A Few of My Thoughts on CT and Cultural Diversity

I'm inclined to agree with those who suggest that CT is relatively free of cultural biases because it focuses on looking at the situation from the individual's point of view and developing an understanding of the individual's thoughts, feelings, and beliefs. This does not mean that we can ignore issues of cultural diversity because, even if CT is relatively unbiased, it is practiced by individuals who may well have their own biases.

If CT argued that rationality was "right" and that those who rely on emotional reasoning, intuition, authority, faith, etc. were simply wrong (as Tom Dowd suggests) it could be argued that this is a cultural bias. However, CT does not assert that rationality is right and other epistemologies are wrong.

CT focuses on understanding what thoughts, feelings, and actions the individual experiences in problem situations and attempts to identify any cognitions that play a role in the individual's problems. If we find any dysfunctional cognitions, we try to help the individual find more adaptive alternatives (as well as using a range of other interventions).

If emotional reasoning causes problems for the individual and it appears that a more rational approach will be more adaptive, we will try to get the individual to try a more rational approach and observe how that works in real life. However, if an overly rational approach causes problems for the individual, we may work to get the client to be more aware of his or her emotions and to take them more seriously.

We try to identify what actually works in real life rather than assuming that our culture or the client's culture is "right." In order to do this effectively we need to be aware of our own biases, we need to try to understand the client's culture, and (most of all) we need to accurately observe what actually happens in real life rather than trusting our own preconceptions or the client's.

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