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New Department of Education Grant Program Excludes Psychology
As part of the Bush Administration and Congressional attempts to boost math and science achievement, Congress approved the new National Science and Mathematics Access to Retain Talent (SMART) grant program that would provide financial assistance for third and fourth year college students already pursuing degrees in physical or life sciences, math, computer sciences, technology or engineering fields. While including cognitive science among a list of eligible majors, the Department of Education (DoEd) did not include psychology or other classifications of behavioral science. In response, APA's Executive Directors for Science and Education, Steven Breckler and Cynthia Belar, wrote to the Secretary of Education encouraging the inclusion of many areas of psychology and behavioral science and requesting a rationale for excluding instructional programs in scientific psychology. While no formal change has yet been made, the DoEd is expected to undertake a more formal rulemaking process that would allow for modifications to the list in the future.
 View more information on the SMART Program as well as the American Competitiveness Grant Program
View the letter
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Research Society on Alcoholism Takes Treatment to the Hill
On September 6, Dr. Ting-Kai Li, Director of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), joined Kathleen Grant, PhD, a psychologist and the President of the Research Society on Alcoholism and representatives from the pharmaceutical industry to participate in a congressional briefing on pharmacotherapeutic advances in the treatment of alcoholism. The standing-room-only briefing, promoted by Represenatives Jim Ramstad (R-MN) and Patrick Kennedy (D-RI), Co-Chairs of the Addiction, Treatment and Recovery Caucus, gave the audience an opportunity to learn about the NIAAA research portfolio and public-private partnerships that have lead to recent FDA approval of two new medications to treat alcohol dependence. Dr. Li's presentation addressed a variety of issues, including the NIAAA mission; the scope of health problems related to alcohol use disorders; the prevalence of dependence; definitions of treatment success; co-morbidity with other DSM-IV disorders; treatment guides developed by NIAAA; medications approved or under development; and the pharmacogenomics of personalized medicine. Dr. Grant's presentation also covered a wide range of topics such as epidemiology of alcohol use disorders across the continuum leading to dependence; the developmental trajectory of alcohol use disorders; animal vs. human models; candidate neural pathways involved; genetic and environmental determinants of the disease; and effective behavioral interventions. Representatives from Alkermes and Forest Research Institute then provided summaries of safety and efficacy data on a depot formulation of naltrexone and oral acamprosate, respectively. Representative Kennedy concluded the briefing by commending the presenters and NIAAA for their commitment to developing new pharmacotherapies, yet additionally noting the critical role that behavioral interventions play in treating substance use disorders.
View the announcement for the briefing
View Dr. Li's presentation
View the NIAAA treatment guides
View Dr. Grant's presentation
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APA Member Advocates for NSF-Sponsored Research at Capitol Hill Lobby Day
Nora Newcombe, PhD (Fellow of APA Divisions 1,3,7 and 35 and Professor of Psychology at Temple University) joined other scientists supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF) for a Capitol Hill Lobby Day earlier this month. Newcombe represented APA at the September 13 event sponsored by the Coalition for National Science Funding (CNSF), a group in which APA Science Policy staff is very active. She visited the offices of two Members of the House of Representatives from Pennsylvania, Representatives Allyson Schwartz (D-PA) and Chaka Fattah (D-PA), to advocate for increased NSF funding in Fiscal Year 2007. Newcombe was eloquent in her argument on behalf of behavioral research support in particular, using her own empirical studies in the areas of learning and development to highlight for congressional staff how the science of psychology can address national priorities such as education.
View a photo from the meeting
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Action Alert Urges Scientists to Contact Senators to Move S. 3880
The Public Policy Office emailed Action Alerts on September 13, 2006 to members of the Public Policy Action Network who live in states represented by members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. The purpose of the Action Alert was to encourage the targeted Senators to urge their colleague, Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-PA), to schedule action on S. 3880, the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act. This bill is supported by APA, the Society for Neuroscience, and other scientific organizations that support scientists conducting research with nonhuman animals.
S. 3880, sponsored by U.S. Senators Diane Feinstein (D-CA) and James Inhofe (R-OK), would increase penalties for animal rights activists who destroy scientific labs and stalk scientists. The bill protects the First Amendment rights of activists, while increasing the tools of the FBI and other agencies to track and thwart the segment of the animal rights community who resort to terrorist tactics to make their point. With the congressional session rapidly coming to a close, scientific organizations like APA are strongly urging Congress to take action on this bill.
As of late September, 56 APA scientists had contacted their Senators about this issue. Although Chairman Specter has not been able to schedule a markup of the bill, we are told he has noted that the scientific community is strongly supportive of the bill. We will continue our efforts to protect scientists when the next Congress convenes in January. Thanks to all of you who took the time to contact your Senator's office -- watch SPIN for additional news about this important subject.
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WHO Requests Input On Alcohol-Related Problems
A 2005 World Health Assembly resolution on public health problems caused by harmful use of alcohol requested that the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) draw up recommendations for effective policies and interventions to reduce alcohol-related harm. The resolution additionally asked that a report be made to the Sixtieth World Health Assembly in 2007 on evidence-based strategies and interventions to reduce alcohol-related harm, including a comprehensive assessment of public health problems caused by harmful use of alcohol.
Read the full article
View the Public Policy Office's response to the survey
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Open Access Amendment to NIH Reform Act Is Withdrawn
SPIN readers may recall that APA, as publisher of 43 scholarly journals, is very concerned about the impact that any new open access requirements could have on its journals program (see a previous SPIN article on this issue). Consequently, Public Policy Office staff were watching closely as U.S. Representative Mike Doyle (D-PA), a member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, introduced an amendment to H.R. 6164, the NIH Reform Act of 2006 (see this SPIN issue for more on H.R. 6164) that would have required all journal articles about federally funded research to be deposited in a free, open archive (NIH's Pub Med) no later than six months after they were accepted for publication. NIH's current policy is voluntary, not mandatory, and asks that articles be archived in Pub Med within 12 months of being accepted for publication. APA sent this letter to Rep. Doyle encouraging him to withdraw his amendment until the Congress could more fully consider its ramifications. Ultimately, Rep. Doyle did withdraw his amendment, most likely at the request of the Energy and Commerce Committee leadership. H.R. 6164 was then reported by the Committee and passed by the full House, 414-2, on September 26, 2006.
Read the full article
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NIMH Council Highlights Findings from Practical Clinical Trials
On September 15, NIMH Director Tom Insel, MD, began the open policy session of the National Advisory Mental Health Council meeting by taking a moment of silence in recognition of the recent death of Wayne Fenton, MD, former Director of the Division of Adult Translational Research (DATR). NIH Director Elias Zerhouni, MD, then addressed the Council and provided an explanation of the current and future NIH budget situation and the impact on individual investigators. Focusing on the positives, Dr. Zerhouni noted that because of increased applications per applicant (up from 1.2 to 1.5) the success rate is actually higher than it appears. To illustrate that point, Dr. Zerhouni explained that in 2006, the overall success rates were roughly 19.8% for applications, but 25% for an individual applicant. He also sought to combat the perception that NIH is overly focused on clinical research by stating that NIH devotes about 60% of its resources to basic science, 25% to translational science and only 15% to clinical research. Ironically, the remainder of the Council meeting was spent discussing NIMH's clinical trials research, including the results of the nearly $145 million spent over the past six years on four of the largest clinical trials ever undertaken by the Institute, which were: 1) the Clinical Antipsychotic Trials of Intervention Effectiveness (CATIE) Study; 2) the Systematic Treatment Enhancement Program for Bipolar Disorder (STEP-BD); 3) the Treatment for Adolescents with Depression Study (TADS); and 4) the Sequenced Treatment Alternatives to Relieve Depression (STAR*D) Study. While many of the findings from these trials have been featured in the mainstream press, Council member Karen Wagner, MD, PhD, noted that the TADS study found not only that a combination of pharmacological treatment and cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) worked best for adolescent patients with moderate to severe depression in the short term, but that after 36 weeks, those treated with CBT alone fared just as well as those receiving pharmacological treatment alone or in combination with CBT. This is a significant finding that may not have drawn as much press as is warranted.
Read the full article
View the Director's Report from Dr. Tom Insel
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Psychologists Center Stage at NIDA Advisory Council Meeting
On September 20, the Advisory Council (AC) for the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) held its 94th meeting. At the meeting, programs run by psychologists were featured prominently, and APA Fellow Dr. Cora Lee Wetherington, Women & Gender Research Coordinator in the Office of the Director, provided a very interesting and comprehensive review of NIDA's gender research portfolio. When asked what area within the broader portfolio she would prioritize if she were the NIDA Director, Wetherington stated simply that she would ask more researchers to analyze their data by gender (so please heed her request if you do not already include gender analysis on a routine basis).
Read the full article
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APA Signs Letter Supporting Senator McCain on Detainee Issue
On Friday, September 22, APA President Gerry Koocher, PhD, joined other organizations in signing a letter to Senator John McCain (R-AZ) that read, in part, "We strongly support your efforts to prevent all U.S. personnel from engaging in harmful and abusive interrogation practices and to preserve long-standing U.S. observance of the Geneva Conventions." APA weighed in on the issue as Congress continues to consider differing pieces of legislation that address prescribed structures and procedures of military commissions, as well as proscribed interrogation behaviors that could be considered war crimes.
View the letter to Sen. McCain in full
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House of Representatives Passes NIH Reauthorization Legislation
On Tuesday, September 26, the full House approved the National Institutes of Health Reform Act of 2006 (HR 6164), sponsored by House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Joe Barton (R-TX). The bill was subject to a hearing and a full Committee review last week and was approved by a vote of 414-2. Representatives Ed Markey (D-MA) and Jesse Jackson, Jr. (D-IL) were the sole votes against the bill. There is currently no Senate version of the legislation, and because of few remaining legislative work days, it is not clear that the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee will take up this issue before the 109th Congress adjourns. Congress is scheduled to leave town at the end of this week to concentrate on the fall elections, but is scheduled to reconvene in November with an agenda likely focusing on passing the remaining FY07 appropriations bills. To read more about the details of the bill, please see the September Psychological Science Agenda.
View the September Psychological Science Agenda article
View the legislation directly
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Division 50 Comments On ONDCP Plan
Following a request from the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy to comment on the President's 2006 National Drug Control Strategy, Division 50 Past-President (Marsha E. Bates, PhD), President (Kim Fromme, PhD), and President-elect (Nancy A. Piotrowski, PhD) drafted a timely and constructive response. Organized to emphasize the positive, recommend improvements, and suggest additional priorities, the comments focused on eleven existing initiatives and recommended an additional two.
View the Division 50 response
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Grand Challenges of Mind and Brain at NSF
The July issue of SPIN described a recent NSF workshop jointly sponsored by the Biological Sciences and Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences Directorates. Although the workshop was closed to the public, a report of the meeting is now available online.
Science Policy staff is indebted to all the psychological scientists who contributed their expertise either by serving on the steering committee or by presenting as part of the Workshop Panel.
Read the original article
View the meeting report
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New APA Science Policy Fellow Starts Work in Executive Branch
Each year, APA's Science Directorate sponsors and places a psychologist in an executive branch research office, with the goals of: providing scientists invaluable learning experiences in research, science administration and policy; contributing to more effective uses of psychological knowledge within federal agencies; and broadening awareness about the value of the psychology-government interaction among psychologists and within the federal government. The 2006-2007 Science Policy Fellow, Dr. Kathleen Pierce, arrived in Washington in early September to complete her initial orientation organized by the American Association for the Advancement of Science. This week, Pierce began work within a behavioral sciences directorate at the Department of Defense, where she will bring to bear her background in social psychology and her particular expertise in cultural identity.
Previous Fellows have worked in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy; the Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research and the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development at the National Institutes of Health; and the National Science Foundation. For more information on the Science Policy Fellowship program, please contact Heather Kelly of APA's Public Policy Office at hkelly@apa.org or 202.336.5932.
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NIDDK Looking for Applications to Move Effective Interventions to the Community
Some of the most striking findings in behavioral research have come from the study of diabetes. The Diabetes Prevention Program community trial (DPP) demonstrated that a modest dietary and exercise intervention was effective in preventing the onset of diabetes in people with impaired glucose tolerance and was most effective among older participants. In 1993, the Diabetes Complications Control Trial showed that health complications from diabetes could be reduced 60-70 percent by tight blood glucose control. Programs based on these trials, however, have not been widely moved to community settings.
Read the full article
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Any questions?
If you have any questions regarding SPIN or specific science policy issues, please feel free to contact any of APA's Science PPO staff.
Geoff Mumford, PhD, Director of Science Policy
Pat Kobor, Senior Science Policy Analyst
Heather O'Beirne Kelly, PhD, Senior Legislative and Federal Affairs Officer
Karen Studwell, JD, Senior Legislative and Federal Affairs Officer
Anne Bettesworth, Science Policy Associate | 
