(PS7-A3) Examining Community Mental Health Providers Multicultural Counseling Knowledge and Awareness: Results from a Statewide Survey

Saturday, November 19, 2022

10:30 AM – 11:30 AM EST

Location: Westside Ballroom, 5th Floor

Author(s)

Noah S. Triplett, M.S.

Doctoral Candidate
University of Washington, Seattle
Seattle, Washington
JB

Jasmine Blanks Jones, Ph.D.

Postdoctoral Fellow
Johns Hopkins University
Baltimore, Maryland

Co-Author(s)

SD

Shannon Dorsey, Ph.D.

Professor and Associate Chair of Graduate Studies, Psychology
University of Washington, Seattle
Seattle, Washington
MR

Minu Ranna-Stewart, LICSW

Director, Student Support Services
Puget Sound ESD
Seattle, Washington
NJ

Nathaniel Jungbluth, Ph.D.

Clinical Psychologist
Seattle Children’s Hospital
Seattle, Washington

There exist tremendous racial and ethnic inequities in mental health services and outcomes. While cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) implementation efforts have focused on providing community mental health clinicians training in CBT to ensure clients are receiving evidence-based care, trainings have often overlooked the importance of ensuring CBT is delivered with cultural humility in these settings. Understanding multicultural counseling knowledge and awareness of community mental health providers trained in CBT is an important first step toward addressing mental health inequities. Community mental health clinicians and supervisors (N=119) responded to an online survey. All participants had been trained in CBT through a state-funded CBT training initiative for child-focused community mental health clinicians. Participants responded to the Multicultural Counseling Knowledge and Awareness Scale (MCKAS), which asked respondents to rate agreement (on a 1-7 Likert scale) with items across two subscales: knowledge of multicultural counseling frameworks and awareness of multicultural counseling issues. Higher scores represent greater knowledge and awareness. Optional questions gathered participant demographics. Survey respondents were largely White (73.9%), female (77.4%), and held master’s degrees (85.6%). MCKAS scores were relatively high (M=5.51 out of 7; SD=0.66), with respondents reporting slightly higher awareness (M=6.07; SD=0.74) than knowledge (M=5.16; SD=0.84). On average, White clinicians had lower MCKAS scores (M = 5.43, SD = 0.66) than non-White clinicians (M = 5.73, SD = 0.63), t(49.21) = -2.18, p = 0.034. These findings were driven by the knowledge subscale, where White clinicians had significantly lower knowledge (M = 5.06, SD = 0.87) than non-White clinicians (M = 5.43, SD = 0.72), t(55.80) = -2.26, p = 0.028. There was no significant difference in multicultural counseling awareness between White clinicians (M = 6.02, SD = 0.76) and non-White clinicians (M = 3.21, SD = 0.61), t(63.50) = -1.35, p = 0.18. Though average MCKAS scores were relatively high in our sample, findings highlight the importance of addressing multicultural knowledge and awareness when offering CBT trainings in community mental health settings. Though our sample size limited our ability to make comparisons across specific racial and ethnic identities, it appears White clinicians have lower knowledge of multicultural counseling frameworks than non-White clinicians. Given the mental health workforce is comprised of mostly White clinicians, it is important to address these knowledge gaps to ensure Clients of Color receive evidence-based and culturally robust mental health care.