The use of competencies to train and assess psychologists has a long history but needs further consultation to reach consensus on its use.
Increasing emphasis is being placed in the education, training and supervision of psychologists on developing and measuring competencies. This paper is a review of the origins of the competencies movement. The emphasis on competencies began with the World War II American aviation industry and vocational training sector. The approach is considered useful for developing and assessing the basic building blocks of clinical skills. The authors argue that it requires careful consideration when used for advanced competencies and needs to emphasise applications to real-world professional activities. They state that more stakeholder consultation is required to achieve consensus about a definition of competence and the necessary sub-competencies. Agreement is needed about the milestones at which competencies should be acquired. The acquisition of competences needs to be assessed with ecologically and psychometrically valid assessment tools. According to the authors, during the later stages of training it is especially important that competences are applied to authentic clinical situations.
doi.org/10.1111/cp.12143
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