Serving Special Populations In Counseling

Serving Special PopulationsThe greatest obstacle in serving special populations starts with ourselves. An essential component of being multi-culturally competent is to have awareness of ourselves as cultural beings; an awareness that acknowledges our privileges, biases, and status. There is something so appealing about having a colorblind perspective; to believe oneself as not being influenced by racial prejudice or the “-isms” that oppress and marginalize people. However, the truth is we are, often in subtle and implicit ways. We are indeed shaped by socio-historical structures of society and have learned to operate and navigate ourselves accordingly. To believe that we can automatically adopt a neutral stance after years of such socialization does a disservice to our clients and to ourselves. One of the most effective ways to prevent drift into colorblindness is to suspend any belief that we are neutral just because we have experience in psychological science, counseling theory, and evidence-based treatment protocols. Using the ADDRESSING Model, which stands for Age, Developmental or other Disability, Religion and spirituality, Ethnic and racial identity, Socioeconomic status, Sexual orientation, Indigenous heritage, National origin and Gender is a great start. It was developed by Pamela