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The interface between law and psychology is examined, opportunities for psycholegal and social action research are explored, and the benefits of forensic psychology training to both professions are explicated.This article offers a proposal for a doctorate in the field of forensic psychology. Forensic psychology, broadly viewed, is the application of psychological principles to legal issues and the legal system, especially the criminal justice system, for which psychologists with high levels of skill in treatment, diagnosis, consultation, social action research, and theory construction are vitally needed (Gottfredson, 1972;Twain, McGee, & Bennett, 1972; Warren, 1972). The doctoral program is designed to train individuals with special competence in treating personality disorders and criminal offenders; but we also aim to develop a research center for dealing with psycholegal problems within the civil as well as criminal justice system. Finally, it is intended that this program will develop a cadre of potential faculty to teach these specialized skills in other academic institutions.Unlike traditional programs in clinical psychology or social and personality

Previous studies on attitudes toward work-release programs have indicated that employers, and sheriffs with experience in those programs, respond positively, while sheriffs without such experience are about evenly divided. This paper assessed the attitudes of potential employers towards various aspects of work-release programs in order to identify the most likely participants and the viability of expanding such work-release programs. Analysis of the results of a group-administered questionnaire-given to a group of potential employers who were members of service organizations, the Lions Club and the Rotary Club-revealed that a clear majority of this group of potential employers were sympathetic though with some reservations noted. While employers of ex-offenders and victims of crime were less responsive, about 40% of these groups were also willing to hire work-releasees. The need for effective planning, administration, research, and publicity was underscored.

Most programs for performing discriminant analysis provide a summary table of hits and misses in predicting group membership by using the discriminant function. The interpretation of such tables can be enhanced greatly by computing Cohen's kappa, κ, the chance corrected percentage of agreement between actual and predicted group membership. The standard error of kappa can be used to set confidence limits for the accuracy of the discriminant prediction and to test the difference in predictive accuracy for two independent samples. This was demonstrated in this article, using data previously published in a more preliminary form.