American Psychological Association

American Psychological Association, organization for the promotion of psychology as a science, a profession, and a means of promoting human welfare. The organization was founded in 1892 at Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts, and incorporated in 1925. Voting membership in the association is limited to persons holding a Ph.D. degree in psychology. The association, which has more than 150,000 members, publishes an annual directory and about 50 periodicals, including the Journal of Experimental Psychology, Psychological Abstracts, and American Psychologist. The headquarters of the association is in Washington, D.C.

In the early part of the 21st century the APA struggled with a controversial issue after it was revealed that psychologists were aiding prisoner interrogations conducted by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) at secret prison sites and by the U.S. military at detention facilities in Afghanistan and at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. In 2006 the APA passed a resolution against torture, and in 2007 the association further strengthened prohibitions against psychologists taking part in interrogation sessions in which torture techniques were used. The resolution included “an absolute prohibition against psychologists’ knowingly planning, designing, and assisting in the use of torture and any form of cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment.”

The resolution specifically cited “mock executions, water-boarding or any other form of simulated drowning or suffocation, sexual humiliation, rape, cultural or religious humiliation, exploitation of phobias or psychopathology, induced hypothermia, the use of psychotropic drugs or mind-altering substances used for the purpose of eliciting information; as well as the following used for the purposes of eliciting information in an interrogation process: hooding, forced nakedness, stress positions, the use of dogs to threaten or intimidate, physical assault including slapping or shaking, exposure to extreme heat or cold, threats of harm or death; and isolation, sensory deprivation and over-stimulation and/or sleep deprivation used in a manner that represents significant pain or suffering or in a manner that a reasonable person would judge to cause lasting harm; or the threatened use of any of the above techniques to the individual or to members of the individual’s family.”

The resolution followed reports that retired military psychologists were instrumental in devising such techniques, which were put into use at CIA secret prisons and at Guantánamo, where suspected terrorists linked to al-Qaeda and the Taliban were being held. The APA rejected a stronger resolution that would have banned psychologists from working in such interrogation facilities. Critics charged that because suspected terrorist detainees are held without the right of habeas corpus, working in such facilities was inherently unethical for mental health professionals.