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Christopher King

Associate Professor, Psychology, College of Humanities and Social Sciences

Office:
Dickson Hall 455
Email:
kingch@montclair.edu
Phone:
973-655-3325
vCard:
Download vCard

Profile

I am an Associate Professor of Psychology and the current Director of Clinical Training (DCT) for the PhD Program in Clinical Psychology at Montclair State. I am a licensed psychologist in New Jersey and New York State, and a licensed attorney in Pennsylvania. I can be reached at the contact information above, or at the separate email below in connection to my role as DCT.

Specialization

I attended a joint-degree (JD-PhD) program. My PhD was in clinical psychology with a forensic psychology concentration, and I parallelly graduated from law school. I consider myself a general clinical psychologist first and foremost, and a forensic psychologist second. I consider myself only a legal writer rather than a legal practitioner.

I teach doctoral courses in professional practice and history and systems of psychology, and graduate and undergraduate courses in forensic psychology and legal psychology.

My research lab focuses on forensic psychology, correctional psychology, police and public safety psychology, and mental health law. The link to my research lab website is provided below, in addition to other websites reflecting some of my research. Due to my primary obligation to Montclair State applicants and incoming or current Montclair State students, many of whom are interested in my research lab, I very rarely consider others (e.g., high school students, those seeking postbac research experience) to join my lab.

I plan to review PhD applications for the 2024–2025 application season, for a mentee to begin fall 2025. In the interest of equity to all applicants, I do not conduct "pre-interviews." Rather, I direct all prospective candidates to review the extensive posted information about the PhD Program in Clinical Psychology at Montclair State, consider attending Montclair State's Graduate Virtual Open House in the fall or spring (at which there is a session about the program), and review my answers to FAQs from PhD applicants posted below. I holistically review all completed applications that identify me as a mentor of interest and recommend a small number of these applicants to the program to be invited to the program's interview day. It is with these interviewees with whom I meet to discuss their experience and interests, and whether we might be a good fit to work together.

My current practice interests include program development and supervision in Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), especially for persons involved with the criminal legal system. I am also currently interested in preemployment psychological screening of police officer candidates.

See the below links for more about my research areas, links to my Google Scholar and ResearchGate profiles, information about applying to my research lab, and FAQs for PhD applicants.

Resume/CV

Office Hours

Fall

Friday
9:00 am - 11:00 am
Dickson Hall 455 or Zoom (please email ahead of time to schedule)

Research Projects

Forensic psychology and mental health law

Current directions/projects:

(a) Law and practice concerning forensic psychological testing.

(b) Law and practice concerning hybrid psychological–legal concepts for evaluation.

See link for recent articles, book chapters, and presentations.

Correctional psychology

Current directions/projects:

(a) The clinical utility of incorporating the self-perceptions of justice-involved persons and digital technologies into correctional human services, including the development of the latter.

(b) The interpretability of measures of developmental maturity and criminal sophistication, as used in evaluations of justice-involved juveniles, by examining the comparative performance of justice-involved young adults on these measures.

(c) Validation of theories underlying correctional human service principles.

(d) Program-evaluation work on a telehealth Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) program for persons who are reentering the community from federal prison.

See link for recent articles, book chapters, and presentations.

Police and public safety psychology

Current directions/projects:

(a) Multicultural topics in pre-employment psychological screenings for police officer candidates.

(b) The utility of structured professional judgment in conducting pre-employment psychological screenings for police officer candidates.

See link for recent articles, book chapters, and presentations.

Secondary research themes

I occasionally branch out within or beyond my primary research themes when a compelling idea arises from colleagues or students.

See link for examples.