Abnormal Behavior in Cultural Context

Abstract

Many psychologists are finding that they are not able to confine their professional activities to the psychological problems of the middle class. This is not a startling revelation since, in our culturally complex society, many individuals who have severe psychological problems are just as likely to be from the under-classes (the poor, the ethnic minorities, the growing number of refugees, the chronically disabled, etc.) as they are to be from the more familiar middle class. What is startling, however, is that the theories we are taught, the procedures and techniques we have inherited from the last generation of psychologists, and even the training programs that introduced us to the profession have their roots—indeed, their major thrust—in middle-class values and orientations. Contemporary practitioners or researchers have little preparation for dealing with the “cultural problem” in our professional activities—little beyond the admonition of sage methodologists that we should be wary of our transgressions if we consider using procedures or concepts derived in one culture with clients or problems from another. But to examine the situation practically, what does the practitioner who is presented with the following problem situations do?