Amid the COVID-19 outbreak that were heightened in the United States between 2020 and 2021, reports of racial discrimination increased compared to year’s past for those who identify as Black, Indigenous, or Person of Color (BIPOC). Experiences of racial discrimination are stressful, and individuals in a romantic relationship may turn to their partner to receive support. However, in the context of interracial romantic relationships where one partner identifies as White, experiences of racial discrimination may be sometimes dismissed or minimized from the White partner, which may further the distress of their BIPOC partner. Nevertheless, supportive behaviors, such as empathy, may alleviate distress and validate one’s experience of racial discrimination. Relational savoring is an online intervention that has been theorized to increase empathy and perspective taking by focusing on positive relational memories associated with one’s partner, grounded in attachment theory. The purpose of this study was to examine whether relational savoring was effective in increasing empathy and perspective taking in a sample of White identified individuals who are in a romantic relationship with a BIPOC partner. This study collected data from 111 White identified individuals in an interracial romantic relationship with a BIPOC partner for an average of 8.9 years. It was hypothesized that White identified individuals who participated in a relational savoring task would report increased empathy and perspective taking when their partner experiences a racially discriminatory event via a vignette, compared to those in the control condition. Contrary to the study’s hypothesis, participation in the relational savoring task did not statistically change White participant’ ability to perspective take and report empathic concern when faced with their partner experiencing acts of racial microaggression. Results did, however, show that relational savoring, compared with a control condition, is effective in decreasing negative emotion after exposure to a vignette that depicts a racial microaggression.

Multiple psychological frameworks have been developed to conceptualize how people internalize colonial logics about their cultural identity and culture, and how these logics in turn influence their psychological wellbeing. The extant literature has also offered various empirically supported frameworks to understand the role colonialism may have on the cultural identity and psychological wellbeing of Puerto Ricans, a community still enduring colonial oppression. This study analyzes cultural control as a mechanism of internalized colonialism, or more specifically, what messages Puerto Ricans internalize about their culture. The current qualitative research involved individual phone interviews with 12 self-identified Puerto Ricans living in Arizona and Florida. This study used qualitative thematic analysis of the transcripts, and hypothesized that Puerto Rican participants will internalize colonial logics. This study contributes to the foundational understanding of Puerto Ricans’ perception of culture, so a more complete framework can be utilized by clinicians who provide therapy to this unique and understudied population.

The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic during the spring of 2020 necessitated a sudden and national transition from in-person to telehealth mental health services. Burgeoning literature has supported the use of telehealth services generally, though there is little research related to its use among graduate-level trainees. The present study utilized data collected from a university counseling training center to compare client outcomes, namely ratings of depression and anxiety, between in-person (pre-pandemic; n = 86) and telehealth (intra-pandemic; n = 102) groups. Additionally, I examined treatment format (in-person vs. telehealth) as moderator of the association between client-reported working alliance and client-reported outcomes. Results showed a significant and negative effect of the working alliance on symptoms of depression and anxiety regardless treatment format. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

Research indicates that mental health issues are highly prevalent among college students (e.g., American College Health Association, 2018) and that first-generation students could be a higher risk of experiencing psychological distress compared to continuing-generation college students (House et al., 2019). Research also documents approximately two thirds of psychologically distressed college students do not seek help or mental health services (Hunt & Eisenberg, 2010). The purpose of the study was to contribute to the line of research on help seeking attitude and intention among college students by (1) examining potential group differences in the relationships between self-stigma, experiential avoidance, and help seeking attitude between first-generation college students and continuing-generation college students and (2) proposing the integrative model including variables from the moderated mediation model proposed by Brenner et al. (2019) and the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 1991; Ajzen & Fishbein, 1980). The final sample for the study consisted of 295 college students (Mage = 22.95, SDage = 5.94). Of the final sample consisting of 295 participants, 174 (59%) students identified themselves as continuing-generation college students whereas 121 (41%) students identified as first-generation college students. The data were collected via an online survey and were analyzed through descriptive statistics and structural equation modeling. The results did not support the proposed differences between first-generation college students and continuing-generation college students in the moderated mediation model of help seeking. The inconsistent results between the present study and previous research may be attributable to sample size, diversity factors of samples, and/or timing of data collection. The results rendered some support for adding self-stigma as a modifying variable to the theory of planned behavior. The implications of the results in relation to research and practice are discussed.

Activity in the sympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system tends tocovary amongst romantic partners. Studies of interpersonal physiology suggest that romantic partners possess the ability to influence each other’s physiological states, which may be observable through systematic covariation in partners’ physiological activity (i.e., physiological synchrony). However, very few studies have directly tested physiological synchrony across conversation contexts, which is a notable gap in the literature given that social context may modulate the implications of physiological synchrony on relational functioning. Using electrodermal skin conductance as a measure of autonomic activity, this study used multilevel vector autoregressive modeling to test for time-lagged physiological synchrony across different-gender romantic partners while they discuss 1) a mutual stress and 2) a topic of mutual enjoyment. Strong carryover (i.e., autoregressive) effects were observed in both female and male partners in both conversations. Unidirectional time-lagged synchrony was observed in the mutual stress conversation, with female skin conductance preceding and predicting male skin conductance, on average. No time-lagged synchrony effects were observed in the enjoyment conversation, on average. Across both conversations, physiological synchrony varied greatly between each couple. Findings prompt future studies to further explore physiological synchrony using multiple physiological indicators to identity couple-specific dynamics.

Depression is a serious mental health concern that has increasing prevalence rates in the United States (Mojtabai et al., 2016). Asian Americans with depression tend to experience severe and persistent symptoms, but are significantly less likely to seek treatment than other racial/ethnic groups (Alegria et al., 2008; Lee et al., 2011). The current study utilized the Health Belief Model (HBM) to examine Asian American emerging adults’ depression-specific mental health beliefs and resulting intentions to seek mental health care. Furthermore, the current study tested the traditional HBM against an Asian value-informed HBM via structural equation modeling among a sample of 385 Asian American emerging adults (Mage = 21.81, SDage = 2.88). Primary study results indicated good model fit for both the traditional and Asian-value informed HBMs. Specifically, in the Asian-value informed HBM, perceived benefits of professional mental health care mediated the association between Asian value adherence and likelihood of mental health help-seeking. Post hoc analyses provided support for the Asian value-informed HBM over the traditional HBM. These results suggest that Asian cultural values influence mental health beliefs and, in turn, the likelihood of mental health help-seeking behaviors among Asian Americans. The results of the current study have important implications for practice as well as future research in highlighting the impact of cultural variables on mental health beliefs and behaviors among Asian American emerging adults.

Depression has been found to be a major problem for young adults in college, with multiple studies indicating high prevalence rates for this population. College students struggling with depression suffer from various consequences, including academic impairment and suicidal ideation, with suicide being a leading cause of death for people in the typical age range for undergraduates. Grounded in cognitive behavior theory and humanistic theory, this study examined the intra and interpersonal factors related to depression among undergraduates. Specifically, the interrelations between friend social support, sense of belonging to the college, mattering to friends, hope, and depressive symptoms were explored. Sex and number of close friends were controlled for, as the literature also showed evidence of their significant relations to depression. The sample consisted of 177 undergraduates between the ages of 18 and 25 from a large southwestern university. Participants responded to an online survey. While participants represented a diverse range of ethnicities, the majority were White. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses revealed that hope and sense of belonging to the college negatively predicted depressive symptoms. Furthermore, through zero-order correlations, it was found that friend social support, sense of belonging to the college, mattering to friends, and hope were all positively correlated with each other. Implications for prevention and clinical practice include the roles that counselors, college personnel, and students play in the battle against depression.

Individuals in a romantic relationship may avoid discussing certain topics with their partner, often to avoid relational and emotional risk. This strategy is known as topic avoidance and may be an important factor for individuals in turbulent romantic relationship to consider due to the importance of communicating with a partner. The associations between characteristics such as openness, relationship satisfaction, and perceived partner unresponsiveness, and topic avoidance have not been directly studied within dogmatism literature. However, dogmatism, defined as a person’s relative openness (or closedness) to new information, may be an important construct associated with topic avoidance that strengthens the associations between perceived partner unresponsiveness, and topic avoidance, and weakens the association between openness, relationship satisfaction, and topic avoidance. Using data from 334 individuals in romantic relationships, results revealed that perceived partner unresponsiveness was positively associated with State of the Relationship, relationship satisfaction was positively associated with Conflict-Inducing and Negative Life Experiences, such that as scores on relationship satisfaction and perceived partner unresponsiveness increased, topic avoidance scores also increased. Openness was not associated with Topic Avoidance. Additionally, as predicted, dogmatism moderated the association between relationship satisfaction and State of the Relationship Topic Avoidance, the associations between perceived partner unresponsiveness and State of the Relationship Topic Avoidance and Negative Life Experiences Topic Avoidance. This research has important implications for clinicians working with individuals who present with relational concerns

and exhibit dogmatic behavior. Limitations and future directions are discussed.

In this study, I investigated supervisory practices (i.e., structure and facilitation) when training therapists of differing levels of experience and self-efficacy are working with clients presenting with varying levels of suicidal risk (i.e., low or high). While previous research has supported that trainees need and want less structure and direction from their supervisors and become more self-efficacious as they gain more experience, this same assumption may not hold for crisis situations, such as when clients present with suicidal risk. To examine how trainees rate the quality of clinical supervision when working with clients presented with varying levels of suicidal risk, and how this may vary according to trainee experience level and trainee self-efficacy, an experimental design was used in which trainees read vignettes of pretend clients and supervisory sessions. It was hypothesized that quality ratings of supervision and client risk level, trainee experience level, and trainee self-efficacy would be moderated by the type of supervisory practice received. Results found significant main effects for trainee experience level, client risk level, and type of supervision received on supervision quality ratings, but no significant moderations. Clinical implications for supervisory practices and future directions for research are discussed.

Traditional autonomy within clinical supervision was reinterpreted by incorporating culturally-encompassing autonomy types (individuating and relating autonomy) from the dual autonomy scale. The relations of vertical collectivism and autonomy measures were examined. Lastly, potential moderating effects of vertical collectivism on experience level and autonomy were assessed. The sample consisted of 404 counseling trainees enrolled in graduate programs across the US, aged between 21 and 68. Results from the confirmatory factor analysis supported the proposed two-factor structure of individuating and relating autonomy among counseling trainees for the adapted dual autonomy scale. Results indicated that individuating autonomy was moderately correlated with relating and traditional autonomy, and relating autonomy was not correlated with traditional autonomy. Vertical collectivism was not correlated with relating autonomy, but significantly predicted individuating and traditional autonomy. Moderating effects of vertical collectivism on experience level and autonomy were not supported. Further implications and future directions are discussed.