Social Justice Commons^™

Four Positive Lessons Learned During The 2020–2021 Covid-19 Global Pandemic: Implications For Spirituality In Clinical Practice, Thomas G. Plante

Psychology

While the COVID-19 global pandemic has wrecked havoc for over a year in ways that we have not seen in our lifetimes, many important positive lessons have been learned during these tumultuous and what has felt like apocalyptic times. Upon close reflection, four critical and positive lessons were learned by this author that have implications for how we productively move forward in our efforts to provide spiritually and religiously informed psychotherapy services both now and in the future. These important lessons include the benefits of telehealth and “telespirit” services as well as highlighting the advantages of reflection, discernment, and resetting …

Understanding Black Experiences And Access Barriers In The Expressive Arts Activities And Therapies, Jadea Harris, Ana K. Marcelo

Psychology

Black individuals in America experience racism, discrimination, and microaggressions that can affect their mental and physical health. (Alvarez, Liang, & Neville, 2016). Unfortunately, Black individuals typically do not seek out mental health treatment because of mistrust, stigma, misdiagnosis, and lack of culturally sensitive approaches to treatment (NAMI, 2002). One way to encourage Black individuals to seek mental health support and to provide more support could be through expressive arts. Expressive outlets may act as a protective barrier against adverse experiences and serve as an opportunity to bring healing amongst uncomfortable feelings of racial trauma and more. Historical and empirical evidence …

A Review Of Spiritual Development And Transformation Among College Students From Jesuit Higher Education, Thomas G. Plante

Psychology

The college experience can be a critically important and enriching time for personal as well as academic growth and development. For many students, college is their first foray into a more independent world and lifestyle no longer under the careful, and sometimes critical, eyes of their parents, families, and schoolteachers. When students go far away from home to attend college, they need to find ways to live independently, manage their many needs, and attend to the rigors of academic life in higher education. Additionally, the college years offer a unique and important period for spiritual growth, development, and transformation. The …

Clericalism Contributes To Religious, Spiritual, And Behavioral Struggles Among Catholic Priests, Thomas G. Plante

Psychology

The Roman Catholic Church has received a remarkable amount of press attention regarding clerical perpetrated sexual abuse with child victims as well as other clerical behavioral scandals in recent years. Much has been reported in both the popular and professional press about the various aspects and elements of priestly formation and ministry that might contribute to behavioral problems among clerics. Additionally, much has also been written and discussed about the challenging religious, spiritual, and behavioral struggles among clerics when clerical misbehavior significantly contradicts expected behavior in terms of sexual, behavioral, and relational ethics. Since Catholic priests are dedicated to chastity, …

St. Ignatius As Psychotherapist? How Jesuit Spirituality And Wisdom Can Enhance Psychotherapy, Thomas G. Plante

Psychology

The great wisdom traditions associated with various religious and spiritual practices and institutions have offered a variety of helpful strategies for more effective living and coping with life’s many challenges. In most recent times, efforts to secularize these strategies have been made in order to appeal to the general population as well as to secular mental health professionals as tools for their clinical practices. Although mindfulness meditation and yoga are perhaps the most notable examples, many other intervention strategies have been and can be borrowed from various religious and spiritual traditions to use in a secular manner if so desired. …

Relationship Between Religion, Spirituality, And Psychotherapy: An Ethical Perspective, Thomas G. Plante

Psychology

Spirituality and religion are typically a critically important element of most people’s lives. They offer an overarching framework for making sense of the world and a strategy to cope with life’s stressors. They provide a community and a way to wrestle with life’s biggest questions regarding meaning, purpose, and suffering. Mental health professionals are mandated to behave in an ethical manner defined by their codes of ethics. These codes typically understand religion and spirituality a multiculturalism issue. Professionals need to be respectful and responsible and pay close attention to potential implicit bias, boundary crossings, and destructive beliefs and practices. Working …

The Santa Clara Ethics Scale, Thomas G. Plante, Anna Mccreadie

Psychology

Ethics and ethical decision-making are important for well-functioning communities and societies, including college campuses. Yet, there are very few high quality, cost-effective, relevant, and easy-to-use assessment instruments currently available. This paper introduces the new Santa Clara Ethics Scale, a very brief no-cost questionnaire assessing general ethics. The 10-item scale was administered to 200 university students along with several other measures to assess convergent and divergent validity. Information regarding the validity and reliability of the scale along with test utility is presented. Implications for future research and use are discussed as well.

Asian Americans Respond Less Favorably To Excitement (Vs. Calm)-Focused Physicians Compared To European Americans, Tamara Sims, Birgit Koopmann-Holm, Henry Young, Da Jiang, Helene Fung, Jeanne L. Tsai

Psychology

OBJECTIVES:

Despite being considered a "model minority," Asian Americans report worse health care encounters than do European Americans. This may be due to affective mismatches between Asian American patients and their European American physicians. We predicted that because Asian Americans value excitement (vs. calm) less than European Americans, they will respond less favorably to excitement-focused (vs. calm) physicians.

METHOD:

In Study 1, 198 European American, Chinese American, and Hong Kong Chinese community adults read a medical scenario and indicated their preference for an excitement-focused versus calm-focused physician. In Study 2, 81 European American and Asian American community college students listened …

A Survey Of Ethics Training In Undergraduate Psychology Programs At Jesuit Universities, Thomas G. Plante, Selena Pistoresi

Psychology

Training in ethics is fundamental in higher education among both faith-based and secular colleges and universities, regardless of one’s academic major or field of study. Catholic colleges and universities have included moral philosophy, theology, and applied ethics in their undergraduate curricula for generations. The purpose of this investigation was to determine what, if anything, Jesuit college psychology departments are doing to educate psychology majors regarding ethical issues. A survey method was used to assess the psychology departments of all 28 Jesuits colleges and universities in the United States. A total of 21 of the 28 schools responded and completed the …

The Cultural Shaping Of Compassion, Birgit Koopmann-Holm, Jeanne L. Tsai

Psychology

In this chapter, we first review the existing literature on cross-cultural studies on compassion. While cultural similarities exist, we demonstrate cultural differences in the conception, experience, and expression of compassion. Then we present our own work on the cultural shaping of compassion by introducing Affect Valuation Theory ( e.g., Tsai, Knutson, & Fung, 2006), our theoretical framework. We show how the desire to avoid feeling negative partly explains cultural differences in conceptualizations and expressions of compassion. Specifically, the more people want to avoid feeling negative, the more they focus on the positive (e.g., comforting memories) than the negative (e.g., the …

Nurturing Compassion Development Among College Students: A Longitudinal Study, Thomas G. Plante, Katherine Halman

Psychology

Little research exists on the development of compassion among college undergraduates. This study tracks changes in compassion and identifies factors associated with these changes over the course of undergraduate students’ college careers, from the time of admittance to the time of graduation. Compassion levels assessed at the point of college entrance accounted for 25% of the variance in compassion at the time of graduation. These findings provided evidence for the notion that compassion can continue to be cultivated once in college. Predictors such as diversity training, the frequency of religious service attendance, participation in community-based service-learning, political identification, and feeling …

Compassion Predictors In Undergraduates: A Catholic College Example, Erin S. Callister, Thomas G. Plante

Psychology

Compassion is sorely needed in contemporary society, including within faith-based colleges. Past research has examined the prevention of compassion fatigue in healthcare professions, but relatively little research exists on the predictors of compassion, particularly among student populations. This study examines the factors associated with higher compassion levels in graduating college seniors, revealing demographic, experiential, and beliefrelated factors contributing to compassion. Results suggest that the general profile of a highly compassionate graduating college senior is a student who is female, politically liberal, religious, studying the natural or social sciences, actively involved in community service or volunteering, and who has undergone workshops …

Compassion Development In Higher Education, Roxanne Rashedi, Thomas G. Plante, Erin S. Callister

Psychology

Many schools of psychology and religious studies intend to promote the cultivation of compassion. Compassion is currently an integral area of study in psychology, religious studies, and higher education, specifically in faith-based higher education. While secular universities in the United States strive to generate disciplinary-based knowledge through scholarship, their ability to promote students' use of the information they are learning to create positive social change has typically lagged. Conscious of the magnitude of today's global issues and dissatisfied with the current disparity between the world's reality and university curricula, scholars have begun to re-imagine the role of higher education in …

If You Can’T Take The Heat, Stay Out Of The Kitchen: A Reflection On “Student Beliefs, Multiculturalism, And Client Welfare.”, Thomas G. Plante

Psychology

In Student beliefs, multiculturalism, and client welfare, Professor Kristin Hancock offers a thoughtful description of and reflection on the contemporary challenges associated with psychology graduate trainees managing their personal and religious beliefs and practices with the training and professional demands of the psychology profession and their educational training institutions. She reviewed several recent court cases (e.g., Ward v. Polite et al., Keeton v. Anderson-Wiley et al., Ward v. Wilbanks et al.) where psychology students sued their graduate programs (typically secular state universities) because their training requirements included multicultural competency training involving sexual issues such as homosexuality. These graduate training …

Get Rich U Or Get Transformed U: Reflections On Catholic Liberal Arts Education In The 21st Century, Thomas G. Plante

Psychology

Catholic liberal arts educators can proclaim boldly that we are in the business of formation and transformation of students at multiple levels and in multiple ways. We want our students to be competent, ethical, and compassionate global citizens who are thoughtful, savvy, deep thinkers who love learning and who love helping others. Research and best practices support the claim that the virtues cultivated by the liberal arts contribute to the flourishing of individuals and society as a whole. Catholic colleges and universities have a long history of promoting the liberal arts, and data from various sources suggest that we are …

The Impact Of College Student Immersion Service Learning Trips On Coping With Stress And Vocational Identity, Brad A. Mills, Richard B. Bersamina, Thomas G. Plante

Psychology

This study examined the impact of service learning immersion trips on vocational identity and coping with stress among college students. Fifty-one students (15 males, 36 females) who participated in immersion trips and 76 students (25 males, 51 females) in a non-immersion control group completed a series of questionnaires directly before and immediately after both fall and spring break immersion trips, and during a four-month follow up. Results suggest that, after returning from an immersion trip, students report a greater ability to cope with stress and a somewhat stronger sense of vocational identity relative to students who do not participate in …

The Sexual Abuse Crisis In The Roman Catholic Church: What Psychologists And Counselors Should Know, Thomas G. Plante, Courtney Daniels

Psychology

Recent events regarding child sexual abuse committed by Roman Catholic priests in the Archdiocese of Boston and elsewhere have yet again resulted in a tremendous amount of media attention and frenzy regarding this topic. During 2002 alone, approximately 300 American Catholic priests, including several bishops, were accused of child sexual abuse. Many were forced to resign their positions while others were prosecuted and went to prison. Curiously, there still exist many myths and misperceptions about priests who sexually abuse children and their victims. Since psychologists and other mental health professionals are likely to interact with many who have been impacted …

Clergy Sexual Abuse And The Catholic Church: What Do We Know And Where Do We Need To Go?, Thomas G. Plante

Psychology

Few recent topics have received the kind of media attention, heated debate, and discussion than the topic of sex-offending clergy, their victims, and supervisors. It is a story about too many bishops (and priests) behaving badly when they are purported to be the moral, religious, and ethical leaders of society. It is a remarkable story. However, it is a complex story that has had little scholarship and discourse driven by thoughtfulness, civility, and reason.

A Proposed Psychological Assessment Protocol For Applicants To Religious Life In The Roman Catholic Church, Thomas G. Plante, Marcus T. Boccaccini

Psychology

This paper proposes a psychological assessment protocol for applicants to religious life in the Roman Catholic church. While most Catholic religious orders, seminaries, and dioceses require applicants to complete some type of psychological evaluation prior to entrance into seminary, there is no established standard or protocol suggested for conducting these evaluations. The current proposed assessment protocol provides those conducting or receiving these evaluations with a comprehensive foundation from which they can add or delete components to meet their specific needs. Furthermore, the utilization of a standard clergy assessment protocol creates the opportunity for the establishment of a national database useful …