About the I.U. Chapter
 Area Spokesperson: Dr. Scott Thompson |
All IUB psychology majors are welcome (and encouraged) to attend Psi Chi meetings and take part in the Psi Chi activities.
The official purposes of Psi Chi are:
- to augment and enhance the regular curriculum through psychology-related programs and activities,
- to recognize and encourage academic and research achievements in psychology. Membership and participation in Psi Chi is a way to experience psychology under more informal and sociable conditions than in regular classes,
- and to become better acquainted with other psychology major students and with the department and its faculty.
Notices of Psi Chi activities are usually posted in the Psychology Building near Psychology Advising Office and on the large bulletin board in the hall of the classroom win on the first floor (outside lecture hall PY100).
To view the I.U. Chapter Bylaws, click here (pdf) .
About Our Meetings
Psi Chi holds regular meetings concerned with such topics as careers in psychology, what graduate school is really like, interesting current research, etc. Other activities have included lab tours and visits to mental institutions, picnics and other social affairs, and fundraisers.
About Psi Chi*
Psi Chi is the National Honor Society
in Psychology, founded in 1929 for the purposes of encouraging, stimulating,
and maintaining excellence in scholarship, and advancing the science of
psychology. Membership is open to graduate and undergraduate men and women
who are making the study of psychology one of their major interests and
who meet the minimum qualifications. Psi Chi is a member of the Association
of College Honor Societies and is an affiliate of the American Psychological
Association (APA) and the American Psychological Society (APS). Psi Chi's
sister honor society is Psi Beta, the national honor society in psychology
for community and junior colleges.
Psi Chi functions as a federation of chapters at more than 900 senior colleges and universities in the USA. The national office is located in Chattanooga, Tennessee. A National Council, composed of psychologists who are Psi Chi members and who are elected by the chapters, guides the affairs of the organization and sets policy with the approval of the chapters.
Psi Chi serves two major goals--one immediate and visibly rewarding to the individual member, the other slower and more difficult to accomplish, but offering greater rewards in the long run. The first of these is the Society's obligation to provide academic recognition to its inductees by the mere fact of membership. The second goal is the obligation of each of the Society's local chapters to nurture the spark of that accomplishment by offering a climate congenial to its cretive development. For example, the chapters make active attempts to nourish and stimulate professional growth through programs designed to augment and enhance the regular curriculum and to provide practical experience and fellowship through affiliation with the chapter. In addition, the national organization provides programs to help achieve these goals, including national and regional conventions held annually in conjunction with the psychological associations, research award competitions, and certificate recognition programs. Also, the Society publishes a quarterly magazine, Eye on Psi Chi, which helps to unite the members as well as to inform and recognize their contributions and accomplishments.
Students become members by joining the chapter at the school where they are enrolled. Psi Chi chapters are operated by student officers and faculty advisors. Together they select and induct the members and carry out the goals of the Society. All chapters register their inductees at the national office, where the membership records are preserved for reference purposes. The total number of memberships preserved at the national office during the first 68 years is over 325,000. Many of these members have gone on to distinguished careers in psychology.
*This text is borrowed from "Eye on Psi Chi."
