Australian psychologists' perspectives on cross-cultural practice with clients of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds

The multicultural character of Australian society increasingly demands that psychologists treat clients from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds. In response, the need for the development of multicultural competence by the psychology profession has been identified as crucial to support effective cross-cultural psychological practice with CALD clients within the international research literature. Similarly multicultural competence is recognised in a range of mental health policies, psychology profession's ethical codes and guidelines, and the training and registration frameworks of the profession. In the Australian context however little empirical research has been undertaken to understand what psychologists themselves think about, or what they do as part of their, cross-cultural practice with CALD clients. The present research explored Australian psychologists' experiences of cross-cultural practice with CALD clients. The aim was to identify elements of effective cross-cultural practice, barriers to effective cross-cultural practice, and the ways in which psychologists learn to work crossculturally. Thirteen experienced cross-cultural practitioners provided 29 self-selected critical incident narratives of their experiences in crosscultural practice with CALD clients, and subsequently completed semistructured interviews. Thematic data analysis found that psychologists' experiences of cross-cultural practice when first working with CALD clients left them 'feeling thrown in the deep end' without the necessary skills to treat their clients effectively. Over time their experiences of working cross-culturally shifted to enjoyment and mastery of a range of applied multicultural competencies. Yet, even as experienced practitioners, participants felt frustrated by systemic barriers to working effectively with their CALD clients, as well as feeling overwhelmed when working with asylum seekers and/or refugee clients. Thematic analysis also identified 10 elements of multicultural competencies that were applied by participants in their practice with CALD clients. Barriers to effective practice were identified in four domains: systemic practices; the psychologist's stance; client attitude/social status; and the relationship between client and psychologist. Overall this study found strong evidence that psychologists do not learn to work effectively with CALD clients through their training programs. Instead participating psychologists had a strong interest in cultural issues, sought out cultural immersion experiences, and in the main learned on the job after realizing that they were ill equipped to work cross-culturally by standard Western psychology training programs in Australia. Future research should be conducted to verify these findings with a larger national sample of Australian psychologists. Research is also needed to address the absence of CALD patients' voices and experiences in the multicultural competence literature.