Candidates for APA President
Sharon Stephens Brehm is senior adviser to the president of Indiana University and professor of psychology in the clinical and social programs at Indiana University Bloomington. She received a BA in psychology from Duke University, an AM in clinical psychology from Harvard University, returned to Duke for a PhD in clinical psychology and completed her clinical psychology internship at the University of Washington Medical Center. After 15 years on the psychology faculty at the University of Kansas, she served as dean of the Harper College of Arts and Sciences at SUNY Binghamton, provost at Ohio University and chancellor of the Indiana University Bloomington campus.
With over 50 publications, including eight books, Brehm has contributed to both clinical and social psychology, and has strengthened connections within psychology. Her first book, "The Application of Social Psychology to Clinical Practice," helped to establish a flourishing field of interdisciplinary dialogue in theory, research and practice. The co-edited volume "Developmental Social Psychology: Theory and Research," also described a range of integrative possibilities. The scope of her work includes providing professional advice for the general public in "Help for Your Child: A Parent's Guide to Mental Health Services"; editing a collection of papers by women scholars, "Seeing Female: Social Roles and Personal Lives"; and co-authoring with Jack Brehm a comprehensive theoretical and empirical review, "Psychological Reactance: A Theory of Freedom and Control." Two multi-authored textbooks continue to be highly regarded and widely adopted: "Intimate Relationships" by Brehm, Miller, Perlman and Campbell in its third edition, and "Social Psychology" by Brehm, Kassin and Fine in its fifth edition.
Brehm has been an intra-university professor at the University of Kansas, a Fulbright senior research scholar at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales and a visiting professor in Germany and Italy. She was chair of the governing board of OhioLINK, the statewide higher education library consortium; founding chair of the governing board of the Ohio Learning Network; a member of the American Council on Education's Commission on International Education; and is currently a member of the Board of Directors of the Association of American Colleges and Universities. Her service to psychology includes chairing the Discipline Screening Committee for Fulbright Awards in Psychology as well as membership on numerous journal editorial boards and the NIMH Mental Health Small Grant Review Committee. She completed four terms on the Executive Committee of APA Div. 8 (Society for Personality and Social Psychology) and two terms as Div. 8 representative on the APA Council of Representatives. She has served as secretary of the Women's Caucus; chair of Coalition for Academic, Scientific and Applied Psychology; member of the APA Task Force on Women in Academe; and is completing her second term on the APA Finance Committee. She is a member of Divs. 1, 2, 7, 8, 9, 12, 35, 52 and 53; a fellow of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology; and a member of the University of Kansas Women's Hall of Fame. Additional biographical information is available at http://mypage.iu.edu/~sbrehm.
Brehm's candidate statement
This is a crucial time for psychology.
Consider our challenges:
A market-driven health-care system in which cost containment can become more important than patient outcomes.
Granting agencies that do not always recognize that psychological science is as robust and meaningful as the biological and physical sciences.
Educational institutions that expect psychology teachers to conduct large classes, often without sufficient assistance and at lower salaries than other scientists receive.
To meet these challenges, all of APA must work for all of psychology-- enhancing the status of psychological science and its applications, supporting psychology teachers and their students and strengthening the role of psychologists as essential health-care providers.
APA must also help us seize unique opportunities, such as:
Positioning psychology as the major field in understanding the complex interactions (mind and body, humans and machines, individuals and groups) that increasingly will determine how we study, treat and educate human beings. In areas such as neuroscience, pre scription privileges, teaching technologies and the NSF Human and Social Dynamics initiative, psychologists must be major contributors to breakthrough discoveries and best practices.
Leading the development of a life-span perspective on psychological health. The U.S. cannot meet the treatment needs of children and adolescents, and the aging of the boomers will create yet another treatment shortage. APA is uniquely qualified to articulate the comprehensive life-span perspective required for a more effective approach to psychological health care.
Enhancing access to and the value of psychology among people of color in the U.S. and in other countries to ensure that psychology will thrive in the multicultural global society of the 21st century.
I ask you to join me in a strong commitment to a vibrant, united APA in which all psychologists work together for the good of the field and the well-being of humankind.
