Counselor Education Commons^™

Counseling Young Adults Regarding Spiritual Wellness: The Need And The Practice, Ellise Nolan, Fawn Gordon, Kailey Bradley

Adultspan Journal

The authors explore literature discussing an increasing level of anxiety and depression in young adults connected to struggles with meaning and purpose. The authors present the challenges of young adulthood as a developmental stage, highlighting the role that spiritual/religious exploration can occupy in counseling. Exploring the barriers counselors report to integrating spirituality into counseling, the authors propose counselors utilize the Ways Paradigm framework to support young adults with their spiritual wellness, giving examples of ways of understanding, ways of being and ways of intervening for working with clients with diverse religious/spiritual beliefs. The authors conclude with a case study and …

Exploring The Relationships And Differences Of Cultural Identity Salience, Life Satisfaction, And Cultural Demographics Among Emerging Adults, Matthew L. Nice

Adultspan Journal

Quantitative research methods were used to evaluate the salience of emerging adults’ (N = 444) cultural identities of race/ethnicity, gender, sexuality, spirituality, and socioeconomic status on perceived life satisfaction and cultural demographics using the Multicultural and Social Justice Counseling Competencies (MSJCC; Ratts et al., 2016) as a guiding framework. Findings from a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) indicated significant differences between specific cultural demographics and their cultural identity salience. Racial/ethnic and spiritual identify salience were found to be significantly related to emerging adults’ life satisfaction. A regression model considering race/ethnicity and spirituality identity saliences was significant when controlling for …

The Unequal Distribution Of Social Risk For Black Men Across The Life-Span. A Novel Framework., Waleed Y. Sami

Adultspan Journal

This conceptual overview offers a comprehensive overview of systemic pathways that negatively impact the mental health of Black Men throughout their lives. Our argument highlights the importance for counselors and mental health professionals to utilize a thorough social risk assessment that considers these pathways in order to effectively address the mental health needs of Black Men while fostering positive working relationships. This overview strongly advocates for the use of context and structural determinants when evaluating mental health symptoms. Without an appropriate understanding of social risk and determinants, counselors may inadvertently perpetuate disparities by decontextualizing symptomology, and reproducing racist discourse.

Connecting With Clients In Later Life: The Use Of Telebehavioral Health To Address Older Adults’ Mental Health Needs, Jordan B. Westcott, Nicolette Castagna, Megan K. Baker, Jaclyn Musci, Nick Gowen, Benjamin Wiley, Benjamin Comire, Anne Patterson, Matthew C. Fullen

Adultspan Journal

Telebehavioral health offers a unique opportunity to expand access to mental health services for older clients by addressing systemic barriers that often render mental health care inaccessible in later life. Although health interventions facilitated by technology, including telebehavioral health approaches, proliferated at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, little guidance exists for counselors seeking to provide such services to clients in later life. In this manuscript, we describe challenges accessing mental health services, how telebehavioral health services can address these barriers, and practical consideration for delivering telebehavioral health approaches for counselors who work with older clients.

Power Of A Feminist Identity On Sense Of Self And Purpose, Kerry Diekmann

Adultspan Journal

This study centered on feminist-identified women and the meaning they made from their feminist identity. Using an Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis design, eight women were interviewed to understand their lived experience and the influence their social or political identity had on how they experienced and made sense of their world. The overarching finding was that all participants exuded a strong sense of self, which seemed to provide resilience and empower participants to navigate sexism and other injustice. Themes that support this finding include exhibiting confidence and self-advocacy, confronting sexism, and describing a connection between feminist identity and career or activism. Implications …

Integrating Feminist Approaches In Counseling Work With Adult Women, Kristen M. Toole

Adultspan Journal

The scope of ‘women’s issues’ in counseling is an ever-evolving landscape. Recent events such as the reversal of Roe v. Wade and the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on women serve as powerful reminders of the necessity of this focus while underscoring a deep-rooted history of oppressive patriarchal structures. Therefore, counselors must remain informed of the unique considerations surrounding adult women in counseling and acquire proficiency in versatile techniques to meet this population’s nuanced needs. This article examines the complexity of contemporary womanhood and explores the fundamentals of Feminist Counseling Theory (FCT), a holistic, multiculturally conscious, social justice theory in counseling. …

Recognizing Ableism And Practicing Disability Humility: Conceptualizing Disability Across The Lifespan, Katherine M. Atkins, Tamekia Bell, Tilottama Roy-White, Maria Page

Adultspan Journal

Disability culture is often misunderstood by counselors who lack extensive training in working with individuals with disabilities (IWDs) (Stuntzner & Hartley, 2014). This quantitative study used the Counseling Clients with Disability Survey (CCDS) to explore the beliefs and perceived knowledge of counselors-in-training (CITs), counselors, and counselor educators regarding preparation to counsel IWDs, which is particularly important as disability status can change across the lifespan, and given that the Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP) Standards Review Committee provided a guide to the draft standards incorporating the infusion of disability concepts. Results indicate that counselors were competent …

Utilization Of The Social Determinants Of Mental Health Framework With Older Adults For Assessment, Case Conceptualization, And Treatment Planning, Janelle L. Jones, Julia Lancaster, Lauren Robins, Wendy K. Killam, Matthew L. Nice, Bisola Duyile

Adultspan Journal

This conceptual paper will aid counselors and mental health professionals in obtaining insight to utilizing a Social Determinants of Mental Health Framework with older adult clients. Further, the article incorporates the Multicultural and Social Justice Counseling Competencies to further contextualize the therapeutic alliance. The authors utilize the Social Determinants of Mental Health Framework to frame counseling assessment, case conceptualization, and treatment planning to improve the mental health outcomes of older adults. The article utilizes a specific case example to assess, conceptualize, and plan treatment for an older adult client contextualized in their environment.

Emotional Disengagement, Lori L. Ellison

Counseling Faculty Research

Emotional disengagement is a pattern of response, typically to negative emotional experience, that attempts to deny, suppress, or mask those resulting negative feelings. It can be manifested in a number of behaviors, but the goal is to remove oneself from the unpleasantness of those emotions, regardless of the consequences. This entry examines emotional disengagement, its associated behaviors, and their consequences.

Scapegoating, Lori L. Ellison

Counseling Faculty Research

The term scapegoating comes from the Hebraic tradition of the Day of Atonement. The patriarch Moses would take a goat and curse it with the sins of the people of Israel. This would then be followed by sending the goat, laden with the sins of the people, into the wilderness alone to die for them. The goat’s symbolic sacrifice was a way of removing the year’s evil thoughts and behavior from the people and transferring them to the innocent goat so that the people could move forward in a new way.

Family Timeline Mural Drawing With Asian American Families, Rieko Miyakuni, Catherine Ford Sari

Counseling Faculty Research

According to the 2010 U.S. Census Report, Asians were the fastest-growing race and ethnic group in the United States between 2000 and 2010, increasing by 43.3% (Hoeffel, Rastogi, Kim & Shahid, 2010). “Asian” refers to a person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asian, or the Indian subcontinent, including, for example, Cambodia, China, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippine Islands, Thailand, and Vietnam (Hoeffel et al., 2010).

The majority of Asian Americans are foreign born or first-generation living in multigenerational households. As a result, three or more generations typically live under the …

Praxis: Gender Matters In Counselor Education And Training: Increasing Gender Awareness In Counselor Education And Training, Reiko Miyakuni

Counseling Faculty Research

Western society defines male and female sex from physiological attributes (e.g., genitals and chromosomes), this dichotomous view of gender is referred as gender binary.

Problems with Gender Binary

• Variations in sex and gender do not fit in the male/female, masculine/feminine dichotomy (Wiseman & Davidson, 2011).

• Diamond (2002) defined, “gender” is the social and cultural expectation of how females and males should identify themselves, how they think, behave (e.g., ‘typical’ female/male acts in a feminine/masculine ways) and feel (e.g., prefers heterosexual attraction). This gender binary socialization pressure restricts individuals’ potential.

• “Behavior does not have gender, but in today’s …