MC Master of Counseling: Cultural Awareness and Diversity 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: A counselor notices they feel less empathy toward clients from a specific ethnic background. This is best described as:
- Cultural countertransference (Correct answer)
- Racial microaggression
- Stereotype threat
- Cultural encapsulation
Correct answer: Cultural countertransference
Cultural countertransference occurs when a counselor's own cultural biases and values affect their emotional reactions to clients from different backgrounds.
Question 2: Which concept describes the stress experienced by individuals who must navigate between two distinct cultural worlds?
- Acculturation stress
- Bicultural stress (Correct answer)
- Cultural dissonance
- Marginalization syndrome
Correct answer: Bicultural stress
Bicultural stress refers to the psychological tension experienced by individuals who must constantly negotiate between two different cultural identity systems.
Question 3: When using standardized assessments with culturally diverse clients, a counselor should FIRST:
- Use only verbal administration
- Evaluate the instrument's normative sample for cultural representation (Correct answer)
- Translate the test into the client's native language
- Administer the test without modification to ensure validity
Correct answer: Evaluate the instrument's normative sample for cultural representation
Before using any standardized assessment, counselors must examine whether the normative sample included adequate representation of the client's cultural group.
Question 4: A Native American client declines to make eye contact during sessions. The culturally competent counselor should:
- Gently encourage eye contact as a therapeutic norm
- Recognize this may reflect a cultural communication style and not pathologize it (Correct answer)
- Refer the client for shyness assessment
- Document it as a possible social anxiety symptom
Correct answer: Recognize this may reflect a cultural communication style and not pathologize it
In many Native American cultures, avoiding direct eye contact is a sign of respect, not avoidance or psychopathology.
Question 5: The RESPECTFUL model in multicultural counseling is primarily used to:
- Evaluate client resistance to therapy
- Provide a framework for understanding multiple dimensions of client identity (Correct answer)
- Train counselors in evidence-based treatment protocols
- Assess cultural competence in supervisors
Correct answer: Provide a framework for understanding multiple dimensions of client identity
The RESPECTFUL model offers counselors a multidimensional lens covering religion, economic class, sexual identity, and other identity factors that shape a client's worldview.
Question 6: Which approach is most consistent with a collectivist cultural orientation in counseling?
- Emphasizing personal autonomy and self-determination
- Focusing on family and community involvement in the treatment plan (Correct answer)
- Encouraging the client to challenge parental authority
- Setting boundaries that exclude family from session discussions
Correct answer: Focusing on family and community involvement in the treatment plan
Collectivist cultures prioritize group harmony and interdependence, so counseling approaches that include family and community are more culturally aligned.
Question 7: A counselor who believes that all humans share common psychological needs regardless of culture is demonstrating:
- Cultural relativism
- Ethnocentrism
- Universalism (Correct answer)
- Cultural humility
Correct answer: Universalism
Universalism holds that core psychological processes are shared across all humans, though multicultural counselors also recognize cultural differences in how needs are expressed.
MC Master of Counseling: Cultural Awareness and Diversity 2
A counselor notices they feel less empathy toward clients from a specific ethnic background.
This is best described as: