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As with any new field, ethical standards for
practitioners of energy psychology are evolving. The
Code of Ethics that has been developed
by the Association for Comprehensive Energy Psychology is posted at:
www.energypsych.org/coe.html
and their
Standards of Practice statement can be found at:
www.energypsych.org/standards.html
The
Code of Ethics established by the American
Psychological Association remains a model set of standards for all
psychotherapists and can be found at:
www.apa.org/ethics/code.html
Numerous ethical concerns are thoughtfully addressed
in the American Professional Agency’s Newsletter on Risk Management for
Psychologists. Current as well as back issues can be downloaded free
from:
www.americanprofessional.com/insight.htm
One of the first books on ethical
guidelines specifically for practitioners of energy healing methods is
Character Is the Ultimate Currency: The Role of
Ethics in Energy Therapies by Debra Hurt (Ashland, Oregon:
Siskiyou Essence, 2000, available through
debrahurt@yahoo.com).
An ethical consideration that is of direct relevance
to the possible uses of this program, and one with which the fledgling
field of energy psychology has been wrestling, involves the level of
professional training that is required before someone is considered
qualified to employ the techniques it uses.
Controversy about whether energy-based treatment approaches should be
offered by non-professionals is inevitable.
The at-home treatment routines assigned to a growing
number of people by their psychotherapists, along with a spate of
self-help books, are simple enough to use and yield results that are
impressive enough that people are tempted to try them with family and
friends. Non-licensed counselors and "coaches" are tempted to offer them
to the public. But the wisdom of a century of clinical practice holds
that psychological interventions which are likely to unearth latent
psychopathology or activate personality disorders require sophisticated
and responsible application and are best left in the hands of
professionals.
The counter-argument is that an energy-based approach
to psychological problems represents a new paradigm where people can
readily influence the energies that affect their physical and mental
health and that these techniques should be widely distributed. Both
positions have merit, and their inevitable dialectic will result in
guidelines for both the professional and self-help oriented uses of the
developing methods. |
