Matakuliah
Tahun
: L0332 – Psikologi Konseling
: 2009
Cultural Issues
Pertemuan 11
PERTEMUAN 11
Cultural Issues
Introduction
•
Assessment may insufficiently take into account differences in how
behaviours are perceived in different cultures
•
Therapist may fail to understand and address the chronic stresses
attached to being in a cultural minority group and the emotional
disruption of migration to a different culture.
The Terminology of culture
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Culture:
Herskovits (1948): part of the environment that is shaped or created by
humans.
Spindler (1963): a patterned system of tradition derived norms
influencing behaviour.
Cross et all (1989): an integrated pattern of human behaviour that
includes thoughts, communications, actions, customs, beliefs, values,
and institutions of a racial, ethnic, religious or social group
A colloquial definition of culture is THE WAY WE DO THINGS HERE
•
•
Enculturation: the transmission of cultural norms within a given
culture.
Acculturation: the behavioural and psychological changes that occur
in individuals as a result of their interaction with a different culture.
The Terminology of culture
•
Culture Shock: a fairly common reaction to stresses of adapting to a
new culture.
 Its symptoms can include anxiety, a sense of loss, confusion of
roles, feelings of helplessness and a desire for a more familiar and
predictable environment.
 Culture shock can engender pathological symptoms, such as
depression and psychological and physical withdrawal.
•
Culture change: change can come from within and without, or a
mixture of the two.  in Britain and Australia, there are traditional
mainstream cultures adhered to mainly by the older generation, as
well as emergent cultures being created predominantly by the younger
generation.
Multiculturalism: cultural mosaics rather than cultural melting-pots
(Britain, Australia, America)
•
The Terminology of culture
•
Cultural cohesion: the extend to which the norms of a culture or
nation help it to stick together.
In Britain, Austria and USA, many of the problems of cultural
minorities are those of equality of access to opportunities within the
mainstream culture rather than the fact that a mainstream culture
exists.
In such culturally diverse countries, a balance needs to be struck
between multiculturalism and cultural cohesion.
•
Race: human sub-groups possessing distinctive physical
characteristics that distinguish them from other human sub-groups.
•
Ethnic minority: groups differentiated from the main population of a
country by racial origin and/or cultural background.
THEORY
•
Current theories of counselling and psychotherapy inadequately
describe, predict and deal with the richness and complexity of a
culturally diverse population (Derald Sue, Allen Ivey and Paul
Pedersen)
•
One of the main dimensions of a culture is that of values or the
underlying principles that guide how people live their live.
•
There is no exact relationship between how people think they ought to
behave, their values and their actual behaviour.
•
Universal values:
Schwarz (1992) classified values into 10 types: power, achievement,
hedonism, stimulation, self-direction, universalism, benevolence,
conformity, and security
•
Laugani’s four core values distinguishing western (British) and
eastern (Indian): read p. 426
THEORY
MULTICULTURAL COUNSELLING AND THERAPY
(MCT)
•
Sue, Ivey, and Pedersen (1996) proposed a meta-theory (theory about
theories) that they called Multicultural Counselling and Therapy (MCT)
•
MCT consists of 6 proposition, each of which has corollaries: (read p.
428-429)
THERAPY
•
Counsellors of all races and backgrounds will increasingly be called
upon to assist clients who posses markedly different worldviews
(Ingrid Grieger & Joseph Ponterotto)
•
There are some goals, which may overlap, for working with clients in
whose problems issues of culture play a significant role: read p. 430432
* Support
* Dealing with post-traumatic stress
* Assisting acculturation and assimilation
* Assisting clients to handle cross-cultural relationship
* Consciousness raising and liberation
* Avoiding further marginalization
* Attaining higher levels of development
* The good society
THERAPY
Therapeutic approaches: read 432-436
• Making existing Euro-American therapist more culture-sensitive
• Multicultural counselling and therapy competences
• Non-Western approaches to counselling and therapy
Additional Roles for multicultural counsellors and therapists: read p. 435