Abstract
Malaysia is a country with a diversified cultural background, ethnicities, and religions. Islam is the most widely practiced religion, followed by Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, other traditional Chinese religions, as well as other indigenous religions. Despite the richness of the cultural landscape, the counseling services in Malaysia seem to be very limited in terms of diversification of multiculturalism. Cultural relevance of counselling theories, adaptation of Western-trained counseling services to suit a Malaysian culture, and multicultural counseling competencies, are among the concerns in the profession. This paper focuses on factors that shape a counselor’s identity based on their cultural background, and its implications on multicultural counseling in Malaysia. Among the important factors highlighted in this paper are religious beliefs and values, locus of control, gender, and personality. This paper encapsulates the importance of understanding a counselor’s cultural identity for the effectiveness of multicultural counseling in Malaysia.
Highlights
Malaysia is a country with a diversified cultural landscape, in terms of ethnicity and religion
This paper focuses on factors that shape a counselor‟s identity based on their cultural background, and its implications on multicultural counseling in Malaysia
Of all the religions in Malaysia, Islam is the most widely practiced religion (61.3%), followed by Buddhism (19.8%), Christianity (9.2%), Hinduism (6.3%), traditional Chinese religions (1.3%), and indigenous religions (0.4%), which are based on the 2020 Population and Housing Census of Malaysia (Department of Statistic Malaysia, 2011)
Summary
Malaysia is a country with a diversified cultural landscape, in terms of ethnicity and religion. According to the most recent demographic data (Department of Statistics Malaysia, 2021), the Malaysian population is divided into three major races: Bumiputera (69.7%), Chinese (22.5%), Indian (6.8%), and other ethnic minorities. Rafidah Aga Mohd Jaladin et al (2020) have listed a few serious concerns about (a) cultural relevance of counselling theories applied by Malaysian counsellors, (b) the extent of adjustment or modification, made by Western-trained counsellors based on Malaysian‟s culture, and (c) the status of multicultural counseling practices among professional counsellors. It is suggested that there is an imminent need for Malaysian professional counsellors to improve their multicultural counseling competencies. The author will discuss the importance of a counsellor‟s self-awareness of his/her own cultural identity in terms of multicultural counseling. The discussion will focus on three aspects of identities, namely (1) religious beliefs or values; (2) worldview, i.e., locus of control and responsibilities; and (3) gender and personality
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