Welcome to the official launch of Psychotherapy Brown Bag. Although we envision the site evolving over time to meet the changing needs of our readers, we already have several components available for your use.
In the main column on the left side of the screen, we will post articles and blog posts. We intend to post around lunch time on weekdays with occasional weekend posts as well. If you are interested in contributing an article or blog post, please feel free to contact Mike ([email protected]) or Joye ([email protected]). Our hope is that this site will serve as a location for conversation regarding topics related to science in clinical psychology. To facilitate this, we have enabled readers to comment on articles and blog posts. To do so, you must register with Typepad, but this is a free service. In addition to blog posts and articles, we have a variety of other tools in the side panels. Under “Uncle George’s Pancakes,” a reference to Paul Meehl’s (1973) commentary on common errors in non-scientific approaches to clinical pathology, you will see several links.
The first link, “Assessment Tools,” provides a list of well-tested assessment tools for a variety of purposes, as well as references to articles through which readers can find actual copies of the measures. The assessment tools are broken down by category, so if you’re looking for a diagnostic interview, a measure of depressive symptoms, or a measure of non-suicidal self-injury, just look for the appropriate category. If you think a measure is missing from our list, and without question many are, feel free to let us know. We’ll look into your suggestion and, if it seems like an appropriate addition, we’ll amend our list.
The second link, “EST Clinics,” is a list of treatment centers that have registered with our site as locations at which individuals can receive empirically supported treatments (ESTs). One of the driving purposes of this site is the desire to educate the general public about ESTs and to help them find locations capable of providing such services. This list will grow as we continue to contact other clinics. If you wish to register with our site or know of a location that may be interested in doing so, again, please feel free to let us know or to put them in touch with us and we will investigate the matter further.
The third link, "Links," is a list of websites that we believe may be of interest to our readers. These sites include homepages for a variety of organizations devoted to causes similar to that of Psychotherapy Brown Bag, as well as publications that aim to disseminate information regarding ESTs and the science of clinical psychology. Here again, if you believe other sites belong on this list, please feel free to let us know and we will follow-up on your suggestion.
The fourth link, "References," is a list of all journal articles mentioned in blog posts and articles on our site. We hope that our articles are informative for our readers, but we also hope that they serve as motivation for readers to follow-up on the information we provide by reading articles published in scientific journals. To access these journals, readers either need to subscribe themselves or use a computer at a library or university that has an online subscription. Also, for any graduate students reading this page, this link can serve as a way to find references to assist in research projects.
In addition to these tools, we have several other services on the site. In the first side panel, you will see links to archived articles listed by month of publication and category of topic. Below this, you will see several tools for subscribing to our feed. Doing so will allow you to receive alerts regarding newly posted material, either by email or through a variety of RSS feed services (e.g., Google Reader). Additionally, you will see a link that will take you to our Facebook group. In our efforts to reach as wide an audience as possible, we hope websites like Facebook will cast a wide net. Please feel free to inform people you know about its existence, regardless of whether or not they are actively involved in clinical psychology. Below that, you will see a link to the website for 1-800-273-TALK. This free, anonymous, 24/7 service provides crisis intervention from trained specialists and is a good resource for anybody in need of immediate care. Psychotherapy Brown Bag does not provide therapeutic interventions, but we fully support the efforts of 1-800-273-TALK in doing so. Finally, in the second side panel, you will see a link to the Academy of Cognitive Therapy. This organization provides wonderful educational materials about cognitive therapy as well as an international registry of cognitive therapists. Clicking on their logo will take you to their home page.
Welcome to our site!
Mike and Joye Anestis
