Introduction
The legal landscape is complicated and constantly changing within the United States of America and within each state for many fields including psychology, counseling, and advertising. With a complex and changing set of regulation, regulatory boards, requirements, and maintenance of licensure a challenge is presented to psychologists to stay current with regulations and the effects of such regulations on ethical standards within the field. Adding to the complexity many psychologists are not licensed and do not directly interact with subjects bringing into question what regulations apply to which psychologist. As ethical standards provided by common morality and member-based organizations such as the APA are not laws functioning legally as a suggestion psychologist are ever challenged to understand what is a legal issue and what is a subjective ethical issue. Often ethical standards reflect the local regulatory code but at times ethical standards are updated due to events prior to legal regulation taking affect. As such, abiding by legal standards within the United States and ethical standards of the field have become a consistent challenge for psychologists.
Legal Change – Influence on Psychological Ethics
With legal regulations changing at a quick pace the challenge for psychologists to maintain an understanding of legal requirements is increasing with difficulty (Bartol, & Bartol, 2018). The ever-changing legal landscape has caused the ethical landscape of the field of psychology to be ever-changing (Berghel, 2019). This changing standard of what is acceptable and not acceptable causes a challenge for psychologists to ensure applicable laws and ethical standards are being followed.
The changing regulations within the United States and within each state has caused ethical standards to change at a rapid rate. Typically, ethical standards have changed at a quicker rate than legal standards as it is easier to change an ethical standard for example within the APA. However, with regulators changing, the ethical standards have been changing at an even more rapidly. For example, in 1992 with the Patient Bill of Rights many activities which were unethical by today’s standards were standard practice. The main lacking in ethical standards is the enforceability as ethical standards do not carry legal weight behind them (Franeta, 2019). Upon the Patient Bill of Rights ethical standards of what is acceptable and not acceptable became law and many psychological and medical practices ceased (Olejarczyk, & Young, 2019).
One day, practices were legal, maybe not ethical but legal and the next day the actions were illegal and warranted legal action and legal disciple. With legal regulations changing rapidly it is difficult for a clinician to maintain a practice within the law at all times. For example, HIPAA is considered an important step and continuing regulation for patient privacy (Moore, & Frye, 2019). The challenge is one day HIPAA did not exist and practitioners and clinicians sharing information freely to the next day requiring patient approval to share certain information with other providers, facilities and or employers. There is a question if HIPAA is more harmful than beneficial as it can greatly limit practitioners and clinicians (Berwick, & Gaines, 2018).
The issue with the relationship between legal regulation and ethical regulation is often the two do not match up. For example, one goes farther than the other. Typically, ethical standards go farther than legal standards but when legal standards are enacted to enforce such ethical standards the regulations go further, and the ethical standards must adjust again creating an ever-stricter environment (Berghel, 2019).
Lastly, to be discussed is the possibility and often reality regulations are incomplete lacking details for specific situations (Ott, et al., 2018). In these situations, ethical standards established by organizations such as the APA or local organizations and committees tend to govern treatment and research methods. However, if a psychologist does not inform such an organization about research which is not clearly prescribed within the law or common ethical standard there is nothing stopping the psychologist from preforming research or treatment which the local community ethics may frown upon.
Opinion of Legal Change – Influence on Psychological Ethics
In this writer’s opinion the United States legal code is far too complicated and long (Schuck, 2018). The legal code in all areas needs to be rewritten with a streamline approach. The country’s legal system needs to be cleaned up and justices to understand technicalities are not the law or a means around the law thereby allowing legal standards to be written in common language. No law or legal issue should require a lawyer to understand. Each and every citizen of sound mind should be able to understand the laws and act accordingly within the laws. In addition to federal laws each state and sometimes each city has its own laws. Often these laws overlap and restate each other but at times one action is legal by the state but is not legal by the federal law or the other way around.
The duplication of laws is a necessary issue as the United States of American is comprised of sovereign nation states which voluntarily unit themselves under a federation which is why the nation is at times called The Union (Adams, 1776). However, the nation and its people would be better served by the federal government sticking to areas in which the Constitution grants it authority allowing the states to regulate all other matters as each state sees fit. The challenge and long-term debate to this issue is then citizens will not be treated equally within each state. One state would provide for certain patient rights while another would not. The foundation and formation of this great country does not guarantee each citizen the same rights it only guarantees each citizen the rights which are prescribed in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. With a loss of understanding of this fact the United States has become an over regulated nation with a bureaucracy which harms its citizens more than helps.
For example, there are many legal issues which take place when a family member is dying. Instead of honoring the medical power of attorney’s wishes until a clearly prescribed legal standard is met often practitioners reject the family’s opinions and refuse to provide the requested treatment. On the opposite side of the situation some practitioners go too far in treatment as the practitioner does not know at what point there is legal authority to say enough is enough.
In summary of this writer’s opinion the laws of the United States and each state need to be cleaned up, simplified and written in common language. Each state and local governing body should offer a point of contact for questions of what is within and outside the law for specific situations. Lawyers should not be required to conduct one’s self within the legal standards of this great nation.
Psychological Ethics Influence on Legal Regulation
How do ethics influence legal regulations? Often ethical codes are precursors to legal codes. Ethical codes such as provided by the APA are far easier and quicker to change than passing a law and enforcing that law. Ethical standards can also serve as a means to prevent additional laws from being enacted. For example, if the APA notices an issue or opportunity requiring an addition to the code of ethics assuming the new ethic code is adhered to by psychologists there will be no need for a legal standard as there is no longer an ongoing issue. Lastly, many lawmakers are not experts in the field of psychology or medicine and therefore rely on what the community is putting into the code of ethics as a guideline for what may need to be passed as a law.
Conclusion
In conclusion, ever-changing legal regulations and ethical standards has created a challenge for psychologists to remain current on what is and is not acceptable practice. An ethical code which is not enforceable outside of legal regulation has led to a complex legal code. This federal legal code is complicated by state and local regulations which maybe repetitive or contradictory to federal code. Simplification of the legal code and a reworking on how the courts enforce the legal code could be beneficial to psychologists and other disciplines lifting some of the burden of seeking to operate within what is deemed right.
References
American Psychological Association. (2017). Retrieved from https://www.apa.org
Bartol, C. R., & Bartol, A. M. (2018). Psychology and law: Research and practice. SAGE Publications.
Berghel, H. (2019). Codes of Ethics in a Post-Truth World. Computer, 52(3), 76-80.
Berwick, D. M., & Gaines, M. E. (2018). How HIPAA harms care, and how to stop it. Jama, 320(3), 229-230.
Franeta, D. (2019). Taking Ethics Seriously. European Psychologist.
Moore, W., & Frye, S. A. (2019). A Review of the HIPAA, Part 1: History, PHI, and Privacy and Security Rules. Journal of nuclear medicine technology, jnmt-119.
Olejarczyk, J. P., & Young, M. (2019). Patient Rights. In StatPearls [Internet]. StatPearls Publishing.
Ott, M. A., Crawley, F. P., Sáez-Llorens, X., Owusu-Agyei, S., Neubauer, D., Dubin, G., … & Rosenthal, S. L. (2018). Ethical considerations for the participation of children of minor parents in clinical trials. Pediatric Drugs, 20(3), 215-222.
Schuck, P. (2018). Limits of Law: Essays on Democratic Governance. Routledge.
Adams, S. (1776). Speech about the Declaration of Independence – 1776. Retrieved from http://www.samuel-adams-heritage.com/documents/speech-about-declaration-of-independence.html