AED Research-Practice Initiative

AED Announces Release of new Research-Practice Guidelines!

The AED is pleased to announce the release of the AED Guidelines for Research-Practice Integration, created by the AED Research-Practice Committee in an effort to advance research and practice partnership in the field of eating disorders. Accompanying the general guidelines is the AED Action Plan which outlines a strategic plan for research-practice integration within the AED.

Access the Research-Practice Guidelines
Access the AED Action Plan
Access the Research-Practice Guidelines in French
Access the Research-Practice Guidelines in German
Access the Research-Practice Guidelines in Italian
Access the Research-Practice Guidelines in Spanish

History of the AED Research-Practice Initiative
The AED Research-Practice Initiative took form in 2007 following an informal survey¹ that posed two questions of 32 AED members:

1. There appears to be a researcher-clinician gap in our field. What do you think is the main cause of this gap?
2. What is one step we can take to close the gap?

The responses to this survey were uniformly thoughtful and united in their concern about the importance of finding effective ways to encourage research-practice integration. The responses also suggested that the impediments to research-practice integration were multi-layered and complex in nature.

The AED Research-Practice Committee (RPC) was then created and charged with the task of further exploring factors that block research-practice integration and developing a strategic plan for promoting partnership between researchers and practitioners.

The RPC developed the following mission and goals statement:

Mission:  To improve the quality of research, clinical practice, and prevention in the field of eating disorders by facilitating an ongoing transfer of knowledge from research into practice and from practice into research, while working to eliminate the factors that result in polarization of these two critical aspects of our field.

Goals: The RPC aims to promote the development of an integrated research-practice culture within the AED by facilitating:

• the development of effective evidence-based practices, while ensuring that research remains focused upon, and relevant to, practice concerns;
  
• the development and sharing of innovative clinical practices and observations to guide the nature and direction of research; and
  
• the promotion of a culture of mutual respect across disciplines.

RPC Activities
Since 2007, the RPC has implemented changes in AED activities, in particular conference activities, that promote interactive learning, researcher-practitioner dialogue, and a balanced research-practice perspective.

2008-2009 RPC members include: Drew Anderson, Angela Favaro, Isabel Krug, Bob Palmer, Susan Paxton, Jill Pollack, Dana Satir, and Howard Steiger.  Committee co-chairs are Judith Banker and Kelly Klump.

Other activities include:

• Global and Regional Think Tank Sessions: The RPC hosted the 2008 AED Global Think Tank Session at the 2008 AED International Conference on Eating Disorders (ICED) entitled “Let’s Talk:  Advancing the Research-Practice Partnership.”  Over 100 conference attendees participated in the session, which focused on generating further steps the AED could take to promote research-practice partnership.

  A similar discussion session was conducted at the 9th London International Eating Disorders Conference in April, 2009.

  A second AED Global Think Tank Session entitled “Are We There Yet? On the Road to Research-Practice Integration” was originally scheduled for the cancelled 2009 ICED that was to be held in Cancun, Mexico. This session will instead be conducted at the 2010 ICED in Salzburg, Austria. Meanwhile, tentative plans are underway for smaller regional sessions to be conducted at the Eating Disorders Research Society Meeting in September 2009 in Brooklyn, NY,  and at venue (to be determined) outside North America. (Further information about these sessions will be posted when final details are confirmed.)

• Research-Practice Listserv
  All AED members are invited to participate in a listserv formed by the RPC in 2008 to promote on-going discussion about research-practice issues, projects, and new directions. Over 150 AED members have joined the listserv since it was formed.  To join, contact Judith Banker (banker@umich.edu)
  
  
  
• AED Forum Columns
  The RPC now hosts two regular columns in the AED Forum:
  
  -New Hypotheses—an informal venue for AED members to share their new ideas about research, education, treatment and prevention.  Entries for this column are not intended to be academic pieces, but rather informal, plain language essays describing thoughts, theories and perspectives that members would like to present to the AED community. Please e-mail your submissions or questions and/or ideas about submissions to angela.favaro@unipd.it.
  
  -Models or Research-Practice Integration – a venue to provide examples of methods and processes used by  AED members to integrate research and practice. For further information about how to contribute to this column, email angela.favaro@unipd.it.

References:
Banker, J., & Klump, K. (2007). Toward a Common Ground:  Bridging the Gap Between Research and Practice in the Field of Eating Disorders.The AED Forum, January.

Banker,J.D., & Klump, K.L.(2009). Research and  Clinical Practice: A Dynamic Tension in the Field of Eating Disorders, In I.F Dancyger & V.M. Fornari (Eds.), Evidence Based Treatments for Eating Disorders, pp. 71-86. Nova Science Publishers, New York.

Kazdin, A.E. (2008). Evidence-Based Treatment and Practice: New Opportunities to Bridge Clinical Research and Practice, Enhance the Knowledge Base, and Improve Patient Care, American Psychologist, 63(3), 146-159.

Levant, R. F. (2006). APA Presidential Task Force Report on Evidence-Based Practice, Evidence-Based Practice in Psychology, American Psychologist, 61(4), 271-285.

¹The survey and responses are more fully described in: Banker, J., & Klump, K. (2007).  Toward a Common Ground:  Bridging the Gap Between Research and Practice in the Field of Eating Disorders.  The AED Forum, January.