Multicultural Guidance and Counselling

1. Multicultural Guidance and Counselling  Mr Mika Launikari, Project Coordinator Finnish National Board of Education Tel. +358-9-7747 7289 Email mika.launikari@oph.fi

2. CONTENTS OF THE PRESENTATION EUROPEAN LEVEL POLICY ISSUES EUROPEAN HANDBOOK MULTICULTURAL COUNSELLING INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION DEVELOPING MULTICULTURAL COUNSELLING COMPETENCIES LIFE MAPPING TECHNIQUE

3. GUIDANCE AND COUNSELLING IN EUROPE Memorandum on Lifelong Learning (2001) International reviews of career guidance policies by OECD, World Bank, CEDEFOP, ETF (2003-2004) European Employment Strategy 2005-2008 Education and Training 2010 Guidance resolution (2004): High-quality lifelong and lifewide guidance is a key component of education, training and employability strategies in Europe! Guidance is a way to promote SOCIAL INCLUSION, SOCIAL EQUITY, GENDER EQUALITY, …

4. HANDBOOK: MULTICULTURAL GUIDANCE AND COUNSELLING – THEORETICAL FOUNDATIONS AND BEST PRACTICES IN EUROPE ”Only” American and Canadian literature available Discussion about multicultural guidance and counselling from a European perspective needed Finland is not interested in making the same mistakes with immigrants as other European countries have made during the 1960s and 1970s PREVENTIVE MEASURES: building up competencies, establishing structures, creating good practices, etc.

5. HANDBOOK ON MULTICULTURAL GUIDANCE TARGET GROUPS: guidance counsellors, trainers of guidance counsellors, education and employment authorities, human resources personnel, … CONTENTS: combination of theory and practice, some policy level issues AUTHORS: Experts from 8 European countries FUNDING: European Commission + Finnish authorities HANDBOOK available as a pdf-document at http://www.cimo.fi/english -> Publications

6. DEFINITION OF MULTICULTURAL GUIDANCE AND COUNSELLING MULTICULTURAL GUIDANCE AND COUNSELLING is a situation in which two or more persons with different ways of perceiving their social environments are brought together in a helping relationship. (Pedersen 1994) MULTICULTURAL COUNSELLING refers to preparation and practices that integrate multicultural and culture-specific aware-ness, knowledge and skills into counselling interaction with individuals of different ethnic and cultural origin. (Arredondo, Toporek & al, 1996) N.B. The term MULTICULTURAL refers not only to various ethnic groups, but also to gender issues, different age groups, disabled people, people with different sexual identity, etc.

7. DEFINITION OF CULTURE developed by UNESCO world conference on cultural policies: "In its widest sense culture may now be said to be the whole complex of distinctive spiritual, material, intellectual and emotional features that characterise a society or group. It includes not only the arts and letters, but also modes of life, the fundamental rights of human beings, value systems, traditions and beliefs." In other words, culture includes spiritual beliefs, actual physical property, people's thoughts and emotions. It includes ways of life, basic human rights, people's values, beliefs, attitudes, norms and traditions. N.B.1. No culture is good or bad: cultures are only different in relation to one another. N.B.2. Cultures are dynamic and they evolve over time.

8. An influential researcher of cultures Geert Hofstede defines it as a collective programming of the mind that distinguishes one group or category of people from another. Generally agreed upon characteristics of CULTURE are: CULTURE is shared. All members of a particular group will share a common culture which defines the range of behaviour "acceptable" within that group. CULTURE is learned. Culture is not innate or instinctive. It is passed from one generation to the next and from individual to individual. It may change over time, as new items are learned and become customs, and others fall into disuse. CULTURE is based on symbols. The elements of language are the primary symbols used by all groups which possess a culture. CULTURE is integrated. The culture of a group is not a collection of random characteristics. It is an interrelated whole.

9. MORE CONCEPTS ETHNICITY - In general ethnic origin refers to membership to a group of persons that are defined on grounds of common history, traditions, culture or cultural background, language, geographical origin and so forth. Ethnicity is experienced cultural differences that matters in social relations. ETHNIC GROUP - Any group of people who set themselves apart and are set apart from other groups with whom they interact or coexist in terms of some distinctive criterion or criteria which may be linguistic, racial or cultural.

10. WHAT IS MULTICULTURAL GUIDANCE AND COUNSELLING? “What we see and observe, how we define ourselves, what we eat and drink, what we like and value, are products of our culture. Our culture determines our choices and views, although it does not explain everything. We are not prisoners of our cultures, our lives are also influenced by our society. Taking the cultural background of our clients into account in counselling does not mean that we adopt a stereotypical attitude towards them but that we accept and understand differences.” Multicultural guidance and counselling does not mean that counsellors should know as much as possible about different cultures but that they are aware of the impact of culture on the personalities and behaviour of both the counsellor him- or herself and the client.

11. CULTURAL DIFFERENCES – 2 MAIN TRENDS UNIVERSAL TREND emphasises that all counselling is multicultural in the sense that all individuals belong to many cultures that have different values. e.g. a black, disabled man from an ethnic minority CULTURE-SPECIFIC TREND stresses the importance of understanding and responding to the special nature of certain cultural groups in counselling and keeping in mind that clients should be seen both as individuals and as members of a culturally different group. e.g. a cultural group defined by ethnic background

12. CULTURAL DIFFERENCES –  CULTURAL IDENTITY NATIONAL: Japanese, American, French, … ETHNIC: Arab, Zulu, Roma, … REGIONAL: East German, West German, … GENDER: cultural models based on the gender roles in ethnic groups SOCIO-ECONOMIC CLASS: rich vs. poor, high vs. low status, ... LEVEL OF EDUCATION: no formal education, basic education, ... RELIGION: Jew, Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Atheist, … AGE: different generations in national and ethnic groups PHYSICAL ASPECTS: blind, deaf, … SEXUAL ORIENTATION: straight, gay, bi, lesbian, … ORGANISATION: multinational, public, private, …

13. COLLECTIVE AND INDIVIDUALISTIC CULTURES COLLECTIVE CULTURE: “WE” comes before “I”, the whole extended family involved in decision making, individual is an integrated member of a cohesive ingroup; communal responsibility, social usefulness, acceptance of authority, loyalty to family are important. INDIVIDUALISTIC CULTURE: ”I” precedes ”WE”, individual has full freedom of choice concerning his/her life (work, education, religion, politics, social role, …), self-actualisation and independence are highly valued, reservations towards authorities, loyalty to things that are personally important and relevant.

14. INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION “ Intercultural communication can be defined as face-to-face interaction between people whose cultures are significantly different from one another.” (Bennett, M. 1998: Basic concepts of intercultural communication) The sending and receiving of messages can be divided into verbal and non-verbal communication. What is said is closely linked to how it is said. The impressions (e.g. closeness or distance, spontaneity or reservedness) that we get from people are to a great extent based on non-verbal communication (e.g. gestures, facial expressions, eye-contact, touching, body distance, …)

15. INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION There are a number of cultural verbal and non-verbal communication differences that can influence the communication and counselling process with individuals from culturally and linguistically different backgrounds. If misunderstood and/or misinterpreted, many of these communication differences can seriously jeopardise the relationship between guidance counsellor and client. CULTURALLY APPROPRIATE NON-VERBAL BEHAVIOUR IS CRUCIAL TO SUCCESSFUL COUNSELLING OUTCOMES!

16. EXAMPLES OF MULTICULTURAL ISSUES IN NON-VERBAL COMMUNICATION N.B. Individual, context and cultural differences contri-bute to difficulties in interpreting non-verbal messages. For example: BODY LANGUAGE PHYSICAL SPACE AND TOUCHING TIME EYE CONTACT VOCAL TONE AND SPEECH RATE

17. SUGGESTIONS FOR SUCCESSFUL NON-VERBAL COMMUNICATION Knowledge and understanding of others´ non-verbal communication is the key to successful non-verbal communication across cultures. BE AWARE AND DELAY ATTRIBUTIONS BE AWARE OF YOUR OWN NON-VERBAL COMMUNICATION MATCH YOUR COMMUNICATION BEHAVIOUR TO DIFFERENT CULTURES

18. DESIRABLE CHARACTERISTICS OF ALL GUIDANCE COUNSELLORS: relevant for general and multicultural counselling competencies CARING as a core element SELF-AWARENESS: who am I, what is my culture? SENSITIVITY towards cultural differences ABILITY to analyse one´s own feelings ABILITY to act as a model to others ABILITY to support counselee´s individual growth ALTRUISM (unselfish regard for the welfare of others) STRONG SENSE OF ETHICS RESPONSIBILITY for oneself and others

19. EMPATHY AS A CORE COUNSELLING QUALITY EMPATHY describes an attempt to understand by imagining or comprehending the other´s perspective and communicating that understanding back to the person. EMPATHY is based on an assumption of difference and implies respect for that difference and a readiness to give up temporarily one´s own worldview to imaginatively participate in the other´s.

20. CULTURE-GENERAL ADVICE FOR SHOWING EMPATHY RESPOND TO CORE THEMES (i.e. listen attentively, put client´s central messages into his/her own words) RECOVER FROM MISUNDERSTANDINGS (i.e. check out your perceptions with the client) DO NOT PRETEND TO UNDERSTAND (i.e. ask for more information/further clarification) USE TIME IN WAYS THAT REFLECT EMPATHY (i.e. take time to think before you speak/respond to clients)

21. CULTURE-SENSITIVE ADVICE FOR SHOWING EMPATHY CHECK YOURSELF FOR CULTURAL BIASES AND HIDDEN PREJUDICES (i.e. be as objective as possible) DO NOT STEREOTYPE (i.e. avoid overgeneralising about any cultural group) INCORPORATE CULTURAL AND ETHNIC DATA INTO COUNSELLING (i.e. personalise the cultural information that you get from your clients) USE CULTURAL SCHEMATA (i.e. mental structures that are characteristic of one cultural group but not others)

22. VARIOUS STRATEGIES FOR INCREASING MULTICULTURAL COMPETENCIES EXPERTS in various sectors in your country, in Europe VOLUNTEER for work in an agency dealing with culturally different clients RESOURCE PERSONS from ethnic groups REVIEW of counselling journals, professional literature DAILY JOURNAL for identifying insights regarding your own cultural identity, assumptions, behaviour, … TRAINING to learn more about multicultural issues

23. LIFE SPACE MAPPING – CASE FROM SWEDEN The original LIFE SPACE mapping technique was created by Vance Peavy, Canada - two round spaces are drawn on a large paper: one of them for PRESENT SITUATION and the other for FUTURE POSSIBILITIES - these two round spaces are combined with a bridge or ladder which represents the steps that the client needs to take before he/she can reach the potential goals. - SWEDEN: a third circle was needed to this visualisation to represent THE PAST (see next slide)

24. LIFE SPACE MAPPING – CASE FROM SWEDEN O O==O The past The present The future Diagram 1. The three circles of Life Space mapping

25. GUIDANCE AND COUNSELLING IN FINLAND: Building up multicultural counselling competencies In-service training of guidance counsellors Initial training of guidance counsellors Information materials Research Professional study visits abroad Participation in national and international conferences Nationally and internationally funded projects