Cultural mistrust and black client perceptions of white counselor self disclosure

The present study was grounded in the need to establish culture-specific approaches to address the issue of cultural mistrust that affects cross-racial counseling dyads. Participants were 210 African American college students from a HBCU. Results of a MANOVA confirmed that counselors who self-disclose and acknowledge racial bias received higher ratings of counselor trustworthiness than counselors who self-disclose and deny such attitudes. It was also confirmed that African Americans' perceptions of the two types of counselor self-disclosure depends upon their level of cultural mistrust. African Americans who score high in mistrust were found to rate counselors who self-disclosed bias as more credible (trustworthiness, expertness, and attractiveness) than counselors who self-disclosed colorblind racial attitudes. African Americans who scored low in mistrust rated counselors who self-disclose colorblind racial attitudes as more credible than counselors who self-disclose bias. Implications for practice, training and future research directions were given.