TY - JOUR
T1 - Perceptions of Intercultural Social Challenges: Towards Culturally Competent Counselling Practice
AU - MAK, Anita
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2015 The Author(s).
PY - 2015/12/1
Y1 - 2015/12/1
N2 - Increasing ethnic and cultural diversity worldwide and especially in Australia requires that psychologists and counsellors cultivate the knowhow to interact and work effectively with clients and stakeholders in cross-cultural contexts. This study aimed to identify and compare themes regarding challenging intercultural social scenarios experienced by supervising, practising and intern psychologists. Transcripts from five focus groups were open-coded on four occasions and the final themes compared with the EXCELL (Excellence in Cultural Experiential Learning and Leadership) program's six key sociocultural competencies (Mak, Westwood, Barker, & Ishiyama, 1998). We found that many challenges reported by psychologists (regardless of their qualifications) were related to difficulties-for psychologists and clients-in executing one or more of key sociocultural competencies: Seeking help or information, participating in a group, making social contact, giving feedback, refusing a request, and expressing disagreement. We also identified barriers to cultural competence in therapeutic relationships, including cultural identity issues, needing to address difficulties in intimate relationships, cultural variation in values/beliefs/social norms, mismatched expectations, psychologists' perceived deficit in intercultural training, and challenges in self-reflection. Based on our findings, we propose a model of culturally competent counselling practice and discuss implications for counsellor and psychologist training, and for future research.
AB - Increasing ethnic and cultural diversity worldwide and especially in Australia requires that psychologists and counsellors cultivate the knowhow to interact and work effectively with clients and stakeholders in cross-cultural contexts. This study aimed to identify and compare themes regarding challenging intercultural social scenarios experienced by supervising, practising and intern psychologists. Transcripts from five focus groups were open-coded on four occasions and the final themes compared with the EXCELL (Excellence in Cultural Experiential Learning and Leadership) program's six key sociocultural competencies (Mak, Westwood, Barker, & Ishiyama, 1998). We found that many challenges reported by psychologists (regardless of their qualifications) were related to difficulties-for psychologists and clients-in executing one or more of key sociocultural competencies: Seeking help or information, participating in a group, making social contact, giving feedback, refusing a request, and expressing disagreement. We also identified barriers to cultural competence in therapeutic relationships, including cultural identity issues, needing to address difficulties in intimate relationships, cultural variation in values/beliefs/social norms, mismatched expectations, psychologists' perceived deficit in intercultural training, and challenges in self-reflection. Based on our findings, we propose a model of culturally competent counselling practice and discuss implications for counsellor and psychologist training, and for future research.
KW - Cultural competence
KW - cultural diversity
KW - intercultural training
KW - mental health professionals
KW - multicultural counselling
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85026421243&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1017/jgc.2015.13
DO - 10.1017/jgc.2015.13
M3 - Article
SN - 1037-2911
VL - 25
SP - 183
EP - 199
JO - Journal of Psychologists and Counsellors in Schools
JF - Journal of Psychologists and Counsellors in Schools
IS - 2
ER -