Abstract

This continuing education activity has been designed to enhance the competence of doctoral-level psychologists involved in teaching and evaluating the APA Profession-Wide Competency of Ethical and Legal Standards in doctoral psychology internship programs. Ethical practice is a pillar of professional psychology and a core requirement for accreditation. Despite this, internship programs may encounter difficulties in effectively incorporating ethics training into their training curriculum and evaluation processes. This session is for postdoctoral-level psychologists serving as internship training directors, supervisors, and training faculty.

This training offers a structured overview of the Ethical and Legal Standards competency as defined by the APA, including the knowledge, skills, and professional attitudes expected of doctoral psychology interns. Through didactic instruction, participants will examine strategies for incorporating ethics training into all facets of the internship program, rather than limiting instruction to individual seminars or supervision sessions. Participants will learn practical strategies for systematically building ethics training into clinical rotations and supervisory contexts, such as through case-based learning, structured ethics discussions, and competency-based evaluation methods. The content of this session builds upon the advanced professional expertise and supervisory duties of postdoctoral level psychologists and is tailored to support their roles within APA-accredited internship programs.

Learning Objectives

Attendees will be able to:

• Describe the specific behaviors associated with internship level competency in the area of Ethical and Legal Standards.
• List 2 strategies for promoting interns’ ability to recognize and appropriately manage ethical problems as they arise.
• Identify at least 2 solutions to common challenges in the training of Ethical and Legal Standards.

Presented by Dr. Erin Foley and Dr. Jenna Symons