5.C.3
Consulting with stakeholders and advocating for clients
ASPPB's competency statement 5.C.3: Consult and collaborate with relevant stakeholders when engaging with diverse populations or advocating for clients
Work with diverse clients and communities often depends on people beyond the therapy room: families, interpreters, schools, other professionals, community organizations and traditional helpers. Psychologists consult and collaborate with these stakeholders, with the client's consent and voice at the center, and advocate when a system's barriers stand between clients and fair treatment. Partnerships work best when power and decisions are genuinely shared.
Key ideas
- Consent and what to share
- Collaboration rests on consent. Psychologists disclose confidential information with appropriate consent or as the law permits (Standard 4.05), share only what is germane to the purpose (4.04), and in consultations avoid identifying details unless the client consents or it cannot be avoided (4.06).
- Cooperation with other professionals
- Standard 3.09 directs psychologists to cooperate with other professionals, when indicated and professionally appropriate, in order to serve their clients effectively and appropriately, which includes teachers, physicians, social workers and community helpers the client wants involved.
- Community partnership
- Community-based participatory research involves community members, organizational representatives and researchers in all aspects of the work, joining their expertise with action. Its strategies redress power imbalances, ensure mutual benefit and build community knowledge and theories into interventions.
- Language access
- Assessment uses methods suited to the person's language preference and competence, unless another language is relevant to the question (Standard 9.02(c)), and the testing Standards' chapter on fairness addresses test takers still learning the test's language. Professional interpreters outperform ad hoc ones.
- Advocacy
- APA's Multicultural Guidelines ask psychologists to address institutional barriers and disparities in educational, health, justice and other systems, and the CPA code's Principle IV, Responsibility to Society, supports acting when social structures harm people. Advocacy for a client proceeds with the client's agreement.
Worked example
Lucía, 15, is in therapy for anxiety. She moved from Guatemala two years ago, and Spanish is her first language. Her school proposes a special education placement for a learning disability based on tests given only in English, and her Spanish-speaking parents ask the psychologist for help.
- Clarify roles and consent: with Lucía's assent and her parents' written consent, agree on what the psychologist will share with the school, for what purpose, and keep to what is relevant.
- Consult the school psychologist and the family liaison, and ask that meetings with the parents use a trained interpreter rather than Lucía.
- Advocate on the evidence: tests given in a language she is still learning may measure her English as much as the ability in question, so ask for methods suited to her language competence.
- Keep Lucía and her parents at the center of each decision, and follow up on what the school decides.
Collaboration and advocacy work through consent, the right partners and evidence, with the client's voice leading.
Check yourself
Which feature most distinguishes community-based participatory research from conventional research carried out in a community?
Sources
- APA (2017), Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct (2002, amended 2010 and 2016), Standards 3.09, Cooperation With Other Professionals; 4.04, Minimizing Intrusions on Privacy; 4.05, Disclosures; 4.06, Consultations; 9.02(c), Use of Assessments
- Israel, Schulz, Parker and Becker (1998), Review of community-based research: assessing partnership approaches to improve public health, Annual Review of Public Health (PMID 9611617), Abstract: involvement of partners in all aspects of the research process
- Wallerstein and Duran (2010), Community-based participatory research contributions to intervention research: the intersection of science and practice to improve health equity, American Journal of Public Health (PMID 20147663), Abstract: strategies (redressing power imbalances, mutual benefit, community theories)
- AERA, APA and NCME (2014), Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing, Chapter 3, Fairness in Testing
- Karliner, Jacobs, Chen and Mutha (2007), Do professional interpreters improve clinical care for patients with limited English proficiency? A systematic review of the literature, Health Services Research (PMID 17362215), Abstract: professional versus ad hoc interpreters
- APA (2017), Multicultural Guidelines: An Ecological Approach to Context, Identity, and Intersectionality; summarized in Clauss-Ehlers, Chiriboga, Hunter, Roysircar and Tummala-Narra (2019), APA Multicultural Guidelines executive summary: Ecological approach to context, identity, and intersectionality, American Psychologist (PMID 30762387), Guideline 5 (power, privilege and oppression; addressing institutional barriers and disparities)
- Canadian Code of Ethics for Psychologists, Fourth Edition (CPA, 2017), Principle IV, Responsibility to Society