What is it about?
The Mental Capacity Act (MCA) tells professionals how they should decide if somebody cannot make decisions about certain things for themselves. If they cannot make these decisions for themselves, then the MCA provides a way for professionals to make decisisons for them. Knowledge of the MCA is important to ensure safe practice. Nobody has conducted a review of knowledge in Clinical Psychologists. We reviewed and published the knowledge of the MCA in a group of Clinical Psychologists working in East Anglia, and use this information to explain what sort of training they may need to improve in their knowledge.
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Why is it important?
Undersatnding gaps in knowledge of Clinical Psychologists is important, since knowledge gaps are likely to negatively impact practice, and will minimise the effectiveness of the safeguards built into the legislation.
Perspectives
There is no fancy methodology in this study, it is just a survey. However, surveys can be important, particularly when there aren't any other surveys asking similar questions of the same types of people. In this case, we found that whilst knowledge was generally good across key areas, there were also some gaps - particularly in understanding who the 'decision maker' might be in a situation for a trainee staff member working with somebody who may not have capcaity to make decisions about consenting to engage in their psychological treatment.
Peter Beazley
University of East Anglia
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Knowledge and confidence of the Mental Capacity Act (2005) in a sample of clinical psychologists in East Anglia, The Journal of Adult Protection, March 2026, Emerald,
DOI: 10.1108/jap-11-2025-0040.
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