Culture and Community Psychology: Toward a Renewed and Reimagined Vision

Interest is growing in community psychology to look more closely at culture. Culture has resided in community psychology in its emphasis on context, ecology, and diversity, however we believe that the field will benefit from a more explicit focus on culture. We suggest a cultural approach that values the community's points of view and an understanding of shared and divergent meanings, goals, and norms within a theory of empowerment. Furthermore, we posit the importance of pluralistic, multi-method programs of research and action encompassing both idiographic and nomothetic approaches, and critical reflexivity of our roles and agendas. Culture can be further incorporated into all the branches and fibers of community psychology.     

Commentary on the Future of Community Psychology: Perspective of a Research Community Psychologist

Community psychology is commented upon from the perspective of a community psychologist who was trained in the Community Psychology Program at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Her background and training are reviewed. A brief survey of research on homelessness as a frame for community psychology research is presented. Concluding remarks are provided on the future of research in community psychology.     

Community Psychology and Community Mental Health: A Call for Reengagement

Community psychology is rooted in community mental health research and practice and has made important contributions to this field. Yet, in the decades since its inception, community psychology has reduced its focus on promoting mental health, well‐being, and liberation of individuals with serious mental illnesses. This special issue endeavors to highlight current efforts in community mental health from our field and related disciplines and point to future directions for reengagement in this area. The issue includes 12 articles authored by diverse stakeholder groups. Following a review of the state of community mental health scholarship in the field's two primary journals since 1973, the remaining articles center on four thematic areas: (a) the community experience of individuals with serious mental illness; (b) the utility of a participatory and cross‐cultural lens in our engagement with community mental health; (c) Housing First implementation, evaluation, and dissemination; and (d) emerging or under‐examined topics. In reflection, we conclude with a series of challenges for community psychologists involved in future, transformative, movements in community mental health.     

Criminal Justice and Community Psychology: Our Values and Our Work—The Introduction to the Special Issue

This special issue of The American Journal of Community Psychology originated from the Society for Community Research and Action Criminal Justice interest group, with a goal of exploring the work of community psychologists intersecting with criminal justice research, practice, and policy and shaped by our shared values—equity, collaboration, creative maladjustment, social justice, and social science in the service of social justice. In this introduction, we discuss the socio‐historical context of the special issue, followed by an outline of the special issue organization, and brief summary of the included papers. Across 13 papers and an invited commentary, we see the ways in which community psychologists are: (1) delivering and evaluating services, programming, or other supports to address the needs of system‐involved people; and (2) working to improve the systems, structures, and interactions with units of criminal justice systems. Across these two sections, authors highlight the guiding role of our values to influence change within and outside of criminal‐legal systems.     

The Application of Community Psychology Practice Competencies to Reduce Health Disparities

This article demonstrates the application of community psychology practice competencies to health disparities reduction. It begins with a discussion of changes and evolution of the maternal child health field over nearly three decades, then describes implications for community psychology practice and the application of practice competencies.     

Cultivating Community Psychology for Future Generations: Symbiosis,Synergy, and Separation

As we near the fiftieth anniversary of the founding of a community psychology division of the American Psychological Association, there are reasons to be concerned about the sustainability of the field. This commentary proposes a need for deliberate, systematic efforts to cultivate settings that can sustain the field. A framework for outreach to build symbiotic relationships and synergistic collaborations with persons who do not identify as community psychologists is proposed. Simultaneously, a strategy of separation from other disciplines may be needed in some circumstances to conserve settings that sustain the field. Finding a balance in these strategies is necessary to cultivate community psychology for future generations.     

Community Psychology: The Case of Cameroon

Community psychology in Cameroon is a budding discipline even its practice, given the scarcity of professionals with specialised training. However, this paper highlights public and private community-oriented projects that resonate with the principles of community psychology. The demands are high with the impact of globalisation, corruption, poverty and HIV/AIDS. Yet it is evident that professional responses to these demands will be slow because even the teaching, research and use of the main discipline of psychology face major problems, blocking its expansion and use. There is the need for strong academic and professional leadership that is usually blocked by tribalism, weakness in the pedagogy of programmes and underdevelopment and unawareness of social problems including the absence of structures for strengthening institutional capacity. These explain why only rudimentary psychological services exist for Cameroonians. There is therefore an urgent need for the rapid formalisation of community psychology in teaching, research and service for alleviating people's distress in Cameroon.     

Reflections on a Community Psychology Setting and the Future of the Field

The 50th anniversary of the Swampscott Conference offers an opportunity to reflect on a community psychology setting, The Consultation Center at Yale, that was formed in response to the 1963 Community Mental Health Act and the 1965 Swampscott Conference. The Center has flourished as a community psychology setting for practice, research, and training for 39 of the 50 years since Swampscott. Its creation and existence over this period offers an opportunity for reflection on the types of settings needed to sustain the field into the future.     

Building Institutions for the Next 50 Years of Creativity Research

The Journal of Creative Behavior 's remarkable half‐century is a good occasion for reflecting on the role of a scholarly field's institutions in fostering creative work. In creativity studies, some of our institutions are flourishing, particularly our many excellent peer‐reviewed journals. But we face some institutional challenges that will require some creative solutions from creativity researchers. This article considers three challenges: (a) how to train and place the next generation of scholars when so few creativity researchers work at doctoral‐level graduate programs; (b) how to tighten the field's social network by bringing together people from different subfields and career stages in face‐to‐face gatherings; and (c) how to identify and develop the leadership needed to manage our scholarly organizations.     

Development of Community Psychology

The growth and development of community psychology in Zambia has been necessitated by many social problems encountered by Zambians be they health, economic or psychological. The work of governmental and nongovernmental organizations at community level has contributed to the development of this sub-field of psychology. Community psychology in Zambia has many challenges to overcome, including the lack of trained manpower and availability of funds. Community psychology has great potential to contribute to the wellbeing of different communities in Zambia.     

Challenging the Frontiers of Community Psychology: A South African Experience

The development of community psychology is of vital importance in South Africa because of the historical context, questions about the relevance of mainstream western psychology and the current social change in the country in the post-apartheid era. Accordingly successful community psychology practices for a South Africa in transition need greater dissemination for access and utilization in the communities. This article draws on the community work conducted at the Itsoseng Clinic to show how and why community psychology could be made more relevant to the new South Africa. The Itsoseng Clinic is a psychology clinic that is situated in the township of Mamelodi. The clinic provides several services including counselling, psychometric assessment, psycho educational workshops, and HIV/AIDS pre and post-test counselling. The clients and community that the clinic serves are of low socio-economic status and struggle with a lack of material and personnel resources. The individuals working within the Itsoseng Clinic represent a diversity that is in itself a valuable resource for supporting the core activities of the clinic. This article explores various themes that were identified within the research study such as, making community, entering the ecology of life, closing the divide and bridging the boundaries.     

This is Not a History Lesson; This is Agitation: A Call for a Methodology of Diffraction in US‐Based Community Psychology

Agitation, as deployed by the Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF), occurs when imaginations and curiosities are piqued, and self‐interest is made visible. In this framework, agitation is a step in creating change. In this paper, I outline two agitations within US‐based community psychology. I then describe a third agitation that is underway; I add my voice and call for a methodology of diffraction as a contribution to critical reflexivity practices within US‐based community psychology. Consistent with the IAF framework, I do not provide solutions. I write this paper as a provocation to help us think imaginatively and creatively about our actions and future, so that we can consider the paradigm shifts needed to move into critical ways of understanding connection, responsibility, accountability, and creating change—of interest during Swampscott and today.     

Considering Community Psychology Competencies: A Love Letter to Budding Scholar-Activists Who Wonder if They Have What It Takes

Recently, community psychologists have re‐vamped a set of 18 competencies considered important for how we practice community psychology. Three competencies are: (1) ethical, reflexive practice, (2) community inclusion and partnership, and (3) community education, information dissemination, and building public awareness. This paper will outline lessons I—a white working class woman academic—learned about my competency development through my research collaborations, using the lens of affective politics. I describe three lessons, from school‐based research sites (elementary schools serving working class students of color and one elite liberal arts school serving wealthy white students). The first lesson, from an elementary school, concerns ethical, reflective practice. I discuss understanding my affect as a barometer of my ability to conduct research from a place of solidarity. The second lesson, which centers community inclusion and partnership, illustrates how I learned about the importance of “before the beginning” conversations concerning social justice and conflict when working in elementary schools. The third lesson concerns community education, information dissemination, and building public awareness. This lesson, from a college, taught me that I could stand up and speak out against classism in the face of my career trajectory being threatened. With these lessons, I flesh out key aspects of community practice competencies.     

Community Psychology in Zimbabwe: Past,Present and Future

The study describes and evaluates community psychology in Zimbabwe. We distinguish between a professional with the title ‘community psychologist’ and the practice of the field of community psychology in Zimbabwe. Community psychology services in Zimbabwe include the provision of education to all school- going age children, and free health services and housing for all. We also consider community psychology applications in the context of the HIV and AIDS pandemic, rising unemployment, homelessness, child abuse, disabilities, disasters and other hardships from urbanization, economics, and other challenges. Psychologists and other professionals offer community psychology services in the context of these challenges.     

Complicating Narratives: Defining and Deconstructing Ethical Challenges in Community Psychology

In this concluding essay, we review the case studies presented in this Special Issue and examine whether community psychology has a distinctive approach to defining and resolving the core ethical canons of the Belmont Report (1979): Respect for Persons, Beneficence, and Justice. For two of these Principles—Respect for Persons and Beneficence—community psychologists elaborate upon and extend their definitions to consider their meaning in community‐based, social justice‐oriented research. The field's approach to Respect for Persons is multilevel in nature; in addition to respecting individuals and their diverse identities, we also have obligations to respect our community partnerships, the communities with whom we work, and the populations and cultures represented in our work. Similarly, for community psychologists, Beneficence is a multilevel construct that considers risks and benefits at the group, community, and cultural levels of analysis. With respect to Justice, community psychologists’ views of our ethical responsibilities are qualitatively different in meaning from the original Belmont Report and from disciplinary‐specific interpretations of this principle in ethical guidance documents from psychology, sociology, and evaluation. Our valuing of social change demands that we contribute to individual and group empowerment and liberation, and in so doing, that we avoid collusion with oppressive systems. Thus, we define our ethical responsibilities for promoting Justice as more action‐oriented than do other disciplines. The essay closes with an exploration of future directions for developing a comprehensive ethical framework for community psychology.     

The Stories We Tell: Introduction to the Special Issue on Ethical Challenges in Community Psychology Research and Practice

This Special Issue examines ethical challenges in community psychology research and practice. The literature on ethics in community psychology has remained largely abstract and aspirational, with few concrete examples and case studies, so the goal of this Special Issue was to expand our written discourse about ethical dilemmas in our field. In these articles, researchers and practitioners share stories of specific ethical challenges they faced and how they sought to resolve them. These first‐person narratives examine how ethical challenges come about, how community psychology values inform ethical decision making, and how lessons learned from these experiences can inform an ethical framework for community psychology.     

Community Psychology at the Crossroads: Prospects for Interdisciplinary Research

Effective engagement in interdisciplinary work is critical if community psychology is to achieve its promise as a field of ecological inquiry and social action. The purpose of this paper and special issue is to help make the benefits of interdisciplinary community research clearer and to identify and begin to address its challenges. Although some areas of psychology (e.g., biological, cognitive and health) have made substantial interdisciplinary strides in recent decades, progress in community psychology (and related areas) is more modest. In this article we explore the prospects for expanding and improving interdisciplinary community research. Challenges include designs, measures, and analytical frameworks that integrate multiple levels of analysis from individuals through families, organizations, and communities to policy jurisdictions, and the complexities involved in simultaneously bringing together multiple disciplinary collaborators and community partners. Challenges to interdisciplinary collaboration common to all disciplines include the disciplinary nature of academic culture and reward structures, limited funding for interdisciplinary work and uncertainties related to professional identity and marketability. Overcoming these challenges requires a synergy among facilitative factors at the levels of the interdisciplinary project team (e.g., the framing question; embedded relationships; leadership), the investigators (e.g., commitment to new learning; time to invest), and the external context (e.g., physical, administrative, economic and intellectual resources and support for interdisciplinary work). We conclude by identifying several exemplars of effective interdisciplinary collaborations and concrete steps our field can take to enhance our development as a vibrant community-based, multilevel discipline increasingly devoted to interdisciplinary inquiry and action.     

“It's the Way That You Do It”: Developing an Ethical Framework for Community Psychology Research and Action

In the 50 years since the 1965 Swampscott conference, the field of community psychology has not yet developed a well‐articulated ethical framework to guide research and practice. This paper reviews what constitutes an “ethical framework”; considers where the field of community psychology is at in its development of a comprehensive ethical framework; examines sources for ethical guidance (i.e., ethical principles and standards) across multiple disciplines, including psychology, evaluation, sociology, and anthropology; and recommends strategies for developing a rich written discourse on how community psychology researchers and practitioners can address ethical conflicts in our work.     

Diversity and Community: The Role of Agent‐Based Modeling

Community psychology involves several dialectics between potentially opposing ideals, such as theory and practice, rights and needs, and respect for human diversity and sense of community. Some recent papers in the American Journal of Community Psychology have examined the diversity‐community dialectic, some with the aid of agent‐based modeling and concepts from network science. This paper further elucidates these concepts and suggests that research in community psychology can benefit from a useful dialectic between agent‐based modeling and the real‐world concerns of community psychology.