Issue link: http://ncumarketing.uberflip.com/i/816855
Research-Informed Clinicians: Why Diversity Matters Members from the School of Social and Behavioral Sciences (SSBS) Diversity and Community Committee (DCC) presented an informative webinar on the importance of diversity when reading and/or designing research. Presenters for this well-attended webinar of over 75 guests included both MFT and psychology faculty: Drs. Valerie Glass, Annabelle Goodwin, Alycia Harris, Mary Streit, Asha Sutton, and Yulia Watters. Presenters described the history of the field of family therapy noting that, like many mental health fields, the field of MFT was born of a predominantly white, middle-class, male tradition (McDowell, et al., 2002). They further described that a limitation of this history is that minority experiences- both those of clients and clinicians- are often overlooked. This leads to a gap in both training as well as best practices for meeting the needs of diverse populations. Trends in the literature from both MFT and psychology were examined. Specifically, presenters cited a content analysis that looked at journal articles published in Family Process, the American Journal of Family Therapy, and the Journal of Marital and Family Therapy between 2004-2011 (Seedall, Holtrop, Parra-Cardona, 2014). This study defined diversity broadly and found that only 28.1% of the articles included some mention of diversity. Race/ethnicity and gender were the two categories of diversity most frequently discussed with SES, sexual orientation, religion/spirituality, and age receiving limited attention. Presenters also shared findings from a study by Lee, Rosen, and Burns (2013) that reviewed the Journal of Counseling Psychology between 1954-2009. The findings were similar to the above-mentioned study and reported that, of all articles examined, only 32% included mention of diversity. A similar trend was uncovered suggesting that race/ethnicity and gender are most frequently included when diversity is considered. Presenters also discussed the meaning of diversity, noting that there isn't one universally agreed upon definition, but that diversity includes many parts of our social identities including race, ethnicity, culture, gender, SES, sexual orientation, ability, religion, and spirituality. Additionally, they described intersectionality, which can be described as "how different types of discrimination intersect to oppress people in multiple and simultaneous ways, contributing to social inequality and systemic injustice" (Butler, 2015, p. 584). M F T S A I N V I T E D G U E S T L E C T U R E S E R I E S