Multicultural Competence
Multicultural competency is the ability to understand another culture, to facilitate effective communication, while working with the people from that culture. Multicultural competence means fluency in more than one culture, in any environment (Sue et al., 2009). Learning to be sensitive to the cultural expressions of another culture is part of multicultural competence, requiring energy and time. Competency means being in a position to function effectively as an individual in the context of different cultural beliefs and behaviors. The majority of the clients from the Hispanic population have limited access to English proficiency, which affects their full range of psychological services. When the psychologists are involved in the evaluation and diagnosis, they may face challenges that could lead to their misinterpretation of the symptom expression due to poor communication (Gallardo et al., 2009). This is even worse in more advanced psychological conditions because of the poor understanding of their cultural norms, mannerism and verbal styles.
The Hispanics prefer services from psychologists who understand their culture. This is because the Hispanics view the outward expression of emotions such as crying as healthy. However, the psychologist may misinterpret the symptoms as more severe, with difficulties in communication, which could have inappropriate impression to the therapist. Furthermore, the performance of the psychological and psycho-educational tests may not reflect accurately the abilities and abilities because the tests used are designed specifically for the English speaking populations (Cornish et al., 2010). In treatment, most of the psychologists do not understand specific Hispanic experiences or recognize their cultural familial strengths and values. Therefore, the therapists may not draw available community support to the achievement of the curative goals. Furthermore, the effectiveness of the majority of the treatments awaits approval with the Hispanic populations. Most of the Latinos will involve the whole family in their choice for treatment. Their adherence to family values may cause them to develop strong ties to their providers rather than therapists’ care settings.
To address effectively psychological issues for the Hispanic population, it is necessary to modify practices at the individual and systemic level to allow individual diagnosis and treatment of their cases (Owen et al., 2011). For instance, modified approaches should be developed alongside the new models adopted for treatment to reduce the chances of misdiagnosis and termination of therapeutic success. The approaches used need a clear demonstration of the understanding of the cultural, social and traditional beliefs of the Hispanic cultures. The psychologist should explore previous efforts to address the previous efforts to address the problems, which could include working with folk healers. This will help the therapist determine the potential for the adverse interaction of the herbs and curative foods prescribed for medication. Furthermore, the providers need to understand the concepts of marianismo, respect, machismo and simpatis, to develop interventions that are culturally acceptable (Gallardo et al., 2009).
In addition, the psychologists have to understand the deeply rooted refusal of the whites to recognize and accept the values of the Hispanics in the past, present and future of their country. Therefore, the educational, political and economic developments of the Hispanics have a history of neglect and oppression. Therefore, the health care providers have to understand the economic situation of the Hispanics, and make services affordable and available within the community, under a flexible schedule (Owen et al., 2011). In addition, the service providers need to be aware of the social, political and educational forces affecting the psychosocial functioning of Hispanics, and prepare to offer viable strategies to address their issues. In this case, the service providers need to incorporate active efforts, which focus on empowerment of the community. They have to establish the truth through clear communication and actions, which will develop trust between them and the clients from the Hispanic community.
References
Cornish, J. A. E., Schreier, B. A., Nadkarni, L. I., Metzger, L. H., & Rodolfa, E. R. (Eds.). (2010). Handbook of multi-cultural counselling competency. Wiley. com.
Gallardo, M. E., Johnson, J., Parham, T. A., & Carter, J. A. (2009). Ethics and multiculturalism: Advancing cultural and clinical approachable. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 40(5), 425–435.
Owen, J., Leach, M. M., Wapold, B., & Rodolfe, E. (2011). Clients and their therapist variability in clients’ perceptions of their therapists’ multicultural competencies. Counselling psychology Journal, 58(1), 1.
Sue, S., Zane, N., Hall, G. C. N., & Berger, L. K. (2009). The case for cultural competency in psycho-therapeutic intervention. Annual reviews of psychology, 69, 525.
