History and development of cultural competence advocacy in applied psychology

Abstract

The history and development of cultural competence advocacy is reviewed, beginning with a discussion of its ubiquity across a wide variety of contexts outside of applied psychology and its appearance in the scholarly literature under a wide variety of different names and labels. The chapter reviews common justifications that are often advanced in support of its need as an essential component of applied psychology training. The best available consensus among scholars within applied psychology as to the essential components of cultural competence is also reviewed. A discussion of scholarly attempts to measure and teach the construct within applied psychology is also briefly summarized.