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Psychology International
Volume 23, Number 1, March 2012
For an online version, visit: www.apa.org/international/pi
C ON TEN T S
COVER:
Psychology in Egypt
INTRODUCTION
The modern discipline of psychology began in the 19th century. In the pre-modern Islamic
context, the term psychology referred to the study of human mind and behavior, while the
term mind referred to human intellect and consciousness. Thus, medieval Islamic
psychology did not deal with the mind only (Ashy, 1999). Early Arab and Muslim scholars
wrote extensively about human psychology. They used the term Nafs (self or soul) to indicate
individual personality and the term fitrah (nature) as an indication for human nature. Nafs is
a broad term that includes the qalb (heart), the ruh (spirit), the aql (intellect) and irada (will).
Early Muslim scholars had a certain philosophy in their writing that encompassed all areas
of human enquiry, i.e. the knowledge of all things, both divine and human (Ashy, 1999).
Therefore, Islamic psychology, or Ilm-al Nafsiat (psychological sciences), referred to the
study of Nafs and was related to psychology, psychiatry, and neurosciences (Deuraseh and
Abu Talib, 2005). Al-ilaj al-nafsy (psychological therapy) in Islamic medicine was simply
defined as the study of mental illness and is equal to psychotherapy, as it deals with curing/
treatment of ideas, soul and vegetative mind. The psychiatric physician was referred to as altabib al-ruhani or tabib al-qalb (spiritual physician) (Deuraseh and Abu Talib, 2005).
Moreover, the Islamic and Arabic psychological era included the establishment of the first
mental hospitals, the development of the first clinical approach to mental illness, and a
unique experimental approach to the study of the mind (Khaleefa, 1999; Paladin, 1998).
DEVELOPMENT OF PSYCHOLOGY IN EGYPT
Recently Published.............. 16
Selected Review from
PsycCRITIQUES.................... 17
ANNOUNCEMENTS ........... 19
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REFERENCES
Ahmed, R.A., Gielen, U.P. (1998). Psychology in the Arab world. In
R.A. Ahmed, & U.P. Gielen (Eds.), Psychology in the Arab Countries
(pp. 3-48). Menoufia: Menoufia University Press.
Ahmed, R.A. (1992). Psychology in the Arab countries. In U.P. Gielen,
L.L. Adler, & N.A. Milgram (Eds.), Psychology in International
Perspective: 50 Years of the International Council of Psychologists (pp. 127150). Amsterdam: Swets & Zeitlinger.
Ashy, M.A. (1999). Health and illness from an Islamic perspective.
Journal of Religion and Health, 38, 241-257.
Cairo University 75th Anniversary (1983). A historical registry. Cairo:
Cairo University Press.
Deuraseh, N., & Abu Talib M. (2005). Mental health in Islamic medical
tradition. The International Medical Journal, 4, 76-79.
Hunt, M. (1993). The story of psychology (1st ed). New York, NY:
Anchor Books.
Jakovljevic, M. (2011). Hubris syndrome and a new perspective on
political psychiatry: Need to protect prosocial behavior, public benefits
and safety of our civilization. Psychiatria Danubina, 23, 136-138.
Khaleefa, O. (1999). Who is the founder of psychophysics and experimental
psychology? American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences, 16, 2.
Mohamed, W.M.Y. (2008). History of Neuroscience: Arab and Muslim
contributions to modern neuroscience. IBRO History of Neuroscience.
[http://www.ibro.info/Pub/Pub_Main_Display.asp?
LC_Docs_ID=3433].
Paladin, A.V. (1998) Ethics and neurology in the Islamic world:
Continuity and change. Ital J Neurol Sci., 19, 255-258.
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Reid, D.M. (1990). Cairo University and the making of modern Egypt.
Cairo: The AUC Press.
Rizk, Y.L. (1998). The Egyptian University. Al-Ahram, 12 November,
1998. (Egyptian newspaper) (in Arabic).
Sapiro, V. (2001). Introduction to Political Psychology. [http://
www.polisci.wisc.edu/users/sapiro/ps267.htm].
Soueif M.I., & Ahmed, R.A. (2001). Psychology in the Arab world: Past,
present and future. International Journal of Group Tensions, 30, 211-240.
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Panels:
Mental Health and Sustainable Development
Refuge and Psychosocial Wellbeing
Poverty Eradication in the Lives of Women and Children
Email: unpsychday@gmail.com
Web: http://unpsychologyday.org - Register by April 12th!
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EARLY-CAREER PSYCHOLOGISTS:
GRADUATE STUDENTS:
Wendy Baccus
(George Mason University)
Bonnie Brett
(University of Maryland)
Max E. Butterfield
(Texas Christian University)
Eva Dundas
(Carnegie Mellon University)
Juliana Schroeder
(University of Chicago)
Jonathan Stange
(Temple University)
The United Nations Holds its Annual Commission on the Status of Women
The 56th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) took place at the United Nations Headquarters in New
York from February 27 to March 9, 2012. The primary theme of this years session was the empowerment of rural women and
their role in poverty and hunger eradication, development, and current challenges. The Psychology Coalition at the UN (APA,
IAAP, ICP, IUPsyS, and SPSSI) sponsored a parallel event titled Transforming Communities through Psychosocial
Empowerment of Poor Rural Women and Girls. The speakers discussed outreach to rural women in Peru and India; using
psychosocial interventions to empower girls to return to school; and transforming rural communities through environmental
initiatives. The CSW is a functional commission of the UN Economic and Social Council, held annually since 1946. During the
10-day Commission, Member State representatives gather at the UN Headquarters to evaluate progress on gender equality,
identify challenges, set global standards, and formulate concrete policies to promote gender equality and womens empowerment
worldwide. For more details on this years CSW, please visit www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/csw/56sess.htm.
From left: Jennifer Weber, Maame YelbertObeng, Rucha Chitnis, Kurt Salzinger,
Liliana Mayo, Deanna Chitayat
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PSYCHOLOGY IN ACTION
Psychologist Prescriptive Authority Movement in Europe
By Elaine S. LeVine, PhD, ABMP, New Mexico State University
The movement to allow psychologists with appropriate post-doctoral training
to prescribe psychotropic medications for their patients is based on three
heuristic propositions: 1) properly trained psychologists with prescriptive
authority can increase access to care for many underserved populations; 2)
the combination of psychotherapy plus psychotropic intervention, when
appropriate, is more efficacious than either approach alone; and 3) one
provider, skilled in psychodiagnostic and psychotherapeutic techniques, as
well as psychopharmacology provides a practical and less expensive means of
intervention for patients. Over a hundred psychologists in branches of the
military and in New Mexico and Louisiana have been prescribing for over ten
years and there have been no complaints of prescribing malpractice by
regulatory boards. Moreover, a body of case study evidence of prescribing
psychologists efficacy as consultants about medication and active prescribers
is accruing (see LeVine, 2011; McGrath and Moore, 2010).
Presently, three programs have received designation from the American Psychological Association as having met the
educational guidelines for training prescribing psychologists as adopted by the American Psychological Council in August,
2010. These programs are housed at Alliant University in California, Fairleigh Dickenson University in New Jersey, and New
Mexico State University in New Mexico. All of these programs have drawn students primarily from the United States, but
because they employ distance education formats, they have also included psychologist/students from around the world.
New Mexico State University (the SIAP/NMSU), in conjunction with the Netherlands Institute of Psychology (NIP), is
initiating a new iteration of classes to begin in September of 2012. Like the previous program, many of these classes will be
taught online, and some will be offered live in Utrecht, Netherlands. We anticipate the program will be very effective and
interesting, as this iteration will be able to draw on the skills of the Dutch psychologists already trained in psychopharmacology,
as well as some medical personnel from the Netherlands who have become supportive of the movement. Because a central
purpose of this program is to provide quality care with increased access to underserved populations throughout the world, a
certain number of applicants for this iteration will be accepted from countries outside of the Netherlands.
The prescriptive authority movement has been driven by very lofty aspirations among psychologists to provide higher quality care
and greater access to care for underserved populations. It is very exciting to witness the evolution of this movement from its core
as a demonstration project in the U.S. Department of Defense twenty years ago, to its present international efforts. For more
information on the program, please visit the New Mexico State University website at education.nmsu.edu/cep/siap/index.html;
or contact Elaine LeVine at eslevine@hotmail.com or Huib van Dis at h.vandis@uva.nl.
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GLOBAL HEALTH
A Jefferson Science Fellow in
Global Health
By Robert L Balster, PhD, Virginia
Commonwealth University
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CURRENT ACTIVITIES
It is now February 2012, and I have been in Washington
since last August along with 12 other Fellows. After arrival
and orientation I was given a very wide range of options at
the State Department where I could do my fellowship.
During the interviews I discovered that most of these units
had little experience with scientific psychology. Also, I
learned quickly that they were interested in me because I had
general science skills that could be applied to a wide range of
policy topics, not because of my research experience in the
area of substance abuse or because I am a behavioral
scientist. It made me appreciate once again the solid training
that psychologists have in scientific ways of thinking and
appreciation for evidence-based practices and policies.
I was placed in the Administrators office
at the U.S. Agency for International
Development (USAID) Global Health
Bureau. USAID is a component of the
State Department and focuses on the
provision of foreign assistance in several
areas, including health. I am attached to
what is known as the Global Health
Initiative Launch Team. This team reports to Amie Batson, the
Deputy Assistant Administrator for Global Health, and I was
quickly taken under the wing of Elizabeth Higgs, an infectious
disease expert on loan to USAID from the NIH. A driving
philosophy behind the work of the Global Health Bureau is
President Obamas Global Health Initiative (GHI,
www.ghi.gov). There are several principles articulated in the
GHI, including goals such as increasing country involvement
and ownership in its health problems, strengthening country
systems for health delivery and research, and discovering and
implementing solutions that work.
The major focus of my work has been to assist USAID in
helping developing countries implement more of the solutions
that work. As scientists, we know that doing more of what
works is a call for evidence-based practice and policy, but
infusing a culture of research and evaluation has significant
challenges. One of the ways I have been helping has been to
work with a small team to facilitate interactions between
USAID and the National Institutes of Health (NIH), given
NIHs investment in health research and evidence-based
practices. More can be done to link NIH research to the health
needs of other countries. Synergizing USAID and NIH makes
sense because USAID has extensive on-the-ground experience
with helping countries address their health problems. My
extensive experience in the NIH grant world has helped me
make a contribution to this initiative here at USAID.
Another important issue is defining what constitutes
evidence for evidence-based practice and policy in
developing countries. Since most research knowledge comes
from work that has been done in higher resource countries,
we need to ask how the knowledge generated by this work
can be applied globally. There can be many challenges in
advancing evidence-based practices inside the U.S., let alone
in settings where the evidence base is leaner. One strategy
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NOTES:
1. This article is part of a collaborative project to research,
organize, and share important GMH resources. The project
includes articles, presentations at conferences and courses,
and a website (GMH-Map: sites.google.com/site/gmhmap).
The principle article for the project is currently submitted for
publication and is to be posted on the website. It extensively
highlights materials from the last two decades of GMH
developments via a resource map, organizing the materials into
six categories: organizations, conferences/events, publications,
training, human rights, and the humanitarian sector.
2. Many people with GMH interests are clustered at schools/
departments of public health, international health, or medicine at
particular universities (e.g., U.S. examples: Johns Hopkins
University, Bloomberg School of Public Health; Columbia
University Mailman School of Public Health; Harvard Social
Medicine Department and the School of Public Health; and the
Global Health Institute at Duke University). Currently health
professionals and graduate students usually need to connect with
such academic-relational clusters having a strong global
emphasis, especially in mental health, as a key way to pursue
more training, research, and future career opportunities in GMH.
I strongly believe that the academic-professional psychological
community must also intentionally offer GMH training.
World Health Organization (WHO) Resolution on Global burden of mental disorders and the need for a
comprehensive, coordinated response from health and social sectors at the country level - January 20, 2012
The Executive Board of the World Health Organization (WHO) recently approved a historic resolution to be presented at
the May 2012 WHO World Health Assembly. The resolution urges member states to develop policies and strategies to
address the promotion of mental health, prevention of mental disorders, and early identification, care, support, treatment,
and recovery. It also asks governments to promote human rights, tackle stigma, address poverty and homelessness, tackle
major modifiable risks, create opportunities for generating income, and provide housing, education and healthcare service.
According to WHO, mental disorders account for 13% of the global burden of diseases. To view the full Resolution, please
visit apps.who.int/gb/ebwha/pdf_files/EB130/B130_R8-en.pdf.
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UN MATTERS
How Might Psychologists
Commemorate United Nations
International Volunteer Day?
By Juneau Gary and Neal S. Rubin,
Column Co-Editors
We must harness volunteer spirit in service of [our] planet.
This profound statement was made by United Nations (UN)
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon at a UN-sponsored
conference in September 2011 (Harness volunteer spirit, 2011).
His comments are consistent with the mission of the office of
United Nations Volunteers (UNV), a UN organization that
promotes peace and development by advocating for global
volunteerism. UNVs website asserts that volunteerism is a
powerful means of engaging people in tackling development
challenges, and it can transform the pace and nature of
development. UNV embraces volunteerism as universal and
inclusive, and recognizes volunteerism in its diversity, as well
as the values that sustain it: free will, commitment,
engagement and solidarity (UN volunteers, n.d.).
In 1985, the UN General Assembly (Resolution A/
RES/40/212) adopted December 5th as its annual
International Volunteer Day (IVD). This celebration is
designed to (1) heighten awareness about the important
contributions of volunteers, (2) promote their safety in
dangerous locales, and (3) encourage people to offer their
services as volunteers. Researchers in the UN Volunteers
Office report that approximately 140 million volunteers
operate around the world in 130 countries and would
comprise the 9th largest country in the world, if aggregated
(Volunteering matters, n.d.; UN volunteers, n.d.).
Many UNV projects use a partner-based initiative model,
involving government agencies, volunteer organizations, the
UN system, the business/private sector, foundations,
sporting teams, academic institutions, faith-based
organizations, media outlets, non-profit organizations,
community groups, and celebrities. UNICEF Goodwill
ambassadors such as Angelina Jolie, Danny Glover, Roger
Moore, and Serena Williams, lend their celebrity status to
highlight various plights in some of the worlds poorest
countries. They travel to refugee camps, hospitals, and
orphanages, among other places, and meet with refugee and
political asylum families, child soldiers, orphans, and victims
of rape, as well as support local rescue worker volunteers.
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RECENTLY PUBLISHED
Foundations of Chinese Psychology: Confucian Social Relations
By Kwang-Kuo Hwang
Professor Hwang, a Taiwanese-born psychologists, trained in graduate school at the University of
Hawaii in social and cultural psychology, began to explore the thoughts and writings of the ancient
venerated Chinese sage, Confucius (551 BCE479 BCE), with special attention to the role of Confucian
ideas in shaping Chinese psychology across the ages. Professor Hwangs studies revealed the profound
impact of Confucian thought for understanding Chinese psychology and behavior, even within the brief
period of Communist and Maoist political domination. In a series of publications that now have
important historical implications for psychology, Professor Hwang documented the relationship between
Chinese psychology and behavior and Confucian thought, especially the critical role of relationism.
Professor Hwang noted that Confucian thought places heavy emphasis on morality, context, and the
nature of interpersonal relations. This recognition became the foundation for much of Professor Hwangs
subsequent writingswritings that now find their first collected presentation in the West through this
compendium of his thought. ~ from the Foreword by Anthony Marsella, PhD, and Wade Pickren, PhD
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ANNOUNCEMENTS
CALL FOR APPLICATIONS:
2012-2013 United Nations Graduate Student Interns
APA is now accepting applications for psychology graduate student interns to work with APAs NGO at the United Nations.
Interns work as volunteers with the APA UN team to help implement the Teams mission of promoting psychology as a
science and profession that is relevant to the UNs global agenda. Applicants must be available at least each Thursday during
the period of September 2012June 2013 and live in or close to New York City to attend meetings at UN headquarters. For
more information and how to apply, please visit www.apa.org/international/united-nations/student-intern.pdf. Deadline for
applications is April 1, 2012.
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USEFUL RESOURCES:
Psychological First Aid: Guide for Field Workers
The World Health Organization (WHO) published a 2011 guide about psychological first aidthe provision of humane and
practical support to those who are suffering serious crisis events. This guide covers both social and psychological support and
provides information on supportive things to say and do for distressed people, how to approach a new situation safely for
yourself and others, and how to avoid causing harm by your actions. The information was developed for use in low and
middle income countries, and the information will need to be adapted to the local context and culture. For the full guide,
please visit http://whqlibdoc.who.int/publications/2011/9789241548205_eng.pdf.
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