The Inter-Organizational Summit on Education and Training (ISET) 2010 Survey on the Influence of the Houston Conference Training Guidelines

Abstract

A conference specific to the education and training of clinical neuropsychology was held in 1997, which led to a report published in the Archives of Clinical Neuropsychology (Hannay, J., Bieliauskas, L., Crosson, B., Hammeke, T., Hamsher, K., & Koffler, S. (1998).

Proceedings of the Houston Conference on Specialty Education and Training in Clinical Neuropsychology. Archives of Clinical Neuropsychology, 13, 157–250.). The guidelines produced by this conference have been referred to as the Houston Conference (HC) guidelines. Since that time, there has been considerable discussion, and some disagreement, about whether the HC guidelines produced a positive outcome in the training of neuropsychologists. To explore this question and determine how widely the HC guidelines were implemented, a meeting was held in 2006. Present and past leaders of the American Psychological Association Division 40 (Clinical Neuropsychology), the National Academy of Neuropsychology, and the Association of Postdoctoral Programs in Clinical Neuropsychology met to discuss the possible need for an Inter-Organizational Summit on Education and Training (ISET). A decision was reached to have the ISET Steering Committee conduct a survey of clinical neuropsychologists that could address the extent to which HC guidelines were present in the specialty and whether the influence of the HC guidelines was positive. An online survey was constructed, with data gathered in 2010. The current paper presents and discusses the ISET survey results. Specific findings need to be viewed cautiously due to the relatively low response rate. However, with some direct parallels to a larger recent survey of clinical neuropsychologists, the following general conclusions appear well founded: (a) the demographics of respondents in the ISET survey are comparable with a recent larger professional practice survey and thus may reasonably represent the specialty; (b) the HC guidelines appear to have been widely adopted by training programs, in that a large proportion of younger practitioners endorsed having had HC-adherent training; and (c) HC-adherent training is associated with a higher frequency endorsement of being well prepared to engage in key professional activities subsequent to the completion of training when compared with those not having HC-adherent training. Overall, the ISET Steering Committee has concluded that the HC guidelines have been widely adopted and that trainees associate participation in HC-adherent training as advantageous. A potential revision based on unfavorable outcomes is deemed unnecessary. Nonetheless, the ISET Steering Committee recognizes that training needs change as a function of the broadening of our field and the introduction of related new technologies, which may prompt updates. The ISET Steering Committee supports the idea that periodic review and updating of training models may be is prudent.

Keywords:

• Professional issues
• Survey