Many college students underuse professional psychological help for mental health difficulties. The stigma associated with seeking such help appears to be one of the reasons for this underuse. Levels of psychological distress and past use of counseling/psychotherapy have been found to be important correlates of stigma associated with seeking psychological help (Obasi & Leong, 2009; Vogel, Wade, & Haake, 2006). For racial and ethnic minorities, the hindering effects of self-stigma and perceived stigmatization by others on treatment seeking may further be compounded by their relationships with their own ethnic groups, with other ethnic groups, and with the dominant society. This study used structural equation modeling (SEM) to test a model that explored the effects of psychological distress and psychocultural variables (i.e., ethnic identity, other-group orientation, perceived discrimination) on perceived stigmatization by others and self-stigma for seeking psychological help, controlling for past use of counseling/psychotherapy. The sample consisted of 260 African American, 166 Asian American, and 183 Latino American students. SEM multigroup analyses indicated measurement invariance, but partial structural invariance, across racial/ethnic groups. Across all 3 groups, higher levels of psychological distress and perceived racial/ethnic discrimination, respectively, predicted higher levels of perceived stigmatization by others for seeking psychological help, which, in turn, predicted greater self-stigma for seeking psychological help. Higher levels of other-group orientation predicted lower levels of self-stigma of seeking psychological help across groups. Higher levels of ethnic identity predicted lower levels of self-stigma of seeking psychological help only for African Americans. Implications for research and practice are discussed.
The measurement of internal ethnic identity and external ethnic identity showed that Chinese American immigrants could be differentiated into different identity groups. Additionally, internal ethnic identity significantly predicted salience of ethnicity and loss of face. Income, ethnicity salience, external ethnic identity, and loss of face were significant predictors of acculturative stress.
Much of the existing literature on psychotherapist self-disclosure has been with White or European American individuals. This article discusses cross-cultural considerations related to therapist self-disclosure. We present a clinical example of how therapist self-disclosure might play an important role with regard to working with people of color.
MMPI‐2 scores of foreign Chinese students (n= 25) were compared to those of a matched sample of Caucasian students (n = 21) and to normative data on American college students. Although responses for all groups were within normal limits, Chinese men appeared more socially introverted than Caucasian men. Relative to Caucasian women, Chinese women were more defensive, depressed, unaware of somatic and psychosocial problems, and gender astereotypic in interests. These tentative findings are discussed in terms of ethnicity and adjustment.
The International Forum (IF) has been a feature of the The Counseling Psychologist for two decades. The current coeditors of the IF offer their observations about why a manuscript might have been rejected in the past, offer suggestions on how to increase a document's potential for being published, and discuss new features of this forum. They also invite authors to contribute articles to the IF on a host of specific topics.
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