Culture-infused counselling: A model for developing multicultural competence

Cultural, personal, contextual, and universal factors integrate to form the personal cultural identities of both the counsellor and the client. These personal cultural identities may have a dramatic impact on the success of the counselling process and must be taken into account in both theory and practice. The culture-infused counselling model builds on the concept of personal cultural identity to form a conceptual framework for enhancing the multicultural competence of practitioners and for optimizing therapeutic outcomes with a wide range of clientele. The specific attitudes, knowledge, and skills required for multicultural competence are described, expanding upon and enhancing earlier theoretical conceptualizations of multicultural counselling competencies. This detailed elaboration of specific multicultural counselling competencies provides a foundation for counsellor education and continued professional development.