Date of Conferral

5-15-2024

Date of Award

May 2024

Degree

Doctor of Social Work (DSW)

School

Social Work

Advisor

Paula Moore

Abstract

Social workers constitute one of the largest clinically trained groups in the helping professions delivering mental health services in the United States. Most U.S. social workers are White and provide mental health services to diverse people. The social work literature has limited information about White clinical social workers’ comfort with delivering mental health services to Black people with mental illness. The aim of this study was to better understand how White clinical social workers who self-identify as culturally competent describe their perceptions of comfort when delivering mental health services to Black people with mental illness. This basic qualitative study was grounded in Owen et al.’s multicultural orientation framework. The participants for this research study were selected using convenience and snowball sampling methods. The data collection strategy involved conducting semistructured interviews with six White clinical social workers. The interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim, and the data were hand-coded, and responses were entered into a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet for analysis. The key findings of this study revealed that although White clinical social workers who consider themselves culturally competent felt at ease, some experienced unease when discussing cultural differences or when faced with cultural situations related to specific age groups or mental health diagnoses. The findings of this study may promote positive social change by equipping social work practitioners with insights that can be utilized to develop educational approaches to increase comfort among White clinical social workers who provide mental health services to Black individuals with mental illness.

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