Joint position stand of the ISSP, FEPSAC, ASPASP, and AASP on professional accreditation

© 2018 Objectives: To situate the current status of accreditation in four key international societies, ASPASP, FEPSAC, AASP, and ISSP, in a historical backdrop and then to draw on these approaches to propose future directions and developments relating to practical standards. Design: A review of the origins and current status of accreditation in four international sport psychology societies is utilized to situate the recent prominence of professional standards and the importance of these in our global professional community. This review is written temporally from past, to present, to future prospects. Method: A presentation of societal accreditation foci is situated temporally using the following structure: (a) emergence and historical backdrop from each society, (b) emergence and reasoning for accreditation, (c) current societal standards/status of accreditation, (d) future developments in the society's accreditation system, and (e) reflections and recommendations for global standards, with suggestions of how this might be accomplished. Results: The presentation of scholarship is intended to serve as a form of advocacy for improved accreditation standards within the global professional community. The societal perspectives call for a balance between localized cultural infusion and proposed global guidelines upon which professionals might meet a converged reasonable practice threshold. Conclusions: Sport psychology accreditation is increasingly important as the applied realm of this profession spans community physical activity/recreation, and developmental and elite/professional sport. Accredited practices must integrate universal and local approaches

International society of sport psychology position stand: mental health through occupational health and safety in high performance sport

There is considerable attention devoted to athlete mental health in high-performance sport. The International Society of Sport Psychology seeks to extend this discourse by expanding the discussion through a lens of occupational health and safety (OHS). Drawing upon knowledge from OHS, the authors have considered existing mental health challenges as well as proactive and reactive strategies conducive of athlete safety. This Position Stand is structured into four sections. The authors introduce OHS and its relevance to high-performance sport in section one. Section two focuses on athlete mental health and the need for an OHS approach within sport organisations. Section three is focused particularly on athlete safety in relation to high-performance youth athletes. The fourth and final section is a broader ideological discussion of how OHS might vary in approach based on national sport systems and cultural orientation