
Is the Department of Psychology an endangered species? At Yet there are vast opportunities for
the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, it was rechris- psychologists to grow into this new
tened the Department of Psychology and Neuroscience. mindset, Metzger said. “Whatever your
The University of California, Santa Barbara’s former Psychol- focus is, how can you utilize that to
ogy Department is now the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences. think about the underserved—to benefit
At Louisiana State University, it’s the Cognitive and Brain Sciences Program. those most at risk, to have a greater
From coast to coast, universities are rebranding themselves to emphasize a impact on society?” she asked.
connection to neuroscience and the brain. Some clinical psychologists might
Cynics might view this trend as an attempt to legitimize psychology as feel threatened by a trend away from
a hard science. “That’s a dangerous direction to go in, because then we’re traditional psychotherapy. They shouldn’t,
not rebranding out of public interest so much as we are out of a desire for Schleider added. “We have a clear evi-
fundability,” said Stony Brook University assistant professor and clinical psy- dence base for individual psychotherapy,
chologist Jessica Schleider, PhD. one very particular level of mental health
There’s a certain practicality at play. As new tools for neuroimaging and support. But that’s not going to reduce
molecular science have become available, big funders like NIH are increasingly the burden of mental illness on a broad
eager to invest in research with a strong biological bent. Efforts to emphasize scale beyond what we’re already achiev-
the brain aren’t necessarily at odds with the movement to shift psychology ing,” she added. “It’s time for us to focus
toward population and behavioral health, said Kenneth Dodge, PhD, a profes- our talents and energies and expertise on
sor of psychology at Duke University. “Findings about the importance of neural building additional systems of support.
development in early childhood, for example, have direct implications for It’s a both/and, not an either/or.” n
designing early childhood education and family leave policies,” he pointed out.
Indeed, psychology may be the field best positioned to translate findings
from basic science into programs and policies that improve mental and phys-
FURTHER READING
ical health on a broad scale. “If we’re serious about promoting well-being
and reducing mental illness on a population scale, we can’t ignore biology,” Extending the scalability and reach of
Schleider said. “But we have to center a public health approach along the way.” psychosocial interventions
Kazdin, A. E.
In M. Barkham, W. Lutz, & L. G.
Castonguay (Eds.), Bergin and Gar-
field’s Handbook of Psychotherapy
behavioral, and physical health on a broader socialization and racial trauma, Metzger and Behavior Change, Wiley, 2021
scale, added Schleider, who is beginning said. And a growing public conver-
work to address the experience of discrim- sation around burnout, stress, and Expanding the reach of psycho
social services for youth: Untapped
ination in teens who identify as LGBTQ+. self-care post-pandemic is also influenc- potential of mentor-delivered single
“Scholars are increasingly focused on ing the field. “Social media, mass media, session interventions
structural influences on mental health and pop culture—these trends are pushing Hart, M. J., et al.
illness, including the laws and policies that the research, funding, and policy and Journal of Community Psychology,
impact the stress people are experiencing influencing the way we think about the 2022
and the ways they are coping,” she said. science,” she said. Healing interpersonal and
“Targeting these social determinants of Even with buy-in from funders and racial trauma: Integrating racial
health is one way we can affect change.” the public, creating a broader definition socialization into trauma-focused
In some ways, the public is driv- of behavioral health won’t be easy. With cognitive behavioral therapy for
ing these efforts. Following widespread a health care reimbursement model African American youth
Metzger, I. W., et al.
protests after George Floyd’s mur- built on one-to-one therapy, there’s the Child Maltreatment, 2020
der in 2020, large funders began question of who will pay to establish
investing more in research on racial mental health primary-care providers

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psychology

COMMUNICATING PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE 3

EMERGING TAKING AIM AT MISINFORMATION 8

TRENDS PSYCHOLOGICAL RESEARCH IS CHANGING 13

WORKER WELL-BEING IS IN DEMAND 23

YOUTH MENTAL HEALTH CRISIS 29

ADVANCING THE FIELD THROUGH PARTNERSHIPS 35

NEW TRENDS IN SUICIDE PREVENTION 40

FACULTY ARE EXITING ACADEMIA 46

VENTURE CAPITALISTS SHIFT FOCUS 51

REBRANDING THE FIELD 55

11 EMERGING TRENDS FOR 2023

in these spaces helpful? How scientists engage the public

Origins, motives and impact in

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Conspiracy theories and other forms of dis- and

Included in psychologists’ efforts to

feature humorous examples of these

PSYCHOLOGICAL Driven by a push to produce

to the fact that quantitative research

“In order to make transformational change, people need to hear

Highly Rated & Trusted Worldwide

Universities, nonprofits, and

Educational psychologist Dr. Yuma Tomes

PHOTO BY JOHN MARINELLI/COURTESY OF TRINITY COLLEGE; PREVIOUS PAGE: SCOTT SUCHMAN

particularly stark, she noted. In Sep-

grounds, can bring a particular flavor of

COPING WITH CHALLENGES

The business case for diversity

employee well-being and behavior. Disease Control and Prevention.

“The organizations that are the most nimble

and creative in managing changes will lead

satisfaction, reduced turnover intentions, more creative and innovative solutions,

“They miss the peer mentoring that

Schools are a key place to help children.

extreme strain,” said clinical psycholo-

Collaboration between psychologists and other fields has the

CHET STRANGE/GETTY IMAGES; ALLISON DINNER/GETTY IMAGES; JORDAN VONDERHAAR/GETTY IMAGES

There’s a common myth that if you ask someone about suicide,

of Massachusetts Chan Medical School.

AgriStress Helpline (833-897-2474) provides support to farmers and ranchers in

National Maternal Mental Health Hotline (833-9-HELP4MOMS) offers help before,

FACULTY The pandemic

ARE EXITING exposed the critical

In a national survey of more than 170 provosts,

ANNA SEMENCHENKO/GETTY IMAGES; OLGA UBIRAILO/GETTY IMAGES

Conversations on campuses and social

in higher education. alignment and burnout

Opportunities than 20 years, CHA’s psychiatry teams

Today, that pace has slowed (see box), but

Psychologists are expanding the

Task Force recommended in October

or disseminate digital interventions to

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