Faculty Bibliography

A work group of administrators, clinicians, state officials, and a representative of service recipients reviewed the professional literature and existing ethics guidelines and policies addressing relationships between staff members and service recipients and made recommendations for a new policy. Five guiding principles were formulated: (1) prevention of the exploitation of recipients of services by staff; (2) the right of recipients to be treated as competent autonomous human beings; (3) recognition that certain developmental stages, treatment settings, and pre-existing relationships increase a service recipient's vulnerability to exploitation and call for more stringent regulation of staff actions; (4) acceptance of a spectrum of permissible relationships for staff and recipients outside of the relationship dictated by the staff member's job description; and (5) recognition of the difference between a relationship focused on treatment or service provision and other professional relationships between providers and current or former recipients.