A Usefule New Year Resolution: Get Acquainted with Your Legislators

If you are interested in accomplishing policy changes at the local or state level, a very good way to start is to get acquainted with the people who represent you in your local and state governments and with key staff members who do a lot of the legwork.

I mean, really get acquainted; don’t just meet them once and let it go at that.

Between legislative sessions, contact state legislators and ask for an appointment to talk about issues that interest you. Request a half-hour meeting, and stick to that limit, unless the Legislator wants to go longer. As part of the meeting, briefly explain Community Psychology and describe specific ways you might be helpful to the Legislator and her/his staff. Ask what issues are important to the Legislator and his/her position on those issues. It is OK to talk about points of agreement and disagreement, or just to hear why it is important to the Legislator. Highlight common interests. Offer to help research issues/solutions.

Ask for permission to maintain contact between and during legislative sessions; get email addresses and phone numbers. Follow-up with a thank you note.

Then follow up and provide any issue information you promised to provide. If you can’t find any relevant information, or if you don’t know the answer to the Legislator’s question, admit it and promise to keep searching. Never try to bluff, as you will lose all credibility.

If you are advocating for a specific issue or cause, be clear about that and make certain that all of your advocacy messages provide factual information and/or suggest possible solutions. Keep your messages brief and to the point. State your request and include a brief supporting comment; ask for a reply. The long “model messages” that many advocacy groups suggest you send out don’t really get read; they get counted but not read.

Legislators hear a lot of purely emotional appeals; be sure yours contain factual information and objective reasons why they might consider a particular solution. Legislators also receive a lot of angry communications, and are turned off. One of my favorite state senators reminded our Homeless Coalition that legislators are human beings and that The Golden Rule works best: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Legislators can handle civil disagreement, so keep it civil at all times.

Find opportunities to get further acquainted. Ask for meetings. Invite the Legislator to coffee. I always state whether I want to advocate, or just get better acquainted and help brainstorm possible solutions. Call or send emails with factual information. If you are teaching Community Psychology or are part of a community coalition, invite the Legislator to talk with your group about policy development and political process.

Most of the above also applies when getting acquainted with local government officials and key department heads. Get acquainted. Learn about issues that are of interest to the official and politically important. Give helpful information. Advocate in a straightforward solution-oriented manner. You might consider volunteering to serve on a local commission or advisory board. You might offer to post a yard sign or make a campaign contribution; often helpful, but not required.

The political process is fascinating, and a key part of policy change. Try it; you might like it! But more important: in the long run, you will be more effective as a policy advocate. Invest the time needed to become really acquainted with your elected officials.

Al Ratcliffe

Tacoma, WA

Psychology of Climate Change: The Slow Process of Change

     Change is hard. Anyone who has ever tried to give up a bad habit or take up a good habit can attest to this fact. And yet when we consider changing our societies to mitigate climate change, we naively assume that if we just figure out the right thing to do, somehow everything will fall into line. The fact of the matter is that change is a slow process, even for very minor changes. The greater the change and the more people involved in making it, the more difficult it will be to sustain.

     Community psychology has long explored the process of creating and maintaining community change. Much like the process a person goes through when attempting to change themselves for the better, a community must go through a series of steps to make lasting change. When you consider that the response to climate change means a planet-ful of communities must go through this same series of steps, you begin to realize the difficulty in responding to climate change.

     I teach a course at the University of Hawai`i, Mānoa called “Cultural Community Psychology and Global Climate Change.” In the short video mini-lecture below, I explain the steps taken to create and sustain a positive change. The societal and global changes necessary to adapt to climate change must incorporate this process if we want to implement lasting changes successfully.

Kati Corlew, M.A.

University of Hawai`i, Mānoa

There's No Place Like Homeless

Right after I mostly retired a few years ago, I volunteered to work one day per week in a large homeless feeding kitchen. My experiences there led me to start attending the monthly meeting of the Tacoma-Pierce County Coalition to End Homelessness – a group of approximately 50 providers of services to homeless people. A couple of years ago, I was asked to participate in the HUD-mandated Homeless Continuum of Care (CofC).

There is probably a CofC in your county. It develops comprehensive plans to end homelessness and makes recommendations to the county and to HUD about funding housing development and support services. It is an interesting place to do community psychology. I have participated in policy development, consolidation of three different county plans to end homelessness (each required by a different funder) into one integrated and more holistic plan, review of grant requests, and governance of the CofC. Currently I am serving as chairperson.

Like your state (unless you live in North Dakota or Alaska) the State of Washington is experiencing a major fiscal crisis. Our state has no income tax and the voters have repeatedly rejected efforts to authorize one. We rely upon sales taxes and “business and occupation” taxes to finance state government. Both of these are markedly sensitive to fluctuations in the economy. Our social safety net is in shreds as state government revenues keep falling.

I have been especially concerned about how people who are homeless or at imminent risk of homelessness can survive as their sources of income are eliminated. I have been advocating for some time that our county needs to do contingency planning for a dramatic increase in homeless individuals, couples, and families with children. As part of that process, I began to gather statistical data about the probable extent of the emergency in Pierce County. I wrote an editorial, subsequently published by our local newspaper summarizing what I learned. You will find it here. Later I learned from the Washington Department of Labor that from January through October of 2011, 70,643 Pierce County residents have exhausted their unemployment compensation. We have no idea how many spouses and children are impacted or how they are faring, but we can predict that a significant number are at high risk of homelessness.

Pierce County now is starting a contingency planning process to try and mediate our pending homelessness emergency. Involved will be Pierce County and City of Tacoma staff members, Associated Ministries, hopefully an architect/planner, informal advice from the Pierce County Department of Emergency Management, and me.

What are the lessons for Community Psychology? Willingness to get involved will be welcomed by your community. A holistic overview is valuable, although the scope of the need may feel truly overwhelming. Collaboration with other professions in search of solutions is fundamental. Many human service providers share our values. Gathering and aggregating data is very helpful. Informing the general public about both scope and consequences is fundamental, and local news media are willing to help accomplish that.

Al Ratcliffe, Ph. D

Tacoma, WA

Kickstarting Social Change: Community Psychology & Crowdfunding

Though I may decry the commercialization of holidays, I must admit that I do love giving and receiving gifts. But what if we could harness this energy, this spirit of generosity, this money that we spend on frenzied holiday shopping to collectively build something amazing? The answer is that people are already doing this, in the growing phenomenon known as crowdfunding.

Crowdfunding is the term used when many people collectively pool their money to fund something they believe in. In a sense, it’s an old concept – people have been pooling money for ages. However, as with many established practices, it has been transformed by the Internet. The proliferation of crowdfunding platforms has allowed artists, filmmakers, entrepreneurs, and activists to raise money and report on the progress of their efforts in a completely new way. The phenomenon has even prompted legislation to allow for crowdfunded investments, and despite some detractors, the Entrepreneur Access to Capital Act overcame the usually partisan U.S. politics to pass through the House of Representatives 407-17.

In a typical crowdfunding scenario, a person or group posts their idea online and sets a fundraising goal. They’re encouraged to provide as many details about their project as possible, and to spread the word to their social networks about their campaign. Most platforms take a percentage of contributions, which may vary depending on whether or not the goal has been reached. Some platforms, like the very popular art funding site Kickstarter, have an all-or-nothing model in which funds are kept in escrow and only processed if the fundraising goal has been met. In many cases, people will receive perks for contributing, and there will be several levels at which people could contribute with progressively better perks.

With the passing of this recent legislation, I expect to see more sites that offer actual monetary returns on investment, but my experience with crowdfunding so far has mostly centered on artistic projects. Earlier this year, I helped a musician friend raise funds to help pay for the production of her album on IndieGoGo, and people who contributed received copies of the album once it was made, along with other perks. Another musician I’m a fan of wanted to make an album of cover songs and started a Kickstarter campaign as an experiment, finding to his delight that his fan base was sufficiently excited about the idea that they exceeded his $3600 fundraising goal in a matter of days, eventually contributing over $15,000.

Here are some more examples of crowdfunding in action:

• The Occupy movement has made extensive use of crowdfunding, raising $75,000 on Kickstarter  to create the Occupy Wall St. Journal and thousands on Loudsauce for various media campaigns, such as running a full-page ad in the San Francisco Chronicle
• Social entrepreneur and noted roller derby enthusiast Micki Krimmel used Kickstarter to raise funds for Neighbor Goods, an online platform in which people can share resources with others in their community
• A man in Newfoundland, Canada raised $7000 on Indiegogo to help out a friend whose house burned down 
• Members of Musicians Without Borders have raised over $3000 and have until February 1st, 2012 to reach its goal of $15,000 for the Rwanda Youth Music program. A widget advertising their campaign is embedded in the beginning of this post.

Although these are all success stories, it bears mentioning that for every success there are many failures. Crowdfunding platforms are not magic – if you can’t get people to buy into your idea and contribute funds, it won’t work. There’s often a lot of behind-the-scenes fundraising and some may question why they should use a site that will collect a percentage of money they mostly raised from their own friends and fans. However, there can be a significant value add for those who are willing to put the time into really thinking through and promoting their projects. As crowdfunding continues to grow, we may find increasing opportunities to pool community resources to invest in sustainable businesses or launch social enterprises that improve community well-being. Community psychology practitioners can be at the forefront of this, reminding people that while the holidays come and go,we can spend our funds the rest of the year creating lasting positive change.

Gina Cardazone, M.A.

University of Hawai`i, Mānoa

Psychology of Climate Change: Political Debates and Cognitive Dissonance

     Scientists are often perplexed by the political nature of the climate change debate. After all, whether or not people accept the evidence supporting the existence of climate change has nothing to do with politics—it has to do with whether or not people accept scientific evidence.

     However, the truly political question—what should we do about climate change?—may be too contentious a topic when we consider the psychological need for consistency between our social and political identities, our morality, and our behaviors. The desire to avoid inconsistency may be driving our desire to avoid that second question—what should we do about climate change? Instead, people focus on whether or not climate change is real, hoping to avoid the ‘what to do about it’ debate entirely.

     I teach a course at the University of Hawai`i, Mānoa called “Cultural Community Psychology and Global Climate Change.” This course explores how human diversity affects the ways in which we respond to and are impacted by climate change. In the short video mini-lecture below, I discuss how the psychological concept cognitive dissonance may be increasing the politicization of the climate change debate.

Mini Lecture Link

Kati Corlew, M.A.

University of Hawai`i, Mānoa

Resisting the Marshmallow: Community Psychology & Willpower

Though most famous for the Stanford Prison Experiment, social psychologist Philip Zimbardo was for a while more interested in talking about a much gentler-sounding (though similarly cruel) study: the Stanford Marshmallow Experiment.

In the marshmallow experiment, 4-year olds were presented with the choice of eating one treat (e.g. a marshmallow) immediately or waiting and getting two treats. Years later, those who had delayed gratification had a host of better outcomes, including significantly better SAT scores. Zimbardo was interested in this experiment as it related to his theories about time and future orientation, but most would describe it in terms of simple self-control.

Yet there is very little that is simple about self-control. This is the subject of a recent book by Baumeister & Tierny titled “Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength.” The title of the book sounds like it may have a simplistic “pull yourself up from your bootstraps” message, and indeed the beginning of the book reads like a rejection of the tenets of community psychology, and any other discipline that attends to societal influences on individual behavior.

But is the concept of willpower really at odds with community psychology?

The authors go on to explain how, in study after study, they found that willpower isn’t really what we think it is. It’s not really about exerting some extraordinary feat of energy and resistance. Rather, willpower is like a muscle, something that can be depleted in the short-term, but that can also be built up in the long term. Exerting willpower does take energy, in the form of glucose, which can also be depleted through decision making, but people who appear to have a lot of self-control use their willpower to build up habits that make it easier for them to make good choices without using up energy. The fact that willpower requires glucose is part of what makes dieting so difficult – the very thing that you’re trying to resist is also the source of what you need in order to resist temptation.

Individual agency is certainly the emphasis of the book. The authors present a number of useful tips for improving individual willpower, such as:

• setting up a “bright line” – clearly defined limit of what you can and can’t do 
• precommitting – deciding ahead of time what you’re going to do and making it difficult or impossible to do otherwise
• monitoring – whether it’s your diet or your wallet, being aware of what you’re doing
• positive procrastination – such as telling yourself “I can eat that cake later”
• exercising – working out your willpower ‘muscle’ in small ways such as correcting your posture
• eating – if you find yourself having trouble making decisions or pushing through on a task, consider how long it’s been since you’ve fed your brain, and stick to foods that will sustain in the long-term

Yet the authors also discuss contextual factors that influence an individual’s ability to successfully exert self-control (e.g. being in an orderly room makes one more likely to think about long-term rewards than being in a messy room). Furthermore, it stands to reason that if an individual is in an environment that provides numerous sources of ego depletion, there will come a point where, barring Gandhi-like reserves of willpower, they will snap.


Imagine the following scenario: You get up to go to work. You pass four fast food restaurants on your way to the bus, which is late. You finally get to work and your boss berates you for your lateness. You suck it up, repressing an emotional outburst, because hey, it's the boss. You then spend the next several hours persisting through a series of uninteresting tasks. At some point, your reserves of willpower will be gone - you'll have spent them resisting, repressing, and persisting. If you didn't have a good breakfast, this will happen much sooner. It may result in you losing focus on your job, being short with a co-worker, or overindulging at lunch, but at some point, it will happen.

As community psychologists, it's up to us to make these connections and help build environments and social structures that make it easier for individuals to make the best choices for themselves and their communities.

Gina Cardazone, M.A.

University of Hawai`i, Mānoa

Lets Talk About Sex...Education

Young people are having sex. Now, this may not come as news to most people in 2011, but many still ignore this concept when it comes to discussing it with youth. And who can blame them? It can be tough to talk about sex and sexuality with a teen or young adult. For some people it may feel dirty, wrong, uncomfortable, or unnecessary; I’m writing to state that in terms of community well-being, it is beyond necessary. So let’s talk “dirty” for a moment.

You might ask, “How does this relate to Community Psychology?” To which I say, “It does. Hold tight.”

Community Psychology as a discipline, from my perspective, is an amalgamation of several wonderful concepts and values. There are key focuses on social justice, empowerment and participation, respect for diversity, and—of particular relevance—individual and community wellness. So when I hear or read statistics that the U.S. teen pregnancy rate is one the highest in the developed world (and is more than double the rate in Canada and other parts of Europe), I start to wonder what has gone wrong. Then I think, “How is this affecting our communities?”

To be clear, we are talking about the number of unintended pregnancies—which is also directly associated to the high number of school drop-out rates. When you consider the reason for high rates of unintended pregnancy, high school drop-outs, and the spread of Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs), you need to consider access to education and resources. It is no coincidence that access to education and resources is directly related all of these things. It is even less of a coincidence that the higher the rate of pregnancy, drop-outs, STIs (including HIV) and drug use, the lower the income of the community.

In a 2009 study done in the New York City school systems, teens made up more than one in every four diagnosed cases of STIs. (It comes as no surprise that New York City also has a much greater number of unintended pregnancies than that of the entire nation). In 2004, a study found that over 75 percent of the New York City school systems did not meet even the most basic requirements for health education, let alone sexual health educationⁱ. This deficit, without a doubt, is a community problem. If we are going to make individual and community health and wellness a priority, we must find ways to spread the knowledge of sexual health care, prevention and contraception to our communities.

If the numbers alone don’t paint a detailed enough picture, consider this fact:

In the past fifteen years, our government has spent over 1.5 billion federal dollarsⁱⁱ on abstinence-only-until-marriage programs, all of which fail to teach the details of safe, preventive behavior. This abstinence-only policy has deprived students of information on the prevention of STIs, sexuality and sexual orientation, and options or access to contraception. Moreover, abstinence-only programs deny access to proper health care information for youth who have been sexually abused, have previously engaged in sexual behavior, or identify as LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender).

People need information. Over the past few years, efforts to mandate universal sexual health education have become more of a priority in some of the nation’s major cities. New York is one of the latest to pass a policy for consistent, universal sex education curriculaⁱⁱⁱ. I question how and what we can do for the smaller cities, towns, and rural neighborhoods—not to mention the states that fight these policies. Within our communities, how can we spread information on sexual health education, prevention, and safety? For a start, we can talk to our legislators and push for policy changes, utilizing the examples of other cities as models for our own actions.

Perhaps most importantly, we need to have more discussion of sex, prevention, options, and resources. Parents, grandparents, friends, siblings, aunts and uncles, teachers, mentors: It is our obligation to spread the word about safety and good health. Ready…. GO!

Note: There are many online sites for suggested tips on how to talk to youth about sex, sexuality, and tough stuff alike. This is one.

Danielle Gemmell, M.A.

Planned Parenthood of New Jersey

i http://www.truth-out.org/new-yorks-sex-ed-mandate-radical-notion-our-kids-might-learn-facts/1319993861

ii http://www.siecus.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=Page.ViewPage&PageID=1271

iii http://www.nyc41percent.com/sex_ed_report.pdf