Regulations Governing Psychology Professionals

Prior to beginning work on this discussion, read the required Boldt (2012) article.

A psychology professional must be knowledgeable of the rules and regulations that govern the profession in his or her state of residence. For this discussion, access your state board of psychology’s website. Conducting an Internet search for your state’s name and “State Board of Professional Psychology” will likely produce the link to the website (i.e., California State Board of Professional Psychology). Once on the website, look for the state’s rules and regulations governing professional psychology. These are often listed as links or tabs with titles such as “Laws and Regulations”, “Rules and Regulations”, “Laws, Policies, and Rules”, “Statutes and Rules”, “Statutes and Administrative Codes”, etc. Review the complete rules and regulations for your state and pay special attention to the sections concerning rules for working with minors. Then, conduct an Internet search for information on consent and confidentiality for mental health treatment for minors in your state of residence. In the discussion, you will address the following case study:

You are a counselor. Twelve-year-old Billy is using drugs without his parents’ knowledge and has come to see you for help. Billy wants outpatient treatment for his substance abuse and informs you that his parents do not know about his drug use. He refuses to permit you to share information with his parents. While a person under the age of 18 is often considered a minor and generally most states would require them to obtain consent from a parent or guardian prior to receiving mental health treatment, there are several exceptions to this general rule.

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In your initial post, analyze your state’s rules and regulations governing psychology as a profession as well as your state information on consent and confidentiality with regard to minors. Apply these regulations to Billy’s case. Elaborate on how you would approach the case by providing information on your state’s consent and confidentiality laws and assessing any impact these may have on your options for Billy’s treatment. Apply any relevant ethical principles and professional standards of psychology as they relate to this complex situation. Evaluate any personal beliefs that may conflict with legal requirements you have as a counselor within your state. Detail what actions you would take to be true to both yourself and the professional requirements.

Guided Response: Review several of your classmates’ posts and respond to at least two of your peers who live in states with different requirements by 11:59 p.m. on Day 7 of the week. You are encouraged to post your required replies earlier in the week to promote more meaningful and interactive discourse.

Examine your peer’s approach to this case. Do you agree or disagree with how he or she intends to deal with the situation presented? Did your colleague provide enough information on his or her state’s regulations to give you a picture of the potential limitations presented by these statutes? Did your colleague’s detailed actions for dealing with personal conflicts suitably align with the professional requirements presented in the case study? Why, or why not? Support your rationale with evidence from the required readings. Pose any questions that may need clarification. Suggest any changes that might improve the efficacy of your colleague’s approach. Continue to monitor the discussion forum until 5:00 p.m. MST on Day 7 of the week and respond to anyone who replies to your initial post.

Carefully review the for the criteria that will be used to evaluate this Discussion Thread.

Week 4 DQ 2

Prior to beginning work on this discussion, read the Schantz (2014) “A Young Scholar’s Guide to Building a Professional Network” article, review the paying special attention to the divisions that may interest you, and review the website .

In your initial post, identify one division related to your career interest that you would consider joining and one specific job related to that division. Conduct a search on your chosen job using. Briefly elaborate on the information provided on the job you searched, and be sure to include educational requirements, duties, future outlook, and salaries related to the position. Use the Internet to search for and compile information about the leading employer prospects for this position in your geographical area. Compare and contrast the compiled information with that from O* Net. Include expected duties, number of job offerings found, educational requirements, job experience, and salary levels where applicable. Analyze psychology as a profession and assess the role the APA could play in aiding you in the development of a professional network. Briefly detail an initial plan for building your professional network as well as obtaining your selected job.

Guided Response: Review several of your classmates’ posts and respond to at least two of your peers by 11:59 p.m. on Day 7 of the week. You are encouraged to post your required replies earlier in the week to promote more meaningful and interactive discourse.

Assess your peer’s selected division and job interest, and review the information on the APA website and O*Net Online if the selected division and job interest are different than your own. Examine your classmate’s professional networking plan and reconcile any discrepancies between his or her plan and your own. Suggest improvements or alternatives that might be included as well as any other job opportunities that might be of interest to your colleague. Continue to monitor the discussion forum until 5:00 p.m. MST on Day 7 of the week and respond to anyone who replies to your initial post.

Carefully review the for the criteria that will be used to evaluate this Discussion Thread.

Requred Resources

Articles

American Psychological Association. (2010). . Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/ethics/code/index.aspx
- Provides access to the APA’s ethical principles and code of conduct.
Boldt, R. C. (2012). . Journal of Health Care Law & Policy, 15(1), 75-115. Retrieved from the EBSCOhost database.
- This article presents a panel discussion on adolescent decision making in the context of treatment for substance use disorders and other mental health treatment.
Schantz, A. D. (2014).. TIP: The Industrial-Organizational Psychologist, 51(4), 157-163. Retrieved from the EBSCOhost database.
- This article presents a panel discussion on building a professional network.

Websites

American Psychological Association. (2014).. Retrieved from https://www.apa.org/about/division/index.aspx
- This Website provides information about the APA’s fifty-four professional divisions.
(http://www.onetonline.org)
- This Website provides information and future projections about occupations. You may find additional links to this and other career building tools on the Ashford Career Services website.
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Recommended Resources

As part of your ongoing studies this week, you are encouraged to interact with one another in the Ashford University Online Psychology Club via LinkedIn. This community of learning will allow you to create supportive networks for like-minded scholarship and to work through difficult course concepts in a mutually respectful environment. Please take a moment to explore the community and see what your colleagues are discussing.

Please note: If you do not already have a LinkedIn account, you will need to create one before joining.

Article

Herman, M., & Sharer, N. (2013). Trying to summarize state licensure laws for psychologists: Burial by grains of salt. Training and Education in Professional Psychology, 7(2), 123-133. doi:10.1037/a0031636

- The full-text version of this article can be accessed through the EBSCOhost database in the Ashford University Library. This article demonstrates the many challenges related to the variation in state licensure laws and the inconsistency with which state boards share information about those laws.

Use a standard 10 to 12 point (10 to 12 characters per inch) typeface. Smaller or compressed type and papers with small margins or single-spacing are hard to read. It is better to let your essay run over the recommended number of pages than to try to compress it into fewer pages.

Likewise, large type, large margins, large indentations, triple-spacing, increased leading (space between lines), increased kerning (space between letters), and any other such attempts at “padding” to increase the length of a paper are unacceptable, wasteful of trees, and will not fool your professor.

You must proofread your paper. But do not strictly rely on your computer’s spell-checker and grammar-checker; failure to do so indicates a lack of effort on your part and you can expect your grade to suffer accordingly. Papers with numerous misspelled words and grammatical mistakes will be penalized. Read over your paper – in silence and then aloud – before handing it in and make corrections as necessary. Often it is advantageous to have a friend proofread your paper for obvious errors. Handwritten corrections are preferable to uncorrected mistakes.

The paper must be neatly formatted, double-spaced with a one-inch margin on the top, bottom, and sides of each page. When submitting hard copy, be sure to use white paper and print out using dark ink. If it is hard to read your essay, it will also be hard to follow your argument.

ADDITIONAL INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE CLASS

Discussion Questions (DQ)

Initial responses to the DQ should address all components of the questions asked, include a minimum of one scholarly source, and be at least 250 words.
Successful responses are substantive (i.e., add something new to the discussion, engage others in the discussion, well-developed idea) and include at least one scholarly source.
One or two sentence responses, simple statements of agreement or “good post,” and responses that are off-topic will not count as substantive. Substantive responses should be at least 150 words.
I encourage you to incorporate the readings from the week (as applicable) into your responses.

Weekly Participation

Your initial responses to the mandatory DQ do not count toward participation and are graded separately.
In addition to the DQ responses, you must post at least one reply to peers (or me) on three separate days, for a total of three replies.
Participation posts do not require a scholarly source/citation (unless you cite someone else’s work).
Part of your weekly participation includes viewing the weekly announcement and attesting to watching it in the comments. These announcements are made to ensure you understand everything that is due during the week.

APA Format and Writing Quality

Familiarize yourself with APA format and practice using it correctly. It is used for most writing assignments for your degree. Visit the Writing Center in the Student Success Center, under the Resources tab in LoudCloud for APA paper templates, citation examples, tips, etc. Points will be deducted for poor use of APA format or absence of APA format (if required).
Cite all sources of information! When in doubt, cite the source. Paraphrasing also requires a citation.
I highly recommend using the APA Publication Manual, 6th edition.

Use of Direct Quotes

I discourage overutilization of direct quotes in DQs and assignments at the Masters’ level and deduct points accordingly.
As Masters’ level students, it is important that you be able to critically analyze and interpret information from journal articles and other resources. Simply restating someone else’s words does not demonstrate an understanding of the content or critical analysis of the content.
It is best to paraphrase content and cite your source.

LopesWrite Policy

For assignments that need to be submitted to LopesWrite, please be sure you have received your report and Similarity Index (SI) percentage BEFORE you do a “final submit” to me.
Once you have received your report, please review it. This report will show you grammatical, punctuation, and spelling errors that can easily be fixed. Take the extra few minutes to review instead of getting counted off for these mistakes.
Review your similarities. Did you forget to cite something? Did you not paraphrase well enough? Is your paper made up of someone else’s thoughts more than your own?
Visit the Writing Center in the Student Success Center, under the Resources tab in LoudCloud for tips on improving your paper and SI score.

Late Policy

The university’s policy on late assignments is 10% penalty PER DAY LATE. This also applies to late DQ replies.
Please communicate with me if you anticipate having to submit an assignment late. I am happy to be flexible, with advance notice. We may be able to work out an extension based on extenuating circumstances.
If you do not communicate with me before submitting an assignment late, the GCU late policy will be in effect.
I do not accept assignments that are two or more weeks late unless we have worked out an extension.
As per policy, no assignments are accepted after the last day of class. Any assignment submitted after midnight on the last day of class will not be accepted for grading.

Communication

Communication is so very important. There are multiple ways to communicate with me:
- Questions to Instructor Forum: This is a great place to ask course content or assignment questions. If you have a question, there is a good chance one of your peers does as well. This is a public forum for the class.
- Individual Forum: This is a private forum to ask me questions or send me messages. This will be checked at least once every 24 hours.

Regulations Governing Psychology Professionals

Regulations Governing Psychology Professionals