Psychology/Evidence/Boundaries and safety
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Evidence
Boundaries and safety
The lines this platform does not cross, stated in full and in one place.
If you are at risk right now
Stop and get help
If you are thinking of harming yourself or anyone else, or you are in immediate danger, contact your local emergency number or a crisis line now.
Self-reflection resources and observation tools are not appropriate during a crisis. Nothing on this platform is monitored, and nothing here can respond to an emergency.
What everything here is
- Educational material for study and professional development.
- Self-reflection resources for people working on their own understanding.
- Behavioural observation instruments for recording what is observable.
- Professional documentation aids for keeping records that can be audited.
What nothing here is
- A diagnostic instrument, screener, or psychometric test.
- A clinical assessment, formulation, or treatment plan.
- A substitute for assessment, treatment, supervision, medication advice or emergency care.
- A source of scores, cut-offs, severity bands or indicative profiles — no page and no resource here contains any.
- A route to a diagnosis or a label, for yourself or for anybody else.
Six lines we do not cross
| Line | What it means in practice |
|---|---|
| We do not diagnose. | No resource here produces or supports a diagnosis. We describe conditions and responses, and we refer questions of identification. |
| We do not score people. | No cut-offs, no severity bands, no indicative profiles. Rates and durations describe episodes in settings, not persons. |
| We do not reproduce protected instruments. | No published questionnaire, coding manual, certification syllabus or clinical test is reproduced or paraphrased anywhere on this platform. |
| We do not sell certainty about other people’s inner states. | Particularly not from faces, and particularly not for use in interviews, discipline or any decision that materially affects somebody. |
| We do not publish material for use in a crisis. | Where there is risk of harm, the correct action is local emergency procedure, not a worksheet. |
| We do not publish a document about a person that the person has not read. | Our support-profile forms require it, and we would ask you to hold to the same standard. |
If you are using these resources with somebody else
- Tell them what you are recording, where, for how long, by whom, and who will read it — before you begin.
- Record their agreement in the words actually used, and record how it can be withdrawn.
- Seek agreement from the person themselves as well as from a guardian, at whatever level of understanding they have.
- Let them read what you wrote. If they cannot read it, read it to them in their channel.
- Record where the file is stored, who may read it, and when it will be destroyed.
Professional users
These resources do not extend your scope of practice. Your registration, your local law, your employer’s policy and your supervision arrangements all take precedence over anything published here. Where a question exceeds your competence or authority, refer — and hand over your records, which will make the referral substantially more useful.
A boundary statement you may reproduce
“This record was produced using structured observation and self-reflection resources. It describes observed behaviour and reported experience in specified settings. It does not constitute assessment, diagnosis, or clinical formulation, and no score, threshold or classification has been applied.”
Educational scope. Everything published on PMA Science Psychology is provided for education, study and professional documentation. Nothing here is a diagnostic instrument, a psychometric test, or a substitute for assessment, treatment, supervision or emergency care by a qualified professional.
If you are at risk right now, contact your local emergency number or a crisis line immediately. Read our boundaries and safety statement.