Psychology Associations in India: Where do we go?

Psychology Associations in India:  Where do we go?

If we are not able to learn from our 80 years of experience, what should we call ourselves ?

Let us think about changing our own attitudes and beliefs if we want to see perceptible change in the growth of the organization- if some one cares for it. Instead of lamenting about the growth of other organizations and being jealous about their growth we need to do lot of introspection. But sorry to say, I am very pessimistic about it now. The reasons are many-

1. We are good at making others introspect- and we are not ready for self analysis. Rather were not trained to do that during our training period. When we do sometimes, we get biased.

2. Though there are factionalism and grouping in every organization, our( psychologists) associations are caught up with individualism and fragmentation. To verify this observation, you may check about the status of every Psychological Association in India including Indian Psychological Association. ( Many new comers may not have even heard of IPA which is more than half a century old and there are not more than 2% percent of the members of IACP holding membership in IPA too).

3. To verify the above observation you may experiment by organizing a regular  local discussion group of psychologists or clinical psychologists wherever you are. ( I have my own findings which I can share with the group later).

4. Annual Conferences alone will not make an organization grow. Lobbying is very very important. Our association has not learned about that so far. We lament about the growth of other professions.  There is always a group of committed people who are devoting time to the growth of the profession. But we have the usual response- "I am busy with my clients, work, research distance, timing etc  "and we are not willing to pay either. We may have to think of having a paid person/persons for the lobbying- a young psychologist who can travel extensively and meet the policy makers regularly, organize press conferences and mobilize parliamentarians

• To convince the policy makers about the role of the profession of psychology in general and clinical psychology in particular
• To initiate more doctoral - postgraduate level programs in different specialties of psychology at the UGC level
• To clarify the status of Psychologists- RCI, Council of Social Science or an Independent Council.
• To convince them about the need for a Separate council for psychologists ( This requires lot of input, including the compilation of the works of the psychologists in India in building up the nation over the past 80 long years)

There is lot of work to be executed and it cannot be done through sitting in our own comfortable chairs and episodic meetings.

Constant and consistent hard work is the only answer and it cannot be extracted by saying " Thank YOU" . We also have to learn to pay for the services that we get from the association on a regular basis. You may ask EDJoseph who is "rich" in his experience in paying from his own pocket for the benefits he had fought and obtained from the Government, which was benefited by all others in the Government service.

• 5. If the thinking of the new generation is  "what benefit do I get by becoming a member of the association"  we need to respond to that cognitive component and provide options, for us to get over this pessimistic state.

 Wrote on Mar 11, 2003 11:20 am