Multicultural Counseling

Multicultural counseling refers to counseling that considers the various cultural identities of the individual present in the counseling session. Traditionally, this type of designation referred to counseling that occurred when there were obvious cultural differences between the counselor and the client, such as racial and ethnic differences. More recently, as the discussion on cross-cultural matters has expanded, there is recognition that all counseling encounters are cross-cultural and therefore multicultural. This entry begins with definitions of basic concepts and goes on to discuss the ADDRESSING model as a way of operationalizing people’s various cultural identities. Case studies of how the counseling process is affected by cultural differences are explained, and the entry [Page 638]concludes with some final observations about counseling and intercultural communication.