Dr. Ralph Piedmont, Professor of Pastoral Counseling, Featured on National Public Radio's Interfaith Voices

Ralph Piedmont was featured on May 28, 2009's Interfaith Voices, discussing "The Psychology of the Soul" and the new Journal Psychology of Religion and Spirituality, which debuted earlier this year and is edited by Dr. Piedmont. Published by the American Psychological Association, it’s the first academic journal of peer-reviewed research on how faith affects human behavior. Psychology of Religion and Spirituality publishes peer-reviewed, original articles related to the psychological aspects of religion and spirituality. The journal publishes articles employing experimental and correlational methods, qualitative analyses, and critical reviews of the literature. Papers evaluating clinically relevant issues surrounding training, professional development, and practice are also considered.

To listen to the interview, click here.

Dr. Piedmont received his Ph.D. in Personality Psychology from Boston University and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the National Institute of Aging, where he was trained in taxonomic models of personality and their relevance for understanding mental and physical health outcomes. His current research interests focus on the measurement of Spiritual Transcendence, a construct that represents a broad, nondenominational, motivational measure of spirituality. He has demonstrated the predictive value of this construct in both normal and clinical contexts, using both American and cross-cultural samples. Dr. Piedmont is extensively published in the scientific literature and is on the editorial boards for Measurement and Evaluation in Counseling and Development, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, and Counseling and Values. He is currently the co-editor of Research in the Social Scientific Study of Religion and is a member of the American Counseling Association (ACA), the American Psychological Association (APA), and the American Association of Pastoral Counselors. In addition, Dr. Piedmont serves as the President of the American Psychological Association's Division 36 which focuses on the Psychology of Religion and is the director of the Loyola College Pastoral Counseling and APA co-sponsored Mid-Year Research Conference on Religion and Spirituality. The aim of the conference is to leverage resources in an effort to stimulate research in the area of psychology and religion/spirituality.