Issues Regarding Confidentiality for Military Psychologists

Federal statutes and military service regulations govern the functioning of military psychologists. Effective July 18, 1988, military psychologists were required to maintain an active state license. The licensing laws of all 50 states cite adherence to the Ethical Principles of the American Psychological Association (APA, 1981a). Potential conflicts exist between federal statutes, service regulations, and ethical principles of the APA. The principal area of conflict may be with confidentiality of information obtained by psychologists from consumers. Thirty active duty Army Medical Department (AMEDD) psychologists were surveyed on current practices regarding confidentality. Twenty-four (80%) responded. Results suggest that most AMEDD psychol- ogists (21 respondents or 87.5%) do not document in writing that they have informed consumers of the limits of confidentiality of psychological infor- mation. Nor do they obtain written permission before releasing information on consumers when requested by unit commanders. Military psychologists are encouraged to advise consumers in writing of the limits of confidentiality of psychological information prior to initiating any professional relationship with a patient.     

Suicide in the army national guard: an empirical inquiry

Since 2004, suicides in the U.S. military have risen, most notably in the Army National Guard (ARNG). Data used in this study were obtained for suicides occurring from 2007 to 2010 and for a random sample of nonsuicides from the general ARNG population. Of the military-related variables considered, a few showed relationships to suicide. Rather, the primary variables associated with suicide were soldier background characteristics, including age (17-24 years), race (White), and gender (male). Cluster analysis revealed two distinct suicide groups: "careerists" (about one third of all suicides) and "first-termers" (about two thirds of all suicides), each group exhibiting different concurrent behavioral problems.     

Exposing the glosses in Seligman and Fowler's (2011) straw-man arguments

The author was disappointed to see an entire special issue of the American Psychologist (January 2011) devoted to military psychology, but he was especially concerned about the one-sided moral justifications presented by Seligman and Fowler (2011) in the final article of the issue. The author feels they misrepresented potential objections to their program and dismissed the inherent dangers of cooperation between organized psychology and the military.     

Precipitating Circumstances of Suicide among Active Duty U.S. Army Personnel Versus U.S. Civilians, 2005–2010

To help understand suicide among soldiers, we compared suicide events between active duty U.S. Army versus civilian decedents to identify differences and inform military prevention efforts. We linked 141 Army suicide records from 2005 to 2010 to National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) data. We described the decedents’ military background and compared their precipitators of death captured in NVDRS to those of demographically matched civilian suicide decedents. Both groups commonly had mental health and intimate partner precipitating circumstances, but soldier decedents less commonly disclosed suicide intent.     

Missing: critical and skeptical perspectives on comprehensive soldier fitness

The author read with interest, and concern, the January 2011 issue of the American Psychologist. The Special Issue on Comprehensive Soldier Fitness addressed a hugely consequential national issue and offered a vision for psychological resilience along with an elaborate set of supporting articles, concluding with some comments on "Objections" to psychologists working with the military. While a bold vision was offered and a game plan presented, no data or evidence are yet available (it is far too early in the process), and that should concern us all. The author hopes the American Psychological Association (APA) and the American Psychologist offer skeptical and critical views in future issues on the issue of the psychological health of our military and as evidence emerges regarding the Comprehensive Soldier Fitness program.     

Soldier Background and Postinvestigative Events Associated With Timing of Suicide Following Deployment of U.S. Army National Guard Soldiers

The present study examined the timing of suicide and its associated soldier background and postinvestigative events among deployed Army National Guard (ARNG) soldiers from calendar years 2007 through 2014. Suicide deaths were nearly equally distributed between soldiers who had been deployed and those who had not. Among those deployed, however, suicides occurred mostly 1 year or more after having returned from deployment. Soldier background and postsuicide investigative events were associated with the timing of suicide. Having more years of military service, more previous deployments, and being married were associated with in-theater suicides. Soldiers younger in age (17–24 years), single, nonprior service, and lower in rank, in addition to having parent-family conflicts, full-time employment problems, and military transition problems were associated with suicides that had occurred 1–120 days and 120–365 days since return from deployment. Soldiers aged (24–29 years), married, and higher in rank, along with more reported problems including past behavioral health conditions, postdeployment behavior health referrals, criminal behaviors, and military performance were associated with suicides that had occurred 1 year or more after return. Findings likely represent time periods of suicide vulnerability for identifiable groups of soldiers, based on soldier background and events surrounding the suicide. Practical and theoretical implications of the findings are discussed.     

Authoritarianism and Political Impoverishment: Deficits in Knowledge and Civic Disinterest

Past research shows that authoritarian individuals hold strong opinions about a variety of political and social issues, such as race relations and military conflict. What has not been established, though, is the amount of general political knowledge that authoritarians possess. In this study, three groups of college students were administered Altemeyer's Right-Wing Authoritarianism (RWA) scale; most of them also received items assessing general political knowledge and specific knowledge about the 2000 presidential election, as well as items assessing interest in politics. Relative to students with low RWA scores, those with high scores possessed less political knowledge; moreover, they expressed less interest in learning about politics. In general, authoritarianism was unrelated to how individuals got their political information or how credible they found their sources. The implication that authoritarians hold strong attitudinal beliefs with weak political knowledge is discussed.     

Turning psychology against militarism

This paper draws on material, mostly from outside psychology, which illustrates the deep rootedness of militarisation in modern culture and the numerous ways in which it permeates civic society. Children, boys especially, learn to value armed conflict. War games are now more realistic, and the distinction between gaming and military training has become blurred. War and deadly weapons are portrayed in unrealistic ways that hide their actual effects. Just war theory, widely subscribed to, justifies armed conflict by proposing that under certain conditions, war can be just with moral rules that apply to the fighting. Many psychologists have worked for the military in one way or another, implicitly or explicitly promoting militarism, and the changing nature of war and armaments is providing further temptations for psychologists to do so. Psychology has been ambivalent about militarism. Peace psychology has not taken an unambiguous position on it, often speaking disparagingly of the absence of war in the absence of social justice, referring to it as “negative peace.” Feminists, often very clear in their opposition to militarism, have sometimes advocated for women to have greater acceptance in the armed forces. The paper concludes by arguing for a more clearly identified Psychology Against Militarism. Community psychology should take a lead in advocating for Psychology Against Militarism because militarism is a good example of how the exercise of power, wreaking widespread harm on us all but especially on those who are already relatively powerless, is collectively legitimised, and hence how we become complicit in supporting it.     

The Dimensionality of Contextual and Citizenship Performance in Military Recruits: Support for Nine Dimensions Using Self-, Peer,and Supervisor Ratings

Organizational Citizenship Behavior and Contextual Performance make up a domain that can be referred to as Contextual and Citizenship Performance (CCP). CCP is essential to assess and promote in military and civilian organizations because it defines the “good soldier” prototype. Unfortunately, extant research has led to confusion as to whether CCP consists of one, two, three, six, or nine dimensions. We shed new light on the composition of CCP by evaluating one-, two-, three-, six-, and nine-dimensional theoretical models using supervisor, self-, and peer ratings of military recruits undergoing basic training. We employed Relative Percentile Method ratings to improve distinctions among ratees when the level of CCP is high. Contrary to much recent literature, our results supported a nine-dimensional theoretical model in all three rating sources. Thus, conceptualizing, assessing and promoting the proverbial “good soldier” may require a more highly nuanced perspective of CCP than is generally acknowledged.     

When Does Soldier Patriotism or Nationalism Matter? The Role of Transformational Small‐Unit Leaders

Patriotism and nationalism, 2 sets of attitudes often associated with the military, are examined in relation to perceived combat readiness and intention to remain in military service. Transformational leadership served as an intervening variable in these relationships. Survey data obtained from a sample of Army National Guard soldiers (N = 415) were used to examine relationships. Among junior‐ranking enlisted soldiers, both patriotism and nationalism showed significant, positive associations with perceived combat readiness and intention to remain in military service. The structural equation model fit soldiers' nationalistic attitudes best, having a considerable indirect effect through transformational leadership on perceived combat readiness. Implications of nationalistic and patriotic attitudes combined with charismatic leaders to benefit soldier readiness and retention are discussed.     

PERMA and the building blocks of well-being

Seligman (2011) hypothesized that PERMA (Positive Emotion, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning, and Accomplishment) are the elements of well-being. Goodman, Disabato, Kashdan & Kaufmann (2017) reported strong evidence that subjective well-being is the final common path of such elements and their data are entirely consistent with Seligman’s hypothesis. They argued, incorrectly however, that he suggested that PERMA constituted a different kind of well-being rather than just its building blocks. The complicated issue, one that transcends psychometrics, of how to decide on elements of well-being is discussed.     

Ethical Challenges for Military Psychologists: When Worlds Collide

Despite the mental health needs in the military and improved access to military psychologists, many in need do not seek psychological services. The military policies, culture, and environment pose considerable barriers to help seeking. In turn, military practices often conflict with the psychologist’s professional ethics, leading to a range of ethical dilemmas including multiple relationships, multiple agencies, and limited confidentiality. To address ethical concerns and encourage service members to seek mental health services, this article proposes maintaining an understanding of military rules, law, and professional ethics; identifying multiple relationships and establishing boundaries up front; and collaborating with the patient in disclosures of information.     

Must psychologists change the way they analyze their data?

Wagenmakers, Wetzels, Borsboom, and van der Maas (2011) argued that psychologists should replace the familiar "frequentist" statistical analyses of their data with bayesian analyses. To illustrate their argument, they reanalyzed a set of psi experiments published recently in this journal by Bem (2011), maintaining that, contrary to his conclusion, his data do not yield evidence in favor of the psi hypothesis. We argue that they have incorrectly selected an unrealistic prior distribution for their analysis and that a bayesian analysis using a more reasonable distribution yields strong evidence in favor of the psi hypothesis. More generally, we argue that there are advantages to bayesian analyses that merit their increased use in the future. However, as Wagenmakers et al.'s analysis inadvertently revealed, they contain hidden traps that must be better understood before being more widely substituted for the familiar frequentist analyses currently employed by most research psychologists.     

Dual-relationship prohibitions: A concept whose time never should have come

The concept of dual-relationship prohibitions has limited value in that it creates confusion and leads to unfair results in ethics and licensing actions. It serves little purpose because it does not assist psychologists in analyzing situations. Neither does it provide much help in assisting psychologists in deciding how to act in a particular situation, such that the client's best interest is considered. This article addresses the problems with dual-relationship prohibitions. It also focuses on the constitutional problems of dual-relationship restrictions. Finally, a new standard is offered, that of substantial conflict of interest. In addition, an analytical model is proposed to guide psychologists in making decisions regarding whether a substantial conflict of interest exists where multiple-role relationships are involved. Finally, several suggestions are presented to make the entire process connected with ethics complaints fairer and more constitutionally sound.     

Practical Computer Ethics (Book)

Do continuing education (CE) mandates increase participation in ethics programs and enhance their perceived outcomes? In a study of 5,198 North American psychologists, significant differences were found between mandated and nonmandated psychologists in relation to their participation in ethics programs but not in the perceived outcomes associated with those trainings. Although 64.3% of those psychologists operating under ethics mandates reported completing at least one ethics training within the previous year, only 40.7% of those without such mandates reported doing likewise. Overall, both groups tended to view their ethics training quite favorably in relation to its perceived outcomes, though they differed in relation to their endorsement of CE mandates. Results are discussed in relation to the ongoing development of evidence-based CE and its role in developing critical professional competencies.     

Exploring Feminist Women's Body Consciousness

In a qualitative investigation of young feminists' experience of body consciousness, 25 feminist women each participated in one of 6 focus groups examining the ways they experienced body image and negotiated cultural messages about women's appearance. Participants described their experience with objectification and its impact on their body image, sense of self, and relationships with other women. Although feminism provided an alternative way to understand cultural messages and reframe negative thoughts, this understanding did not necessarily affect aesthetic reactions. Participants experienced conflict between their feminist beliefs and their feelings about beauty ideals and their own appearance. This conflict is interpreted in terms of a mere exposure effect and existing gender/power relations. Suggestions of ways feminist psychologists can support young women's strategies for resisting negative cultural messages are provided.     

Protecting confidentiality rights: the need for an ethical practice model

All psychologists must uphold the same ethical standards about confidentiality even though each state imposes different legal limits on their ability to protect clients' confidences. The resulting ethical-legal confusion is exacerbated by legally based confidentiality training that treats legal exceptions as if they were the rule and fosters the impression that attorneys are now the only real experts about this aspect of practice. This article provides an ethics-based confidentiality practice model that clarifies the ethical rule and puts its legal exceptions into ethical perspective. Like the Confidentiality section of the American Psychological Association's (2002) Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct, this outline would apply to all psychologists regardless of state laws, but the details of its implementation would vary according to role and setting. It can be used as a universal training outline, a consultation and supervision tool, a guide to professional practice, and a basis for clearer ongoing conversation about the ethics of "conditional confidentiality." Psychologists can use this practice model to regain their status as experts about the confidentiality ethics of their own profession.     

On the home front: stress for recently deployed Army couples

Military couples who have experienced deployment and reintegration in current U.S. military operations frequently experience stress regarding the dangers and effects of such experiences. The current study evaluated a sample of 300 couples with an active duty Army husband and civilian spouse who experienced a deployment within the year before the survey (conducted in 2007). Wives generally reported greater levels of emotional stress compared with husbands. Overall, higher levels of stress were found for couples who reported lower income and greater economic strain, perceive the need for more support and are unsure about how to get support, have more marital conflict, and are generally less satisfied with the Army and the current mission. Husband combat exposure was also associated with more stress for husbands and wives. Additionally, for wives, stress was related to greater child behavior problems and a sense of less Army concern for families. The results suggest areas of intervention with military couples to help them cope with the challenges of military life and deployment.     

Ethics in Psychology and Law: An International Perspective

Some psychologists working in the psychology and law (psycholegal) field feel that the profession does not provide them with adequate ethical guidance even though the field is arguably one of the oldest and best established applied fields of psychology. The uncertainty psychologists experience most likely stems from working with colleagues whose professional ethics differs from their own while providing services to demanding people and the many moral questions associated with the administration of law. I believe psychology’s ethics does, however, provide adequate moral guidance. It has a sound historical basis, has face validity and emphasizes those social moral principles that allow psychologists to best serve individuals and society. Psychologists may nevertheless be confronted with conflicting demands because there are other norm systems that also regulate their behavior as researchers and practitioners, and they, like all people, are influenced by their conscience. Ultimately, psychologists working in the psycholegal field will be best served if they have good knowledge of, and have internalized, the ethical principles of psychology.