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In August, psychologist Sujeeta Bhatt, PhD, of Georgetown
University Medical Center, and Kathleen Pierce, a fifth-year social
psychology graduate student at The Ohio State University, became the first
to complete an APA-sponsored research fellowship in the Department of
Defense's Counterintelligence Field Activity Office (CIFA) in the
Washington, D.C., area.
The fellowship program, which began in June, is a
collaboration between APA and the Department of Defense. Heather O'Beirne
Kelly, PhD, who directs the APA science policy fellowship programs, says
the fellowships are "a perfect opportunity to extend APA's efforts to
promote behavioral research within the federal government and to train
psychologists in national security-related research and policy."
At CIFA, which serves as the coordinating office for the
Department of Defense's counterintelligence activities, Bhatt researched
various techniques to detect deception, and Pierce analyzed how competing
identities affect multinational individuals. The fellows worked in the
office's Behavioral Sciences Directorate under the supervision of three
psychologists, Scott Shumate, PhD, Kirk Kennedy, PhD, and John Capps, PhD.
Working with other CIFA psychologists, Bhatt says, allowed
her to gain insight into how Department of Defense workers--including
psychologists--can use psychological research to create public policy.
"As a scientist, I'm used to moving from grant to
grant," she says. "[The fellowship] allowed me to see what other
options exist in neuroscience outside of academia."
Likewise, Pierce--who has had a longtime interest in
current events and government--used the fellowship as an opportunity to
study policy beyond the university.
"I learned what it is that people in the real world,
outside of academia, want from us," she says. "And I learned how
I could best communicate my work to them."
Now that the fellowship has ended, Bhatt is using a CIA
postdoctoral grant to use functional magnetic resonance imaging to
determine which brain regions activate when a person engages in deception.
Pierce is completing her degree.
(Text from gradPSYCH,
Volume 3, Number 3, September 2005)
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