Exploring Professional Psychology Graduate Students’ Training in Culturally Competent Assessment

Abstract

Culture is recognized as a necessary consideration for psychologists to attend to when conducting assessments, the importance of which professional ethical guidelines make clear as well. What is not yet clear from the existing research is if clinical psychology training programs in Canada reflect this shift in awareness to specifically train students to be culturally competent in their assessment practice, particularly from the perspective of those students being trained. The purpose of this qualitative case study was to increase our understanding of professional child psychology graduate students’ training experiences in Canada, as they pertain to culturally competent assessment practices; as well as if and how these graduate students believe their training has prepared them to conduct adequate culturally competent assessments. Participants included ten students enrolled in a full-time, CPA accredited School and/or Clinical Child Psychology graduate program in Canada, who had completed all their required PhD coursework. Individual semi-structured interviews were conducted virtually, and each participant was asked questions related to their knowledge of culture and culturally competent assessment, experience conducting culturally competent assessments, graduate training in culturally competent assessment, and opinion on the concept of cultural competence. Overall, although students have been trained and prepared by their programs in various ways to conduct assessments with culturally diverse clients, they feel their training is lacking in numerous areas and they require more training before they would consider themselves able to conduct culturally competent assessments. Implications are discussed, as well as future directions for research and training.