Multicultural Issues in Evidence-Based Interventions

Cultural and Linguistic Diversity Representation in School Psychology Intervention Research

“…This limitation also suggests that researchers are continuing the practice of basing study results and discussions on restricted populations-in terms of racial/ethnic group membership, economic status, and language status-and are not exploring the possibility that some aspects of behavior and functioning may be explained by variables associated with cultural and linguistic diversity. As research is limited by lack of information about the transferability to and validity of most interventions with culturally and linguistically diverse samples (Ingraham and Oka 2006), the results of this study suggest that this continues to remain a barrier in providing effective psychological services to diverse youth. If school psychologists are to heed the calls proposed by leaders in the field and by professional organizations to reform school psychology practice to more closely align with empirically supported treatments (Drake et al 2004;Gresham 2001;Gutkin 2012;Kazdin 2004;Kratochwill and Shernoff 2004;National Association of School Psychologists 2010;Sheridan and Gutkin 2000), intervention research must be conducted in a way that allows for decisions about the selection of appropriate interventions to be made with validity.…”

“…For example, researchers have suggested that not incorporating CLD samples into studies may create external validity problems that lead to the inaccurate generalization of findings and the use of interventions that may be inappropriate for certain groups of persons (Fuertes et al 2001;Sue 1999). Ingraham and Oka (2006) have added to this idea by highlighting the unknown portability of the majority of evidence-based practices that have been validated with students representing the majority culture and not CLD youth. To address these issues, it has been suggested that researchers should clearly identify the locations and populations of participants to which results may be generalized (Gersten et al 2005;Horner et al 2005).…”

“…However, school psychologists should have the ability to evaluate the appropriateness of different interventions in order to make the adjustments needed for an intervention to be meaningful and successful for students of different CLD groups and populations. As proposed by Ingraham and Oka (2006), factors to explore when considering using an intervention with diverse populations include (a) the similarities and differences between the sample used in a published study and the intended target sample for the intervention, (b) how an intervention could be modified to match the target population and context, and (c) the mechanisms of change of the intervention and how they can be applied to the target population. If a target sample is different than the sample represented in a published study, a practitioner should identify key areas of differences and consider ways to modify the intervention.…”

Supporting Collaborative Efforts in Implementing Evidence-Based Reading Interventions: The Role of Online Databases

“…The WWC and CDDRE base their evidence standards, in part, on the number of published studies and the sample sizes for those studies. Therefore, some interventions may be recognized as having strong evidence while another may identify the same that cannot clearly demonstrate its effectiveness across groups (see Ingraham & Oka, 2006).…”

“…As Ingraham & Oka (2006) stated, the issue is not that all interventions will not work with diverse populations. Rather, the issue is that because we have not studied it then we do not know what will or will not work.…”