Psychologists in Schools of Public Health: Current Status, Future Prospects, and Implications for Other Health Settings.

The deans and departmental chairs of the 22 schools of public health were asked in 1981 to list all psychologists holding full-time faculty appointments and the names of courses with a substantial behavioral/psychological content. Responses were received from 98% of the departments. The psychologists were then sent a survey concerning their backgrounds, job responsibilities, and satisfaction/dissatisfaction with their positions. There was an 80% response rate. Psychologists accounted for 5.7% of the approximately 1,300 full-time faculty in schools of public health. Psychologists represented a larger percentage of the faculty in departments of behavioral science than in departments of epidemiology, biostatistics, environmental health, and so forth. Public health psychologists were active researchers and publishers, with average totals of 2.5 articles and 26.9 citations for a three-year period. The primary advantages of employment in a school of public health had to do with an appreciation of the public health perspective, an interdisciplinary orientation, and research opportunities. The primary dissatisfactions cited were financial insecurity, isolation from psychology, and lack of appreciation among public health colleagues of the contribution of psychology to public health. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)