Tyrell's Cultural Effectiveness

One of the most promising approaches to the field of multicultural counseling/therapy has been the work on racial/cultural identity development among minority groups. This model acknowledges within groups differences that have implications for treatment. The high failure-to-return rate of many clients seems to be intimately connected to the mental health professional’s inability to assess the cultural identity of clients accurately. The model also acknowledges

Engaging into the importance of multicultural competence, awareness of such competency has become a significant necessity in the area of mental health, and various fields of psychology (Hayes, 2008). It is essential for a counselor to be multicultural competent in order to develop a therapeutic alliance with a client, while understanding their cultural identity. Therefore, culturally competent knowledge, attitudes, and skills of diverse culture, is necessary, in proper treatment and diagnosis. Nonetheless, the complexity of cultural diversity can contribute to challenges in assessment, diagnosis and or treatment. It is further understood; by understanding one’s social history, psychosocial history, presenting problems, along with other pertinent information regarding a cultural responsiveness in a diagnosis, and how it would be beneficial to individuals of various social, ethnic, and other minority groups in order to make a treatment plan based on the findings of a cultural assessment (Sue & Sue, 2013). Nonetheless, cultural influences, often neglected, are needed to incorporate the challenges cultural groups face when seeking treatment. Therefore, I have found it applicable to use “ADDRESSING,” framework in therapy as a resource for developing cultural and relevant assessments in addition to the onset symptoms presented in the client in the case study of Mrs. Hudson. The use of “ADDRESSING” acronym is designed to obtain age, developmental and physical disabilities

In my personal opinion and experience, I find that the field of psychology is lacking in diverse cultural competencies as much as the society is diverse in its population. I believe that as with using any theoretical model, the therapists’ cultural knowledge needs to include understanding of the many cultural considerations influencing the effectiveness of treatment when dealing with clients from diverse backgrounds. When servicing the individuals in the family, care and attention needs to be directed towards family and community norms and values around help seeking, secrecy and confidentiality, family roles, child rearing and spiritual practices.

In order to provide culturally appropriate care, an examination of one's personal views, beliefs, and prejudices must be examined. The first portion of this paper will examine my personal values, beliefs, biases, and prejudices. The remaining paper will analyze the African American culture relating to the Ginger and Davidhizar's Transcultural Assessment Model cited in Hood (2010). This model uses six key cultural elements that include communication, space, social organization, time, environment, and biological variations. This model provides a systematic approach for assessing culturally diverse clients. I will also discuss an aspect of care that I would

Cultural mistrust of white mental health clinicians among African Americans with severe mental illness was conducted to determine the effects of cultural mistrust when African American patients with their white clinicians. The hypothesis tested was African American patients would have more of a negative feeling towards white clinicians that are providing care for them. According to this study they examined 154 African Americans that had been recently admitted into a psychiatric

Dr. Kimberlyn Leary writes about the application of treatment methodologies specific to the treatment African Americans but to make this suggestion is contrary to purpose of this paper. I assert that the creation of specific therapeutic methods for Black people and people of color would only deepen the chasm between black and white. What I am saying here is that there is a way to apply the existing psychoanalytic theories to Black people and most all of these theories address many of the issues of the

Cultural competency and sensitivity are essential factors to effective mental health treatment. ‘Cultural competency is defined as an ability to understand and be aware of cultural factors in the

There is no way to get help if you have no clue to what the actual problem is. Many African Americans underestimate the severity of mental illnesses. “Mental illness is frequently stigmatized ad misunderstood in the African American community.” (NAMI) This is one of the serious issues that people in African American communities suffer with, which is ignorance. Not understanding what is wrong is what will make the problem worse because they choose to ignore the signs or seek help with in families and religious affiliations. (Willie) Many people believe that if they pray or talk to family members it will help them with their psychiatric problems however they are only coping with the issue. This is mainly because of the distrust that many people in the African American population have with psychiatrist and mental health professionals. They often believe that these people are Caucasian, whom could not truly identify with the issues that they are facing on a socioeconomic level. However many not know that, “In actuality, however, even though African Americans are underrepresented as psychologist, they are well-represented among mental health providers in general, and can be found among the ranks of master’s level clinicians, such as professional counselors and clinical social workers.” (Myers) Therefore the myth that if they get help it would not be with someone identifiable is somewhat true for psychiatrics, however for other mental health

As discussed in class, little advancement has been made in the field of mental health care over the past two decades. Rates of mental illness continue to be high especially among certain subgroups, but progress has been stunted by stigma and social environmental issues. Mental health disparities, like many other health disparities, are embedded within a trend of socioeconomic differences (Miranda, McGuire, Williams, & Wang, 2008). Racial and class disparities exist among those afflicted

Samuel Seium. One solution for counselors to reduce the issues of misdiagnosing African-American clients is by being culturally competent. The counselor can first start by assessing the client’s cultural identity and how they see the world. The counselors should distinguish what is culturally relevant to the client. For example, what religious events or cultural activities does the client value because the client may not identify with everything in a cultural compared to someone else. Counselors should be aware of the cultural meaning of the client’s presenting problem. Assess the stigma from the client’s cultural perspective is important because counselor needs to take into account a client’s culture to determine the proper diagnoses (Feisthamel

It is important to be aware of one’s limitations, weaknesses and strengths in the delivery of counseling services. Taking into account the cultural values of the client, the support systems and the client’s view of the key parts of his or her makeup (the history of the client) are culture specific (because someone is of the same race does not mean that values will be the same) and does not discount the individual. Sue et al reminds us that multicultural counseling competency looks beyond racial and ethnic minorities and also includes disabilities, sexual orientation, age, and other special populations (Sue, et al, 1992).

Working with my field supervisor I noticed that she is aware of the cultural diversity of the population that receives mental health therapy at Rincon Family Services. Everyone is different. Consequently, the mental health services that are provided in this facility, are targeted to the Hispanic population, the African-American and also the Caucasian population. During the session with a Hispanic client our empathy and personal awareness about how her culture, family traditions, her parent’s education, and the influence from her peers motivated her to break the relationship with her family, was always present when assessing her case. The client reported, she broke the rules and norms of her family when she started running away from home, having

In a multicultural counseling perspective there are four key approaches when counseling individuals, (a) multicultural awareness of culturally learned assumptions about self and others leading to accurate assessments of clients, (b) multicultural knowledge of information, (c) multicultural skills and interventions, that are appropriate treating clients, and (d) individuals are from a variety of backgrounds, demographic status, and affiliation of cultures. The three-stage approach, will direct the counselor towards levels of multicultural competence in therapy by providing a successful outcome in the recovery process. When conducting a psychotherapy session with a client the counselor should be able to demonstrate skills, when exploring the client’s cultural background. Counselors should also be able to focus on the essential skills and pattern behaviors, when identifying cultural differences. Counseling a minority from a different culture counselors’ must be able to identify their own personal behaviors. These behaviors are crucial when counseling these individuals. First, a counselor must be able to sense the clients’ viewpoint or issue in some way. Secondly, a counselor should be specific when asking a question rather than being unclear and confusing.

Culture surrounds us every day, it is in our arts, ourselves, our community and our careers. Everybody has multiple cultural elements that help create the personality of that person along with helping us identify similarities within a community that we individually reach out to be a part of. Casey, my interviewee, is a junior at Washington University of Saint Louis undergoing a Neuroscience major along with minors in music, linguistics, and French. She identifies herself as a Democratic, Christian, Caucasian. These are the three most stereotypical culture identities that most people are aware of and refer to themselves as. She also considers herself a multilingual, vegan, and bisexual. These identities too, are looked upon by other people in which they would like to express and follow in their everyday practices.

standard case management to determine if one method is more effective than the other with individuals with severe psychotic illness (Burns et al., 1999). The difference this study will make is an improvement in the mental health services rendered in the UK and Europe. The literature review provided a fair and generalized justification for conducting this quantitative study by exploring other variables. Burns et al. (1999) failed to go into detail about specific literature review that inspired this quantitative study. The potential bias the researcher presents is the singling out one ethnic group of Afro-Caribbean, by implying that this ethnic group tends to be uncooperative and poorly served (Burns et al., 1999). All the important concepts are clearly defined by the researcher. Burns et al. (1999) describe previous methods of controlled groups as a way to understand the strength of association between the type of case management and the number of hospital admissions (Burns et al., 1999). Previous methods created the relevance to understanding the purpose of conducting this study.