Mental Health Professionals' Stereotypes toward Latino Immigrants

What is it about?

Many people assume that mental health professionals (counselors, psychologists, social workers, etc.) work without bias toward their clients. However, we assessed whether this was true based on how immigrants were described and based on the training that mental health professionals receive. Participants randomly received different descriptions of immigrants ('undocumented" or "illegal") and were asked questions about their attitudes toward immigrants and about new stricter immigration laws. We found that multicultural training does relate to more positive attitudes, but that certain labels (for example, "illegal") also negatively impact their views toward immigrants.

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Why is it important?

Our findings support the idea that multicultural training is essential for counselors and other mental health professionals. We also believe that mental health professionals who claim to adhere to the American Psychological Association's ethical principles for conduct should be aware that the way immigrants are labeled or portrayed, especially in the media, can impact the services that mental health professionals may provide to these immigrants.