Strategies for Coping with Cultural Diversity

Abstract

Coping with cultural diversity is one of the major challenges facing individuals who seek counseling services as well as those who provide those services. This article describes six strategies, (a) assimilation or monoculturation, (b) acculturation, (c) alternation, (d) integration, (e) separation, andf) fusion that individuals may use to cope with cultural diversity. The relationship between these strategies, an ecosystemic model of culture, and a social cognitive theory of behavior is presented. The article discusses how these strategies may affect the process and outcome of counseling as well as the implications these strategies have for research.

Adolescent Strategies for Coping With Cultural Diversity

“…Coleman's (1995b) model hypothesized that the strategies would cluster together in a particular manner. He suggested that those strategies that involve association with only one culture would be strongly related to each other as would those that involved associating with more that one culture.…”

“…An individual can either score high, medium, or low in these categories (e.g., acculturated, bicultural, lowacculturated). Coleman (1995b) proposed an alternate paradigm for understanding how individuals manage the process of second culture acquisition. Coleman argued that traditional conceptualizations focused on the outcomes of the second culture acquisition.…”

Conflict in Multicultural Counseling Relationships: Source and Resolution

“…1993) have explored the effect of culture on the counseling process. The purpose of this article is to show how strategies counselors and clients use to cope with cultural diversity (Coleman, 1995b) can be a source of conflict and how theories of counseling and human development that are brought to the counseling relationship mler. Brome, &Williams, 199 1) can help to address and resolve conflict.…”

“…I have described the aforementioned process in detail (Coleman, 1995b). The decisions involved are not mutually exclusive.…”

“…We found that ethnicity, gender, and socioeconomic status have a n effect on which strategy an individual will use in different social contexts. I hypothesized that a source of conflict in multicultural counseling is divergence between clients and counselors regarding strategies they use to cope with cultural diversity (Coleman, 1995b). Table 1 represents ways in which this divergence can occur.…”