Discussion: Test Misuse

Test ethics cover both the creation and use of tests. For this Discussion, you concentrate on the implications of test misuse. These can relate to test use with diverse groups, licensure issues, adverse impact, or test security, to name a few.

Some important basic ethical principles regarding testing are as follows:

• The construction of tests needs to be done using appropriate psychometric procedures, so that the test will provide valid measurement.
• When tests are used, they need to be properly selected. The test should be valid for the purpose used and should not be outdated. The selection should take into account the purpose of the testing and should also take the examinee’s language, culture, and disabilities into account.
• The test needs to be administered according to proper protocol in order to maintain standardization.
• The test needs to be interpreted and reported fairly, and the report needs to be stored properly. The responsible psychology professional should prevent misinterpretation and should prevent reporting that results in incorrect decisions or that causes the client unnecessary emotional harm. He or she should also protect the client’s confidentiality.
• Test givers must maintain the security of test materials. Many tests, such as the Wechsler intelligence tests or the MMPI, have been developed over a period of decades. Public familiarity with these tests would destroy their usefulness. Test publishers generally have standards controlling who can buy and use their tests.
• A test has an “adverse impact” when it results in substantially different employment decisions (e.g., hiring, promotion, termination) for one group vs. another group. This adverse impact is unlawful if there is no justification for it. For instance, some jobs might have tests of physical strength that result in fewer women being hired. The employer would need to demonstrate that physical strength is a legitimate job requirement.

To prepare for this Discussion, think of potential negative effects of tests not being administered, stored, or interpreted according to ethical principles. Consider the effects on both the individuals being tested and, potentially, the population at large.

With these thoughts in mind:

Post two potential effects of test misuse on individuals being tested and on the population at large. Support your answer with references to the APA Code of Ethics and other relevant standards.

Be sure to support your postings and responses with specific references to the Learning Resources.

The coaching profession is still relatively new and unregulated. Therefore, it is particularly important that coaches contribute to the profession’s growing credibility by adhering to ethical guidelines, defined by various professional coaching organizations, to address issues such as role clarification, boundaries, confidentiality, and objectivity. Being aware of such ethical issues and how to appropriately address each helps to protect the integrity of the coaching process as well as the coach-client relationship.

Equally important to ethical conduct is the ability to effectively work with diverse clients. Understanding and appreciating the diversity of clients is paramount to effective coaching because it helps to explain how and why clients react to particular situations. Such an understanding also helps to inform strategies coaches use with clients.

For this Assignment, you will apply standards of ethical conduct to ethical issues in a case study. You also will reflect on cultural considerations you might make as a coach in the case study as well as how you might address each.

To prepare for this Assignment:

• Review this week’s Learning Resources related to ethical issues and to diversity in coaching. Pay particular attention to the ethical responsibilities of coaches in addition to ethical issues that may arise during coaching. Also, consider ethical considerations related to coaching diverse clients and cultures.
• Review the article “Career Coaching: Practice, Training, Professional, and Ethical Issues.” Focus on ethical guidelines and issues, as well as multicultural considerations related to career coaching.
• Review the codes of ethics on the BCC Code of Ethics and American Psychological Association websites. Reflect on the standards of ethical conduct for and related to coaching.
• Review the articles “Executive Coaching in a Cross-Cultural Context” and “Executive Coaching for Diversity: An Opportunity for Leaders to Learn and Change” as well as the course media piece “Ethics and Diversity” with Diane Brennan. Consider the role of culture and diversity in coaching. Also, think about considerations related to coaching diverse individuals and teams.
• Review the case study for Week 4 found below. Assuming you are the coach, identify the ethical issues in the case study. Think about how you might address each, using standards of ethical conduct from the BCC and APA websites. Then consider specific diversity considerations you might make as a coach in the case study, and think about how you might address each.

Week 4 Case Study: Ethics and Diversity

Janell is a 38-year-old African American female with a respectable drive for success and a natural ability to inspire her employees. Beating out many of her colleagues, she recently was promoted as the lead project manager in a large, global, technical corporation called Worldtron, Inc., which is headquartered in the United States.

After only a few weeks as a lead project manager, Janell was called for an emergency videoconference with members of a small technical firm, Jupiter, Inc. located in Japan, that Worldtron, Inc., had newly acquired. The videoconference was called because Jupiter, Inc., missed a deadline for a critical element needed in project production. It appears that the Jupiter, Inc., project manager, Ami, had misunderstood the communications regarding the scope of work required. As a result, Janell immediately flew to Japan to temporarily help Ami with operations at Jupiter, Inc. The news of her arrival was not well received by Ami or her team because they attributed the miscommunications to Janell.

After 3 weeks of working with Ami and her team, Janell, concluded that there was resistance on the part of Ami and her team to accept project management directives from Janell. As a result, the project is rapidly falling behind and is in danger of missing the deliverable date, which would cost Worldtron, Inc., millions of dollars. Janell is feeling pressured by these complex issues but thinks she needs to continue to strengthen Jupiter, Inc., so that their work on the project can be completed. To do this, she needs to access her leadership skills, recognize the problem, and encourage the strengths and capabilities of this site. Also, she needs to find a way to work collaboratively with Ami and her team.

Worldtron, Inc., hired you in the past as an external executive coach to work with Janell over the course of 8 months. A senior executive at Worldtron, Inc., called you recently to hire you to work with Ami and Janell in this matter. Most of your global executive coaching is done virtually, via telephone or web conferencing. The senior executive also asked you to describe some of the past details regarding your work with Janell. How should you proceed?

The Assignment: (1–2 pages)

• Describe the ethical issues related to coaching in the case study. Then explain how you might address each using specific standards for ethical conduct from the American Psychological Association and BCC Code of Ethics.
• Describe at least one diversity consideration related to working with clients in the case study. Then explain how you might address such considerations. Be specific.

Support your Assignment with specific references to all resources used in its preparation. Provide a reference list for all sources used, including those in the Learning Resources for this course.

It is well understood that communications media has long been used as a tool for social change. Consider the following examples from radio in the 1930s and 40s, television in the 1960s, and social media today:

• Franklin Roosevelt’s “fireside chats,” delivered via radio, helped galvanize a frightened and dispirited American public to move beyond the Great Depression and back to economic productivity.
• Walter Cronkite’s critical reports of the Vietnam War strengthened the anti-war movement and prompted President Lyndon Johnson to decline running for a second term as president.
• In 2010, a revolutionary wave in North Africa and the Middle East effectively used social media to communicate and raise awareness of conflicts.
• As of April 2015, the DonorsChange.org site raised $320,586,373 to fund 571,111 projects helping 14,431,753 students of 231,701 teachers at 61,608 schools.
• Stopbullying.gov reports “The 2010-2011 School Crime Supplement (National Center for Education Statistics and Bureau of Justice Statistics) indicates that 9% of students in grades 6–12 experienced cyberbullying…The 2013 Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance Survey finds that 15% of high school students (grades 9-12) were electronically bullied in the past year” (n.d., “Frequency of Cyberbullying,” para. 1–2).

With the advent of the Internet and the astonishing rise of social media, anyone can post a website or blog. As such, individuals can post their beliefs and opinions on any topic claiming the validity of their ideas without basing their information on concrete facts. This type of misinformation can be harmful and demonstrate unethical behavior.

Psychologists are often called upon to analyze the impact and implications of communications media on people and communities and to provide evidence-based guidance that could lead to more effective and compassionate applications and use.

With this week’s Learning Resources in mind, consider the role of the psychologist in addressing the implications of mass media today.

By Day 3

Post by Day 3 an explanation of the role that psychologists play in addressing mass media’s influence on the individual and on social change movements. From a psychological stance, present at least one concrete action that could be taken using social and mass media to further the social change or social justice topic you are addressing in your Final Assignment. Explain how psychology informs this action. Include comments regarding any ethical implications related to that use. These may result from both intended and unintended consequences.

Consider the following scenario:

Imagine that a Haitian man beats his wife and part of his excuse is that this is part of the culture of his family. His wife has multiple bruises and a sprained ankle from where she “fell.” She agrees that she needed to learn how to cook and her husband was right in beating her.

In this Discussion, you will apply the APA Multicultural Competence Guidelines as you address your personal biases toward culture-bound syndrome and how personal biases may affect your professional role.

To prepare

• Review the “Neonaticide in a Young Immigrant Woman” case in the course text.
• Review the Learning Resources.By Day 3

Post a response to the following:

• Apply two multicultural ethical guidelines from the APA Guidelines on Multicultural Education, Training, Research, Practice, and Organizational Change for Psychologists to the “Neonaticide in a Young Immigrant Woman” case in the course text.
• Describe and explain your own potential biases toward culture-bound syndrome and how your personal bias may or may not affect your ability to work with the client in your current or future forensic psychology professional role.

REQUIRED READINGS

de Ruiter, C., & Kaser-Boyd, N. (2015). Forensic psychological assessment in practice: Case studies. New York, NY: Routledge.

• Chapter 3, “Neonaticide in a Young Immigrant Woman” (pp. 42–63)

American Psychological Association (1990). Guidelines for providers of psychological services to ethnic, linguistic, and culturally diverse populations. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/pi/oema/resources/policy/provid…

American Psychological Association (2002). Guidelines on multicultural education, training, research, practice, and organizational change for psychologists.

American Psychological Association. (2016a). Guidelines for child custody evaluations in family law proceedings.

APA Presidential Task Force on Immigration. (2016). Crossroads: The psychology of immigration in the new century. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/topics/immigration/report.aspx

The APA Presidential Task Force on Immigration. (2013). Crossroads: The psychology of immigration in the new century. Journal of Latina/o Psychology, 1(3), 133-148. Copyright 2013 by American Psychological Association. Reprinted by permission of American Psychological Association via the Copyright Clearance Center.

Granot, Y., Balcetis, E., Schneider, K. E., & Tyler, T. R. (2014). Justice is not blind: Visual attention exaggerates effects of group identification on legal punishment. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 143(6), 2196–2208. doi: 10.1037/a0037893

Varela, J. G., & Conroy, M. A. (2012). Professional competencies in forensic psychology. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 43(5), 410– 421. doi:10.1037/a0026776

Weiner, I. B., & Otto, R. K. (2013). The handbook of forensic psychology (4th ed.). New York, NY: Wiley.

• Chapter 2, “Defining Forensic Psychology” (pp 35–56),
   

I’m working on a psychology discussion question and need an explanation to help me study.

Males typically identify with the male gender and females with the feminine gender. The question for many researchers today and for this Discussion is: How does this gender identification occur? How do individuals come to identify with and accept themselves as either one gender or the other? This concept is termed gender identity in psychology.

There are two terms associated with gender identity that are important to highlight: gender stability and gender consistency. Gender stability means that gender is a stable personal characteristic and does not change with age or the situation or the environment. Gender consistency means that you identify with your gender regardless of how you are behaving. If you are a male and put on a pink dress, you show gender consistency if you still identify with being male, even though you are behaving like a female.

In this Discussion, you will explore some of the significant factors that influence gender identity and how these influencing factors impact society as a whole.

• Review Chapter 6 in the course text, Gender: Psychological Perspectives. Focus on how different factors influence gender identity. Read “Demographic and Psychosocial Factors Associated With Psychological Distress and Resilience Among TransgenderIndividuals” and “Cross-Cultural Analysis of Gender Roles: Indian and US Advertisements.”
• Watch a few different TV shows, sitcoms, commercials, or news reports. Also, look at a popular magazine and peruse the ads. Think about how these media sources 1) influence and or reinforce gender identity and 2) play a part in influencing gender bias. Focus on specific examples.
• Using yourself or your child (or someone else’s child with whom you are close), think about the most important influential factors on gender identity, including biological, environmental, family, peer group, and cultural.

Post your thoughts on how biology, environment, culture, family, peer group, and the media impact gender identity in the United States. Briefly describe how this influence on gender identity is accomplished. Then, describe the reasons individuals may experience gender dysphoria. Finally, provide some examples for how you think that society can best support the transgendered community. Be sure to support your examples with evidence from your research.

Cite sources in text. In depth explanation

The brain’s interpretation of stimuli informs perception. Two theoretical approaches to perception include bottom-up and top-down perception.

Bottom-up perception describes the perception of stimuli based on concrete characteristics. Top-down perception describes perception of external stimuli based on prior knowledge about their properties. Cognitive psychologists study how and when individuals employ these two types of perception to determine their significance and to shed light on human experiences of the world. 

For this Discussion, consider differences between bottom-up and top-down perception.

With these thoughts in mind:

By Day 3

Post a brief explanation of the active nature of perception. Then explain two differences between bottom-up and top-down perception. Finally, provide one example of how everyday experience would be altered if bottom-up perception were impaired, as well as one example of how everyday experience would be altered if top-down perception were impaired.

REQUIRED READINGS

de la Rosa, S., Choudhery, R. N., & Chatziastros, A. (2011). Visual object detection, categorization, and identification tasks are associated with different time courses and sensitivities. Human Perception and Performance, 37(1), 38–47.

DeGloma, T., & Friedman, A. (2005). Thinking with socio-mental filters: Exploring the social structuring of attention and significance. Conference Papers––American Sociological Association, 1–24.

Proulx, M. J. (2007). Bottom-up guidance in visual search for conjunctions. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 33(1), 48–56.

Wolfe, J. M., & Horowitz, T. S. (2004). What attributes guide the deployment of visual attention and how do they do it? Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 5(6), 495–501.

Geisler, W. S. (2008). Visual perception and the statistical properties of natural scenes. Annual Review of Psychology, 59, 167–192.
Geisler, W. S. Visual Perception and the Statistical Properties of Natural Sciences. Annual Review of Psychology. Copyright 2007 Annual Reviews, Inc. Used with permission from Annual Reviews, Inc. via the Copyright Clearance Center.

Peissig, J. J., & Tarr, M. J. (2007). Visual object recognition: Do we know more now than we did 20 years ago? Annual Review of Psychology, 58, 75–96.
Peissig, J.J., & Tarr, M.J., Visual object recognition: do we know more now than we did 20 years ago? Annual Review of Psychology. Copyright 2007 Annual Reviews, Inc. Used with permission from Annual Reviews, Inc. via the Copyright Clearance Center.

Posner, M. I., & Rothbart, M. K. (2007). Research on attention networks as a model for the integration of psychological science. Annual Review of Psychology, 58, 1–23.
Research on attention networks as a model for the integration of psychological science by Posner, M.I., & Rothbart, M.K. in Annual Review of Psychology, 58. Copyright 2008 by Annual Reviews, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Annual Reviews, Inc., via the Copyright Clearance Center.

REQUIRED MEDIA

Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2012). Perception & attention [Interactive multimedia]. Baltimore, MD: Author.

Transcript: Perception & Attention (PDF)

OPTIONAL RESOURCES

Bach, M. (2012). Adelson’s checker-shadow illusion from Michael’s “Visual Phenomena & Optional Illusion.” Retrieved May 1, 2012 from http://michaelbach.de/ot/lum_adelsonCheckShadow/in…

Bach, M. (2012). Motion aftereffect (waterfall illusion) from Michael’s “Visual Phenomena & Optional Illusion.” Retrieved May 1, 2012 from http://michaelbach.de/ot/mot_adapt/index.html

Bach, M. (2012). Perceive your eye moments from Michael’s “Visual Phenomena & Optional Illusion.” Retrieved May 1, 2012 from http://michaelbach.de/ot/mot_eyeJitter/index.html