Tell us about your time in Vietnam.

ROFLCOPTER GOES SOI SOI SOI SOI SOI SOI SOI

you can approach it like you would any other science; come up with a hypothesis and test it, looking for information that both proves and (potentially) disproves your 'interpretation'

also i don't know why you felt the need to distinguish ethics and morality.

well because there were a few that were using the two interchangeably.  Something can be moral but not ethical.  I thought it was worth mentioning.  As for the first part, you can approach it like a science, but if you neither have the competence or training it can be moral yet not ethical.  Also, science is objective, yet reading people involves a lot of subjective interpretation.  If you're a certified applied behavior analyst, you're trained to explain, control, and predict behavior objectively.  If not you're involving a subjective interpretation of a behavior.  In that case, you need to be aware of your biases and how to minimize those biases.  I doubt you're going around graphing everyone's behavior in a systematic way, but it would be funny if you did.  And if you believed in objective behavior analysis, you would not believe in a mind.  Read skinner's can psychology be a science of the mind? I think you'd like it.

*shoots lazer's from his mind"

I love Skinner, the old coot. I think I'ma read his Walden II this weekend.

Anyway, I have a question about CBT. In CBT, would you say there's a definite brightline where your analysis assumes too much and is too subjective?

EDIT:

I've thought about reading a book that's all about reading people like a book.

I've already got the book, I just haven't read it yet.

I've thought about reading your post about a book that's all about reading people like a book.

I've already read the post about your getting the book and having not read it yet.

no.

skinner and behaviourism aren't anti-mind, they conclude that it's simply not that useful to incorporate into theory. and of course they're wrong, as the popularity of CBT shows. behaviourism is powerful but tautological without (at least) a layer of subjectivity. how is behaviour reinforced? by reinforcers. what's a reinforcer? something that reinforces a behaviour. also you didn't really address the topic too much; it'd be ok to analyse people if you knew what you were doing, but if you didn't it'd be unethical? 

thanks for trying to teach me psychology though.

my interpretation of that:  Defensive. 

If you're not a professional, then you have no ethical issues to worry about.  The ethics police don't knock on the door of undergraduates or at least not that I'm aware of.  Since you said you study psychology and were asking a question regarding ethics and psychology, I tried to answer your question.  Or do you just ask questions and get defensive when people try to help you with the answer?  I was simply trying to help you out, but I'm not so sure you're really looking for the answer. 

If you truly are looking for the answer, the following link should be of some use, it is the APA ethical principles of psychologists and code of conduct.  You can also look up the American counseling association if you are looking to become a counselor. 

http://www.apa.org/ethics/code/index.aspx

But i think I can help you out as well personally.  IF you were a psychologist or not, you wouldn't want to read your friends and family.  You could get information about them that you may not want to know and that is private to them.  That's less than ideal.  If you do, your relationships could potentially suffer.  You're not your friend or family's counselor or psychologist. 

Here's a couple of standards to get you started that are from the APA website:

9.07 Assessment by Unqualified Persons- Psychologists do not promote the use of psychological assessment techniques by unqualified persons, except when such use is conducted for training purposes with appropriate supervision.

3.06 Conflict of Interest
Psychologists refrain from taking on a professional role when personal, scientific, professional, legal, financial, or other interests or relationships could reasonably be expected to (1) impair their objectivity, competence, or effectiveness in performing their functions as psychologists or (2) expose the person or organization with whom the professional relationship exists to harm or exploitation.

3.08 Exploitative Relationships
Psychologists do not exploit persons over whom they have supervisory, evaluative, or other authority such as clients/patients, students, supervisees, research participants, and employees.

It's hard to "turn it off" when you get out of work.  If you're having trouble turning it off, you really need to work on it.  You may begin to not like the fact that you see things about people that generally would help you as a psychologist but not as a person.  I hope that helped.  There's a lot of gray area, there's never a correct answer when it comes to these kinds of questions.

it was meant to be aggressive. there's not much time left before i finish my masters thesis (too little time), i'm a trained counsellor and i'm qualified to administer and interpret quite a range of psychometrics. i know about skinner and theories of the mind, what i wanted was more what your most recent post contained, but perhaps with some personal reflection (would you?).

most (and especially the APAs) ethical codes for psychology are based around clinical work, and the exploitation refers more to personal gain (sex, money, or things) rather than exploitation of position (psychiatry). for instance, if you were doing consulting work as an I/O psych in an organisation your friend worked in, putting to use research to make employees feel more satisfied etc., what are the ethics of that?

i thought it was horrible stuff but a lot of people seem to expect everyone to do this to some degree. they only object on the grounds of being a smug dickhole (eg ryan and earlchip)

Naturally, the APA ethics apply to the three fields of psychology you can obtain a practice credential (school psych, clin psych, and counseling psych).  Nevertheless, APA has several divisions likely including I/O psychs and the ethical standards are up for interpretation.  So long as you're not practicing beyond your competence.  A counselor consulting as an industrial/organizational psychologist would be practicing outside of their boundary of competence.  If you want to do that type of consultation, I would think you'd have to complete a program in industrial/organizational psych.  again from the APA website,

2.01 Boundaries of Competence
(a) Psychologists provide services, teach, and conduct research with populations and in areas only within the boundaries of their competence, based on their education, training, supervised experience, consultation, study, or professional experience.

But if you have the training, these would likely apply:

3.05 Multiple Relationships
(a) A multiple relationship occurs when a psychologist is in a professional role with a person and (1) at the same time is in another role with the same person, (2) at the same time is in a relationship with a person closely associated with or related to the person with whom the psychologist has the professional relationship, or (3) promises to enter into another relationship in the future with the person or a person closely associated with or related to the person.

A psychologist refrains from entering into a multiple relationship if the multiple relationship could reasonably be expected to impair the psychologist's objectivity, competence, or effectiveness in performing his or her functions as a psychologist, or otherwise risks exploitation or harm to the person with whom the professional relationship exists.

Multiple relationships that would not reasonably be expected to cause impairment or risk exploitation or harm are not unethical.

(b) If a psychologist finds that, due to unforeseen factors, a potentially harmful multiple relationship has arisen, the psychologist takes reasonable steps to resolve it with due regard for the best interests of the affected person and maximal compliance with the Ethics Code.

So as it says, if it will impair your objectivity, competence, or effectiveness, if it will cause impairment or risk exploitation, and will likely do harm, refrain from doing it.  Consultation is an indirect service.  It probably wouldn't be necessary to have a professional relationship with that friend.  I would also think it depends on other factors as well.  If you live in a small town and everyone knows everyone, it may be unavoidable to do that.  Above all, do no harm. 

l had some good ponts but maybe they were overlooked because of the lack of 's (t's only on ths laptop whch has a bad keyboard  can type them on other computers)

essentally dong ths s the worst and f you're really gonna be a professonal psychologst  don't thnk ths should even be a queston for you. who even cares about the ethcs of "s t ok to do ths to them" the objecton should come far before that

I'm really sorry about stupid post but I couldn't stop myself from pointing the I out. Carry on with conversation!

l I l I G'DAMN IT!