A National Survey on Multicultural Competence for Professional Counselors: A Replication Study

Over the past 3 decades, significant attention to understanding multiculturalism and cultural competence has been given in both empirical and theoretical literature bases. Multicultural competence is paramount for counselors when working with clients in a therapeutic environment (Alexander, Kruczek, & Ponterotto, 2005; Sue & Sue, 2012). Professional counselors need to be knowledgeable of cultural values, aware of their own cultural background and personal biases, and able to integrate culturally relevant and appropriate interventions in their work with all clients (American Counseling Association [ACA], 2014; Sue & Sue, 2012). According to ACA, counselors must have awareness and knowledge about cultural diversity and effectively apply these dimensions with their clients (ACA, 2014, Standard F.11.e.). Multicultural awareness refers to a counselor's awareness of his or her own cultural worldview and biases. Counselors who are culturally aware have insight into how their cultural biases influence the counseling process, are comfortable with clients' culture, and respect clients' religion and culture (Sue, Arredondo, & McDavis, 1992a, 1992b). Multicultural knowledge refers to a counselor's knowledge about various cultural norms and values that affect the counseling process. Counselors demonstrating cultural knowledge understand how cultural norms influence personality and manifestations of psychological symptomatology. Finally, multicultural skills refers to a counselor's ability to form a working alliance with clients of various cultures and use culturally appropriate interventions. Multicultural skills are demonstrated behaviorally, such as when counselors actively seek out culturally sensitive educational workshops to enhance their training and proficiency in multicultural counseling, or when counselors practice culturally sensitive counseling strategies. Acquiring multicultural competence is an ongoing process of reflection and self-awareness, and, thus, it is important to understand the perceptions of practicing professional counselors, not just counselor trainees (Balkin, Schlosser, & Levitt, 2009). However, researchers have predominantly focused on investigating cultural competence for novice counselor trainees, thus creating large gaps in the understanding of cultural competence beyond counselor preparation programs. In 2005, Arredondo, Rosen, Rice, Perez, and Tovar-Gamero conducted a 10-year content analysis on multicultural-centered articles published in ACA's flagship journal, the Journal of Counseling & Development. The authors concluded that 43% of the articles addressed individuals who were students, which accounted for the greatest number of the empirical articles. Although 35% of the articles focused on the general population, the majority of these articles were theoretically oriented, highlighting the gap in empirical research on nonstudent populations (Arredondo et al., 2005). There has been an increased focus on investigating multicultural competence for professional counselors; however, research remains sparse. Furthermore, researchers have often cited results from Holcomb-McCoy and Myers's (1999) seminal study conducted with professional counselors when discussing the need for more research in this area (Middleton, Erguner-Tekinalp, Williams, & Stadler, 2011; Middleton, Stadler, Simpson, & Guo, 2005; Packer-Williams, Jay, & Evans, 2010). Although this study was influential, it is unclear the extent to which the findings are still relevant today, given that 18 years have passed since the study's publication. To this end, the purpose of the current investigation was to extend and replicate findings from the Holcomb-McCoy and Myers study. * Need for Replication The primary objective of public science is to build a shared body of knowledge on a particular topic (Goodstein, 2011). Open science allows researchers to accumulate a body of knowledge and evaluate, challenge, and reuse methods to further the evidence to any particular claim. …