American Psychological Association and Division 7

American Psychological Association and Division 7

The American Psychological Association, also known as APA, was founded in July of 1988 and is the largest scientific and professional organization of psychologists in the United States and Canada. It is the world’s largest association of psychologists, containing 54 divisions of interest groups, covering different subspecialties of psychology or topical areas, with around 130,000 members including researchers, scientists, educators, clinicians, consultants, and students. Amongst those members is the 2014 president Nadine J. Kaslow, PhD who specializes in psychiatry and behavioral sciences in women and children. To be a member one would have to meet certain criteria in order to qualify, for example: A student affiliate membership can be obtained by submitting an application as either an undergraduate taking psychology courses or as a graduate and pay dues. The dues for an undergraduate are $35 and dues for a graduate are $57.

The APA organization offers extensive resources such as data bases, directorates, programs, scholarships, internships, publications, and up-to-date information that can be found on their website at www.apa.org. The APA’s data bases are helpful and vital tools when looking for news, information, journals, newsletters, magazines, or reports on psychology. Psych INFO, one of their many data bases, contains more than 3.7 million records covering psychology facts and information dating all the way back to the 17th century. Plus holds records for peer-reviewed journals, books, and dissertations.

For example, one of the APA’s published journals in the Psych INFO’s data base is “Emotion”, which covers the study of emotion from a wide range of theoretical traditions and research domains. It consists of articles, knowledge, and theories about all aspects of emotional processes, including reports of substantial empirical studies, scholarly reviews, and major theoretical articles that are published bi-monthly. Another journal called “Qualitative Psychology” is published bi-annually and consists of studies that represent a wide variety of methodological approaches including narrative, discourse analysis, life history, phenomenology, ethnography, action research, and case study. A third journal called “Psychology of Violence” researches violence, extreme aggression, identifying the causes of violence from a psychological framework, finding ways to prevent or reduce violence, and develop treatments. It also recognizes that all forms of violence and aggressions require research from psychology, public health, neuroscience, sociology, medicine, and other related behavioral and social sciences.

Division 7 is the official developmental psychology section of the APA, which specializes in developmental research that involves infants, children, and teenagers, plus promotes and enhances undergraduate and graduate education in developmental psychology and early career development. An APA membership is not required to participate in Division 7’s educational programs however, a Division 7 membership is. To become a member of Division 7 one must be an undergraduate, a graduate, or a psychological scientist from a variety of disciplines who study or work on human development. Division 7 also facilitates the exchange of information about developmental psychology through the division’s newsletter to other associations such as the “American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry”, the “American Psychiatric Association”, and the “American Psychological Association”. The newsletter is called “Developmental Psychology” which provides the latest news and funding opportunities for division members and aspiring developmental psychologists. Division