Diversifying Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology: A Change Gonna Come

ABSTRACT

Objectives

Workforce diversity is an ongoing challenge in the field of clinical child and adolescent psychology. This article discusses individual, institutional, and nonspecific factors that contribute to a lack of diversity among clinical child and adolescent psychologists and offers suggestions to diversify and advance the field of clinical child and adolescent mental health.

Method

Seventeen professors, licensed psychologists, faculty, and clinicians in the field of clinical child and adolescent psychology answered questions about workforce diversity and who is permitted access to the field. No formal research was conducted.

Results

Individual factors included: racial discrimination and microaggressions, feelings of isolation, otherness, and not belonging. Institutional factors included: racism in academia, racial underrepresentation, ethnocentric and culturally-biased training, biased admissions selection processes, financial barriers, and lack of institutional commitment. Nonspecific factors were: values misalignment, hidden expectations, suboptimal mentoring, and limited research opportunities.

Conclusions

Drawing on recent scholarship and the Contexts, Actions, and Outcomes (CAO) Model, we recommend institutional changes in programs, policies, practices, resources, climate, partnerships, and inquiry to improve diversity in the field of clinical child and adolescent psychology.

Disclaimer

The views expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the position or policy of the United States Government or Department of Veterans Affairs.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

¹ Colleagues who responded to our questions included 17 clinical child and adolescent psychologists. The questions were initially sent to 29 racially and ethnically diverse (Black, White, biracial, Latinx) male and female clinical child and adolescent psychologists who were professors, practitioners or both. Since the questions were asked to inform our opinions, and not as a research study, and because responses were fully de-identified, we are unable to provide complete demographic data describing those who responded to the questions.

² Color-evasion racial ideology is recognized as a specific dimension of color-blind racial ideology (Neville et al., 2013). While color-blind racial ideology is arguably the more common and familiar terminology used in the literature, we use “color-evasion racial ideologies” here to reflect what Neville et al., described as “denial of racial differences by emphasizing sameness,” as well as power-evasion or the “denial of racism by emphasizing equal opportunities” (p. 455). Color-evasion may also be preferred by some given recent concerns that the phrase “colorblind” is not sensitive to individuals with vision difficulties.

³ More information about the Scholars Committed to Opportunities in Psychological Education program can be found here https://scopeau.weebly.com/.

Additional information

Funding

The preparation of this manuscript was partially supported by the National Institute of Minority Health and Health Disparities Grant [K23MD016168] (PI D. L. Bernard). All views and opinions expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the funding agencies or respective institutions.