Counseling and psychotherapy with Asian-Americans: Review of the literature.

Abstract

This article is divided into three sections. The first section concerns the diagnosis and assessment of Asian-America ns and covers the following issues: (a) symptom expression, (b) therapist bias, (c) problems with the use of interpreters, and (d) problems with the use of clinical and personality tests. The second section, on counseling and psychotherapy, is divided into three subsections: (a) client variables, (b) therapist variables, and (c) counseling process and outcome. The subsection on client variables covers such issues as the personality of Asian-America ns, language problems, the acculturation process, and counseling expectations. The subsection on therapist variables includes discussion of therapist bias, training bias, lack of intercultural skills, and culture-specific knowledge. The therapy process and outcome subsection reviews empirical studies, clinical case studies, and articles with treatment strategies and recommendations. Research issues as well as research recommendations for each of the areas reviewed are identified and discussed in the third section.