Should culture play a central role in counseling? What are the advantages of making culture central in the counseling process? Can culture-centered counseling strengthen the field of counseling? Taking an active approach to breaking down cultural barriers, Culture-Centered Counseling Interventions recognizes culture as a barrier and brings a true understanding of culture into the therapeutic context. Author Paul B. Pedersen emphasizes that once counselors truly understand the culture of their patients, cultural understanding can be used as a tool of accuracy-indispensable to the practice of good counseling. In this practical guide, the culture-centered process is modeled as a principal dimension in counseling. Exercises and applications are included in each chapter of the book, clearly demonstrating how the course might be taught. In addition, thought-provoking "culture notes" are interspersed throughout the text and provide the reader with helpful insights and challenges. Introducing the reader to specific ways of making culture central to counseling, Culture-Centered Counseling Interventions is the ideal resource for courses in clinical and counseling psychology, multicultural and cross-cultural psychology, social work, and nursing.

Paul B. Pedersen is a visiting professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Hawaii and professor emeritus at Syracuse University. He has taught at the University of Minnesota, University of Alabama at Birmingham, and for six years at universities in Taiwan, Malaysia, and Indonesia. Pedersen was also on the summer school faculty at Harvard University, 1984-988 and the University of Pittsburgh “semester at sea” voyage around the world, spring 1992. International experience includes numerous consulting experiences in Asia, Australia, Africa, South America and Europe, and a Senior Fulbright award teaching at National Taiwan University 1999-2000. He has authored, co-authored or edited 40 books, 99 articles, and 72 chapters on aspects of multicultural counseling and international communication. Pedersen is a fellow in Divisions 9, 17, 45 and 52 of the American Psychological Association.