Black students' attitude toward counseling and counselor preference

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Authors
Duncan, Lonnie Earl
Advisor
Bowman, Sharon L.
Issue Date
1996
Keyword
Degree
Thesis (Ph. D.)
Department
Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services
Other Identifiers
Abstract

The utilization of counseling services by Black college students has been a focus of the help seeking literature. The help seeking literature has focused on the nature of the potential problem, attitude toward counseling, rank of potential helpers, characteristics of help seekers, and the characteristics that Black students most prefer when choosing to see a counselor. The majority of this literature has primarily focused on the differences between White and Black students while ignoring within group differences. The present study examined the help seeking attitude and counselor preference of Black college students. The following hypotheses were investigated: a) whether African self-consciousness, socioeconomic status, sex, cultural mistrust, and prior counseling experience would predict attitudes toward counseling, b) whether African selfconsciousness, sex, socioeconomic status, prior counseling , and cultural mistrust would predict counselor preference for personal concerns, c) whether African self-consciousness, sex, socioeconomic status, prior counseling , and cultural mistrust would predict counselor preference for educational/vocational concerns, and d)whether African selfconsciousness, sex, socioeconomic status, prior counseling , and cultural mistrust would predict counselor preference for environmental concerns.A regression analysis using SPSS revealed that socioeconomic status, sex, and cultural mistrust were statistically significant predictors of attitude toward counseling. Three separate canonical correlations revealed that African self-consciousness, cultural mistrust, and gender were significant predictors of race and gender preferences for personal, educational /vocational, and environmental concerns experienced by Black students. Generally, Black students who were culturally committed, as measured by African self-consciousness, preferred a Black female counselor when faced with personal, educational/vocational, or environmental concerns while those Black students who were less mistrustful preferred a White female counselor for these same concerns. Limitations and implications for theory, practice, and research of the findings are discussed