Comprehensive Exam Review (cont’d.)

1. Comprehensive Exam Review (cont’d.) Click the LEFT mouse key ONCE to continue

2. Cultural and Social Foundations Part 3 Click the LEFT mouse key ONCE to continue

3. When counseling in a cross cultural or multicultural context, the counselor should determine an appropriate stance by evaluating the extent to which: Eurocentric values are appropriate; the client values emotional and/or verbal control (as opposed to assuming the emotional/verbal expressiveness generally promoted in counseling); the family should be involved;

4. the client’s culture promotes consultation with peers and elders (as opposed to the individual assertiveness encouraged in counseling); the client is culturally bound to avoid distressing thoughts (as opposed to developing awareness and insight); the client’s culture promotes trusting persons with whom s/he has lifelong relationship as opposed to the immediate openness and intimacy often expected in counseling;

5. the client is a circular, harmonious, or holistic thinker as opposed to the linear, analytically oriented thinker common in Eurocentric culture; the client perceives psychological distress or metal illness to be a problem of faith or medicine better solved by consultation with a priest or doctor as opposed to a counselor;

6. the client is accustomed to structured, hierarchical social relations as opposed to the democratic, egalitarian relationships promoted in the U. S. macroculture; the client accepts the American middle class values promulgated in the macroculture; or the client understands the counselor’s imagery, analogies, colloquialisms, or nonverbal expressions.

7. Criteria for normal behavior changes from person to person, situation to situation, time to time, and place to place. Racial-ethnic minorities tend to be diagnosed with psychological disorders at a higher rate than white, majority culture Americans, yet they use proportionately fewer mental health services.

8. Some commonly articulated explanations for these phenomena include: members of minority groups are misdiagnosed due to cultural insensitivity; members of minority groups actually have less need for service because they are psychologically healthy and have functional support systems in their communities or social groups;

9. service institutions are not responsive to the specific needs of minority group members; the cultural norms of certain minority groups preclude counseling; and members of certain groups prefer a medical or religious solution to problems.

10. The more person-centered and participative the cultural milieu, the more important the skill of interviewing becomes. Culture centered feedback skills include focusing on: the person’s behavior as opposed to one’s impression of the person; observations as opposed to inferences; the here and now;

11. sharing information as opposed to advice giving; what is said rather than why it is said; giving the client only as much information as the person can use; what is useful to the person rather than oneself; positive implications in an otherwise negative experience, as seen from the client’s cultural viewpoint;

12. anticipating potential negative implications from an otherwise positive experience, as seen from the client’s cultural viewpoint; mirroring the client’s pattern of eye contact; mirroring the client’s pitch, volume, tone, and rate of speech, all of which convey meaning, especially when speaking in a different language;

13. noting the client’s body language; establishing trust by allowing clients to discuss their concerns fully and without interruption or changing the subject; using verbal underlining to accentuate important points; and noting hesitations, changes of subject, or other indices of discomfort.

14. African/Black Americans are more likely than members of the U.S. macroculture to: speak with affect; prolong eye contact when speaking; avoid eye contact when listening; interrupt or interject; make rapid verbal responses; display emotion; display field dependent thinking;

15. prefer a group to an individual venue; include many persons in the family (i.e., extended family); consider the role of mother more impor- tant than the role of wife; consider problems to have their roots in the environment rather than in the self; prefer a behavioral, action oriented, and short term counseling approach;

16. prefer a problem solving approach to counseling; exhibit past/present time orientation (future is “no time” in the African culture); have an external locus of control; attach significant meaning to political events; and make use of the church for its healing potential.

17. African/Black Americans may benefit from: concrete, structured approaches to counseling; counselor self disclosure; introspective therapies; consideration of the spiritual aspects of counseling; and the teaching of new skills.

18. Asian Americans are more likely than members of the U.S. macroculture to: speak softly; avoid eye contact when listening or speaking to influential people; incorporate moderate delays in verbal responses; feel more pressure to obey authority; exert more emotional and verbal control; and

19. desire assertiveness training. Asian Americans may benefit from: conflict resolution; introspective and existential therapies; stress management techniques; assertiveness training; and art or narrative therapy.

20. EuroAmericans tend to: use loud and rapid speech; speak to control the conversation; use eye contact when listening; use frequent nonverbal markers such as head nodding; respond quickly; prefer objectivity to emotion; and display a task orientation.

21. Hispanic/Latino Americans are more likely than members of the U.S. macroculture to: speak softly; avoid eye contact when listening or speaking to influential people; incorporate moderate delays in verbal responses; feel more pressure to obey authority;

22. exert more emotional and verbal con- trol; and desire assertiveness training. Hispanic/Latino American clients may benefit from: psychodrama or other cathartic counseling approaches; incorporation of rituals into the treatment;

23. use of a life history questionnaire to assess familial relationships; help in accessing community re- sources; and help in managing change.

24. Native Americans are more likely than members of the U.S. macroculture to: speak hesitantly, slowly, and softly; speak with brevity and use silence; incorporate humor and spirituality into the dialogue; look away when listening or speaking; discourage verbal communication;

25. sit impassively; agree for the sake of agreement; give away possessions or demonstrate little value for material things; measure time by natural phenomena rather than by clocks; and value relationships over work.

26. Native Americans may benefit from: respectful patience on the part of the counselor; home-based counseling; collaborative efforts between the counselor and local healer; directive interventions such as advice giving, limit setting, and advocacy;

27. story telling and analogy as part of the intervention; physical challenge or adventure counseling; and peer support groups.

28. Ethical Standards and Practice for Multicultural Counseling

29. The Code of Ethics and Standards of Practice of the American Counseling Association and the Ethical Standards of the National Board for Certified Counselors stipulate that counselors do not condone or engage in discrimination based on age, color, culture, disability, ethnic group, gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, marital status, or socioeconomic status.

30. Effective counselors are aware of their own values, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors in a diverse society, and avoid imposing their values on clients. Counselors are aware that culture affects the manner in which clients’ problems are defined. Counselors take into account clients’ socioeconomic and cultural experience when diagnosing mental disorders.

31. Counselors use caution in selecting tests for culturally diverse populations to avoid inappropriate testing that fails to take into account socialized behavioral or cognitive patterns. Counselors are cautious in using tests for and making evaluations and interpretations of the performance of populations not represented in the standardization norm group.

32. Counselors take into account the effects of age, color, race, religion, sexual orientation, and socioeconomic status on test administration and interpretation. Counselors present test results in culturally appropriate contexts and incorporate consideration of relevant factors.

33. Counselors are responsive to special institutional and programmatic recruitment and retention needs for counselor preparation program administrators, faculty, and students with diverse backgrounds and special needs. Counselors are sensitive to diversity issues in conducting research with special populations and seek consultation as needed.

34. In obtaining informed consent for research, counselors use language that is easily understood by research participants to explain procedures, risks, benefits, and limits of confidentiality. When a person is not able to give informed consent, counselors obtain appropriate consent from a legally authorized person.

35. Multicultural Counseling Competencies

36. Multicultural counseling competencies have been developed to identify requisite skills, abilities, and characteristics for counselors to be culturally sensitive in counseling practice. Highlights of these competencies follow.

37. Culturally skilled counselors are aware of and sensitive to their own cultural heritage and how it impacts their counseling activities. Culturally skilled counselors have knowledge of how oppression, racism, discriminatory practices, and stereotyping affect them personally as well as the persons with whom they work.

38. Culturally skilled counselors seek to improve their own cultural sensitivity through participation in educational and consultation activities. Culturally skilled counselors are aware of attitudinal factors, both their own and those of others, and how they impact the practice of counseling.

39. Culturally skilled counselors are knowledgeable about the cultural heritage of the clients with whom they work. Culturally skilled counselors are knowledgeable of the research and literature regarding the mental health characteristics and the cultural heritage of the clients with whom they work.

40. Culturally skilled counselors respect the personal and cultural worldviews and practices of their clients. Culturally skilled counselors have know-ledge of the differences between their clients’ cultural characteristics and their own. Culturally skilled counselors use helping modalities specifically suited to their clients’ cultural heritage and circumstances.

41. Culturally skilled counselors avoid using both overt and covert behaviors that are discriminatory toward their clients. Culturally skilled counselors help their clients fully understand counseling processes, including how they are best implemented within the clients’ cultural heritage and circumstances.

42. This concludes Part 3 of the presentation on Cultural and Social Foundations