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02/18/2004: "In Pennsylvania, Aspirational in Mandatory"

There was an interesting article, with potentially far-reaching consequences, in Winter 2004 State Board of Psychology Newsletter. In "Supreme Court Decides Case Involving the Practice of Psychology," authors Alex M. Siegel and Judith Pachter Schnulder describe the result of a case where a psychologist was disciplined by the State Board for failing to get permission from both parents before performing an evaluation on a child, where the parents shared legal custody. The Supreme Court essentially upheld the State Board's position. This confirms now the practical advice we have been giving about consent for evaluating or treating minors of divorced parents: you need to obtain permission from the person or persons with legal custody.

However, there was another result from the case that has an effect on every practicing psychologist in the state, regardless of your type of practice:

"In addition to following the [State] Board's Code of Ethics, (49 Pa. Code 41.60), psychologists often ask whether they must also adhere to the APA's Code of Ethics. Principle 3(e) of the [State] Board's Code of Ethics requires that a 'psychologist act in accord with APA Standards and Guidelines related to practice and ot the conduct of research with human beings and animals.' (49 Pa. Code 41.61(3)(e)). Psychologists have frequently questioned whether this is aspirational or mandatory. The question was settled in Grossman, when the Commonwealth Court upheld the Board's position that regardless of whether the APA intended the Guidelines to be aspirational for association members, the inclusion of the APA Standards and Guidelines in Principle 3(e) of the Board's Code of Ethics established a mandatory requirement for licensees in this Commonwealth. That is, the Commonwealth stated that the APA Standards and Guidelines must be adhered to as required compliance for the minimal standard of ethical practice. Consequently, the Court agreed that those sections which were considered aspirational in the APA Code became the minimal standard of ethical practice in Pennsylvania. (p. 7; italics added for emphasis)

Aspirational things are usually things that are strongly desirable, but perhaps not fully attainable. The APA Code of Ethics appears to recognize this, because it clearly separates the aspirational values from the specific guidelines, the latter being offered as the minimal standard of ethical practice while the former describe the "perfect" ethical practice. But here in Pennsylvania, we are being held now to a much higher standard as a matter of law. I suspect that the Supreme Court was basing its interpretation on a literal reading of the state's Code of Ethics: because it states clearly in Principle 3(e) that psychologist must adhere to APA Standards and Guidelines, therefore APA's Code in its entirety must be considered mandatory.

I've read the article three times now (it's only one page; you should read it too), and I can't see where this conclusion is directed only at custody evaluations. APA does have guidelines for custody evaluations (Guidelines for Child Custody Evaluations in Divorce Proceedings), so it's possible the Supreme Court's decision had a narrow scope pertaining only to these situations. But in reading the paragraph above, the language is pretty clear: the scope is much larger than that. If anyone else has read this and came away with a different conclusion, please let me know.