News Archive 2013
August Issue of Peace and Conflict: Journal of Pease Psychology is Available
Message from Journal Editor, Dr. Susan Opotow
Dear Members of the Society for the Study of Peace, Conflict, and Violence ,
The August issue of Peace and Conflict, Vol. 19, No. 3, has been published online and mailed (see table of contents below). This is a wonderful issue that seemingly came together on its own. Its papers focus, peripherally or frontally, on an important topic for peace psychology -- how we encounter and understand others. In the introduction to the issue, Editorial Assistant Timothy Luke and I wrote:
“Although each of the contributions to this issue of Peace and Conflict were submitted to the journal’s editorial office independently, they focus on a set of related topics -- dialogue, narrative, empathy, and perspective taking in the context of prejudice, stress, trauma, and heightened or intransigent conflict. They offer insight into peace and conflict that is broad in scope and attentive to detail.”
It is my hope that a reading of the six papers in this issue along with two related book reviews offers insight into the psychosocial conditions in which an unfreezing of attitudes, beliefs, and positions can occur, enabling a shift in attitudes that can foster cooperative, peaceful intergroup relations. How this can happen has long been the focus of social psychological research. The questions, methods, contexts, and findings of these papers update psychological studies of peace by looking at history anew and by considering ongoing issues in contemporary society.
Call For Division Proposals
All proposals must be submitted under the "Division Proposals" tab by Monday, December 2, 11:59pm EST (see submission instructions)
We are looking forward to proposals for sessions to be held at the APA Convention in 2014. This year, we will be accepting submissions for symposia, skill-building sessions, conversation hours, posters, and individual papers. All proposals will receive blind-peer review, and acceptance decisions will be made in January.
One small change we are making this year is that individual paper submissions will now be considered for a "Quick Peace Presentations" session, in which 7-8 people give a 5 minute presentation each, with 10 minutes at the end for discussion with the presenters. These sessions tend to be popular with attendees, and a fun challenge for presenters. Any individual paper that is not accepted to a Quick Peace session, but that still received a good anonymous review, will be given the option of presenting a poster.
We would also like to encourage you to think about requesting Continuing Education (CE) credits for your session. The only additional information you will be asked to give is to identify two-learning goals for session attendees. The APA office is looking for sessions which are relevant to psychological practice, education, and science; enable psychologists to keep pace with emerging issues and technologies; and allow psychologists to maintain, develop, and increase competencies in order to improve services. If a session offers CE credits, the CE credits are available for a charge, but the session is still free for other conference attendees. These sessions also tend to be popular and draw a wider-audience.
Read official APA Convention call for programs and Instructions for writing a proposal here.
Additional Information for Students
Students who have posters, papers, or other sessions accepted by the Division 48: Peace Psychology will be eligible to apply for our student travel awards, to help offset the cost of attending the convention. Information about applying for these awards will be made available in the spring after submissions have been accepted. Any student who is in Washington DC presenting something through our division can apply for these travel awards.
As a student member of APA, you will need to have a full APA Member act as your sponsor on the applications. The APA member does not need to be attending the conference to be your sponsor. If you know do not know an APA Member to ask, please feel free to email either Maggie or Katie about this and we will work with you help find an APA Member to sponsor you.
APA Monitor
The September APA Monitor features Peace and Conflict's special issue on Continuous Traumatic Stress (Vol. 19, No. 2, May 2013) with article by Tori DeAngelis, (read full article). -
August Issue of Peace and Conflict: Journal of Pease Psychology is Available
Message from Journal Editor, Dr. Susan Opotow
Dear Members of the Society for the Study of Peace, Conflict, and Violence ,
The August issue of Peace and Conflict, Vol. 19, No. 3, has been published online and mailed (see table of contents below). This is a wonderful issue that seemingly came together on its own. Its papers focus, peripherally or frontally, on an important topic for peace psychology -- how we encounter and understand others. In the introduction to the issue, Editorial Assistant Timothy Luke and I wrote:
“Although each of the contributions to this issue of Peace and Conflict were submitted to the journal’s editorial office independently, they focus on a set of related topics -- dialogue, narrative, empathy, and perspective taking in the context of prejudice, stress, trauma, and heightened or intransigent conflict. They offer insight into peace and conflict that is broad in scope and attentive to detail.”
It is my hope that a reading of the six papers in this issue along with two related book reviews offers insight into the psychosocial conditions in which an unfreezing of attitudes, beliefs, and positions can occur, enabling a shift in attitudes that can foster cooperative, peaceful intergroup relations. How this can happen has long been the focus of social psychological research. The questions, methods, contexts, and findings of these papers update psychological studies of peace by looking at history anew and by considering ongoing issues in contemporary society.
Current Division 48 President Rachel MacNair Announces the Formation of Three Presidential Division Task Forces
Presidential Task Force 1:
Research Agenda for the Psychology of Weaponized Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (Drones)
E-mail:
Kelly A. Caver
Christopher Ferguson, co-chair
F. Richard Ferraro
Harold V. Hall
Alaa Hijazi
Mark Hovee
Kathie Malley-Morrison
Sherrie Wilcox, co-chair
Presidential Task Force 2:
Research Agenda on Psychological Issues of the Death Penalty
E-mail:
Chrystallee Crain
Karla Sarae Fallon
Titus Hamlett
Ashley Hampton, chair
Krista Hutchison
Presidential Task Force 3:
Research Agenda on Abortion from a Peace Psychology Perspective
E-mail:
Anne Speckhard, chair
Jennifer Brightup
Catherine Coyle
David Fergusson
Martha Shuping
Anne Speckhard, co-chair
Avrum Marco Turk
Each Task Force is charged with these responsibilities:
- Gather and organize existing empirical literature on the questions.
- Have extensive and dynamic conversations from varying points of view as to which studies are strong or weak and what conclusions can be drawn. Identify where the gaps in the literature are.
- Decide on what conclusions there is a consensus from the varying points of view.
- Delineate clearly where the points of disagreement remain.
- Propose research plans needed to address the disagreements and gaps.
- Draft a product of good scholarship to be published, to advance the field on these issues and to spur further research on them.
- Comment on how the science can inform public policy on these issues in a way that can be meaningful to journalists, policy-makers, the general public, and the APA Public Interest Office, and draft materials that would be suitable for such audiences for purposes of public education on the science of the issue.
Division Elections: On behalf of 2013 President Rachel MacNair, Past President Gilbert Reyes has announced the results of the election of officers to the Executive Committee of Division 48. The Division thanks all who served as candidates for their willingness to take on the responsibilities that come with serving as officer and celebrates the remarkable collection of peace psychologists on the ballot. The results are the following: Rebekah Phillips DeZalia, President; Juvia P. Heuchert, Treasurer; Gil Reyes, Member-at-Large; and Jean Maria Arrigo, Division Representative to APA Council.
Call for Papers: Psychology of Non-Violence and/or Gandhian Philosophy, deadline August 31
Gandhi Marg, a well known journal dedicated to Gandhian philosophy, is inviting manuscripts from psychologists and other scholars working in allied disciplines to contribute in its Spring 2014 (or later) publication. The focus of this volume is any aspect of behavior that could be linked directly or indirectly to Gandhian philosophy and its utilization. The range of topics are wide but not limited to the following: theoretical papers, for example, Skinner's analysis of Gandhi's behavior (Whatever Happened to Psychology as the Science of Behavior? B.F. Skinner (1987). American Psychologist, Volume 42(8), 780–786), moral behavior (including moral exclusion/ us-them dichotomy), psychology of justice, community psychology, measurement of nonviolence, neuropsychology of nonviolence/ nonkilling, psychobiography of an activist, correlates of nonviolence (for example, forgiving and compassion), conflict resolution, and nonviolent cultures.
Please submit the title of your paper with a tentative abstract by August 31, 2013 to the Guest Editor, Professor V. K. Kool, on e-address: . We expect to receive your complete manuscript by October 30, 2013.
Special Issue of Peace and Conflict: Journal of Social Issues is Available
Message by Journal Editor, Dr. Susan Opotow
Dear Colleagues,
I am so pleased to let you know that a special issue of Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology that has long been in the works has been mailed by APA. You should already have this issue in hand or will receive it shortly. This issue, “Continuous Traumatic Stress” (Vol. 19, No. 2, May 2013) brings together papers from Sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East, and the United States to present empirically-based research and articulate conceptual and theoretical concerns about the nature, impact, and treatment of continuous exposure to threat and danger (see Table of Contents below). We are delighted that the APA Monitor will have an article on this special issue in the summer. (Read Special Issue)
The issue was guest co-edited by four outstanding South African psychologists -- Debra Kaminer, Gillian Eagle, Garth Stevens, and Craig Higson-Smith. It emerges from the growing recognition of limitations of existing conceptualizations of traumatic stress, such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and complex post-traumatic stress disorder, which assume that trauma exposure has occurred in the past. This assumption fails to adequately capture the experiences of many individuals and communities across the globe that are exposed to realistic, ongoing threat and danger on a daily basis, often combined with an absence of safe spaces in which to find protection and experience ‘recovery.’
The 35 authors who contributed to the 11 papers in this special issue include senior, mid-career, early career scholars, and doctoral students who teach, practice, and conduct research in clinical psychology, neuropsychology, sociology, social behavior, public health, and statistics. They also include NGO founders, directors, field workers, and community members who counsel, research, advise, and facilitate programs designed to ameliorate effects of past and ongoing violence.
By presenting a contextually-attuned and critical clinical perspective on stress and mental health, Timothy Luke and I wrote in the special issue’s introduction, this issue “makes a significant contribution to our understanding of contexts in which peace is elusive and conflict persists” (p. 74).
Best regards,
Susan
Susan Opotow
Editor, Peace and Conflict
Call for Nominations for APA’S Policy Review Task Force on Gun Violence Prediction and Prevention (May 19 deadline)
The American Psychological Association (APA) seeks nominations for the APA Policy Review Task Force on Gun Violence Prediction and Prevention by May 19. The APA Council of Representatives authorized the six-person Task Force during its February 22-24, 2013, meeting. The Task Force charge is to review and amend or possibly replace the 1994 APA Council resolution on Firearm Safety and Youth. The Council allocated funds in the 2013 budget for one meeting of the task force, which will take place in early fall 2013. The final recommendations of the Task Force need to be submitted for governance review by October 21, in order for the Council to consider the recommendations at the February 2014 meeting. In its work, the Task Force will draw on a report on gun violence prediction and prevention that a panel of experts convened by APA will complete by August 2013.
The Council of Representatives approved the creation of the Task Force with the goal of strengthening APA policy related to the prediction and prevention of gun violence. The APA Board of Directors recommended that the Council create the Task Force to address the perceived limitations in the 1994 policy in terms of its age, scope, and evidence base. The Board recognized the need for a new policy to reflect current knowledge on gun violence prediction and prevention, to inform the field, and to provide a strong foundation for APA federal advocacy efforts. The key issues at the forefront of the national debate include the following: the accuracy of predicting violent behavior, especially for low base rate events, such as mass shootings; the effectiveness of various gun violence prevention strategies, including approaches to school safety; education and training needs; research issues as they pertain to gun violence prediction and prevention; and public policy recommendations.
Nominations should include a statement of areas of expertise and interest, as well as a curriculum vitae for each nominee. Send nomination materials to the attention of Ron Schlittler at , FAX, or American Psychological Association, 750 First Street, NE, Washington, DC 20002. For any questions about the Task Force or the nominations process, contact Clinton Anderson, or .
Potential areas of nominee expertise include the following:
- Degree of relationship between mental illness and risk of violence;
- Antecedents of gun violence, including social determinants, gender, and cultural and developmental factors;
- Effectiveness of gun violence prevention strategies at the individual, community, and broader levels;
- Gun violence and related policy;
- APA governance experience.
The Board for the Advancement of Psychology in the Public Interest will review the nominations and provide recommendations to the Board of Directors for appointment by the APA President.
Call for papers on Psychologies of Human Rights, due April 30th 2013
Peace and Conflict: The Journal of Peace Psychology is seeking submissions for a special issue on the psychologies of human rights, guest-edited by Gabriel Twose (Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues) and Christopher Cohrs (Jacobs University Bremen). The editors are seeking empirical research, theoretical papers, and review articles on how the concept of human rights is used in psychological research and practice. Read call for papers.
Extended Deadline to Solicit Women Members of Task Force 3: Research Agenda on Abortion from a Peace Psychology Perspective (March 22, 2013)
The president of the American Psychological Association's Division 48, peace psychology (Rachel MacNair), is establishing three presidential task forces, and the deadline for applications to the one on weaponized drones and the one on the death penalty has now passed. For the third task force, six fine applications came in, but only one was a woman. While men are welcome to participate and we do apologize for saying only women are qualified to apply during the extended deadline period, this is a topic in which it is crucial that there not be a clear gender imbalance in favor of males. Below are the current set of questions for the task force, and below that is a list of the definitions of the tasks.
Applicants should send their c.v., a short statement of why they're interested in serving, and one sentence on what their position on the issue is (pro-choice, pro-life, or middle ground/complicated). A balance of views is important because one of the tasks is to establish where there is consensus among the different perspectives and to be clear where the disagreements are; we also want different perspectives to make discussion of alternative explanations for the empircal data more robust.
Send materials to:
Questions
- Public Debate on Nature of Abortion: What empirical evidence can psychology offer in the debate over whether abortion is best understood as option or violence? In addition to its psychological impact on those women who undergo abortions, what is the impact on children, on male partners and other family members, and on abortion doctors and staff? What is the impact of abortion availability on women as a whole, and on societal conditions for women?
- Domestic Violence and Substance Abuse: What is the association of domestic abuse before an abortion, after an abortion, or as pressure for an unwanted abortion? What causal inferences can be made? If being victims of domestic abuse and/or substance abuse are more prevalent among those who seek abortions, might a professional requirement for screening for such problems be an expected part of reasonable care at the abortion medical sites? Are there any other prevention strategies for domestic abuse or substance abuse that can be ascertained by understanding their relationship to abortion practice?
- Across Cultures and International: What do studies show across cultures, so we can ascertain what impacts are due to culture and which are more universal? Does abortion have psychological impacts that would be predicted from the theory that it kills human beings, or do such predictions fail? What are the more specific psychological impacts of presence or absence of abortion in cases of rape in all contexts, and particularly in war zones and sexual trafficking? What are the psychological impacts of abortion for gender selection, as is sufficiently prevalent in some countries to cause a gender imbalance favoring boys at birth?
- Therapy and Screening: What are the best therapeutic practices for post-abortion women who identify themselves as in a state of distress from the abortions? How do these relate to negative preconditions that led to or were associated with having abortions? Are there preconditions that constitute a psychological counter-indication? (The previous APA Task Force seemed to indicate so, but did not spell it out).
- Conflict Transformation: What possibilities for conflict transformation are there in the society-wide political debates and activist confrontations?
- Other Questions: Does a review of the current literature cause other questions to arise which should be addressed to add to the comprehensiveness of the research agenda?
The task forces are expected to finish their work by November of 2014. Each Task Force is charged with these responsibilities:
- Gather and organize existing empirical literature on the questions.
- Have extensive and dynamic conversations from varying points of view as to which studies are strong or weak and what conclusions can be drawn. Identify where the gaps in the literature are.
- Decide on what conclusions there is a consensus from the varying points of view.
- Delineate clearly where the points of disagreement remain.
- Propose research plans needed to address the disagreements and gaps.
- Draft a product of good scholarship to be published, to advance the field on these issues and to spur further research on them.
- Comment on how the science can inform public policy on these issues in a way that can be meaningful to journalists, policy-makers, the general public, and the APA Public Interest Office, and draft materials that would be suitable for such audiences for purposes of public education on the science of the issue.
Call for Nominations for Presidential Task Forces
The president of Division 48 (Society for the Study of Peace, Conflict, and Violence) announces a call for nominations for three presidential task forces, seeking differing perspectives on the issues involved (pro/con and otherwise) in order to allow for vigorous scientific debate on the empirical data. The task forces are expected to finish their work by November of 2014.
Task Force 1: Research Agenda on the Psychology of Weaponized Unmanned Aerial Vehicles.
Task Force 2: Research Agenda on the Psychological Issues of the Death Penalty.
Task Force 3: Reseach Agenda on Abortion from a Peace Psychology Perspective.
(Read about the Task Forces)
Each Task Force is charged with these responsibilities:
- Gather and organize existing empirical literature on the questions.
- Have extensive and dynamic conversations from varying points of view as to which studies are strong or weak and what conclusions can be drawn. Identify where the gaps in the literature are.
- Decide on what conclusions there is a consensus from the varying points of view.
- Delineate clearly where the points of disagreement remain.
- Propose research plans needed to address the disagreements and gaps.
- Draft a product of good scholarship to be published, to advance the field on these issues and to spur further research on them.
- Comment on how the science can inform public policy on these issues in a way that can be meaningful to journalists, policy-makers, the general public, and the APA Public Interest Office, and draft materials that would be suitable for such audiences for purposes of public education on the science of the issue.
Those interested in joining are asked to attach their curriculum vitae and give a short statement as to their interest in the task force and their basic position on the issue involved. Please send to: .
Deadline: March 8, 2013.
