CULTURALLY RESPONSIVE MENTAL HEALTH: PROVIDING FOR MIDWESTERN HISPANIC/LATINX COMMUNITIES

Hispanic/Latinx communities face a troubling number of barriers in accessing mental health services. Many difficulties associated with access have been studied within urban communities across the southern and western regions of the United States. However, over the past two decades, the Midwest has become a geographical location where this ethnic group has and will continue to see exponential growth. Unfortunately, adequate mental health services for the growing population within this geographic region are scarce. Additionally, more rural areas of the Midwest are heavily impacted by a lack of adequate mental health care services. The barriers that exist to access mental healthcare in rural and Hispanic/Latinx communities highlight the need for service-focused research specific to geographical regions such as the Midwest. This also underscores the roles and responsibilities that mental health care providers have in providing culturally responsive resources for Hispanic/Latinx communities. It is for these reasons that the present study explored the perspectives of mental health care providers in a Midwestern city in their endeavor to provide the Hispanic/Latinx community with culturally responsive mental health services. This study is a step towards assessing the infrastructure of mental health care that is accessible to Hispanic/Latinx communities in the rural Midwest. It will also provide important insight into unique barriers that exist for new growing Hispanic/Latinx communities through the perspective of mental health care providers. The thesis also aims to add to the existing literature that explores how culturally responsive services for Hispanic/Latinx communities may look

BEYOND GATEWAY CITIES: ECONOMIC RESTRUCTURING AND POVERTY AMONG MEXICAN IMMIGRANT FAMILIES AND CHILDREN

Our main objective is to better understand how new residential patterns have reshaped patterns of poverty among America's growing Mexican-origin population. We use data from the Integrated Public Use Microdata Samples (IPUMS) to document recent changes in poverty rates among native-born and foreign-born Mexicans living in the Southwest and in new regions where many Mexican families have resettled. Our analysis focuses on how changing patterns of employment (e.g., in construction and food processing industries) have altered the risk of poverty among Mexican families and children. We demonstrate that the Mexican population dispersed widely throughout the United States during the 1990s. Perhaps surprisingly, Mexican workers, especially new immigrants, had much lower rates of poverty in the new destination regions and rural areas than their counterparts that remained in traditional areas of population concentration - the Southwest. As we show in this study, the dispersion of America's Mexican native-born and immigrant populations raises questions and hopes about their economic and political incorporation into American society.Food Security and Poverty,

A Study of Access to Support Services by Immigrant Populations in Midwestern Counties in the United States

The purpose of this quantitative-descriptive study was to examine the perceptions of immigrants in Midwest counties access to government healthcare services. This study was based on the Rawls Theory of Justice and Social Stratification Theory. Immigrant perceptions were assessed using the 2001 California Health Interview Survey (CHIS). Research questions (RQ) for the study were as follows: RQ 1—What differences exist in immigrant perceptions of their access to government health services, with respect to immigrant status and gender of the immigrant? RQ 2—What differences exist in immigrant perceptions of their access to government health services, with respect to immigrant status and age of the immigrant? RQ 3—What differences exist in immigrant perceptions of their access to government health services, with respect to immigrant status of the immigrant? The survey was sent to 85 immigrants who quantified for the study through Qualtrics, an online survey software company. All participants were either new immigrant or US citizen immigrants, age 18 and older. To address the research questions, a two-way MANOVA and an independent sample t-test were conducted to analyze the effects on the perceptions of access to government services with respect to the gender, age and the immigration status. Although previous research indicated a lack of access immigrants have to social services, this study results showed that the participants’ responses about their perceptions of access to government services were not significantly different according to gender, age and immigration status (p \u3e .05)

The Latino Landscape: A Metro Chicago Guide and Nonprofit Directory

Provides an overview of the demographics and history of the diverse groups within the Chicago area's Latino/Hispanic community, with profiles of each group, and a directory of nonprofits led by or serving Latinos/Hispanics, including program areas

Ethnic and Language Matching: Effects on Hispanics\u27 Treatment Perceptions

Cultural adaptations to mental health treatment have been recommended to improve treatment outcomes in minorities, including Hispanics (Griner & Smith, 2006). One such adaptation includes matching the therapist to the client on culturally salient variables, such as spoken language or ethnic background. Yet, most investigations about the efficacy of matching have been correlational or have not examined language and ethnic match together (Cabassa, 2007). I investigated the effects of both ethnic and language matching on Hispanics\u27 perceptions of psychological treatment. Participants were 100 Hispanic adults (36 men) randomly assigned to one of four conditions. In each condition, participants read a vignette describing a Hispanic man with depression symptoms who received services from a mental health clinician. Vignettes varied the clinician\u27s language (Spanish or English) and ethnicity (Hispanic or non-Hispanic). Questions following the vignette asked participants to indicate the extent to which they felt the clinician was qualified, would be helpful, the treatment was appropriate, and treatment would consider important cultural factors. An exploratory factor analysis revealed these questions represented two factors: clinician professional qualifications and clinician consideration of culture into treatment. These factors represented dependent variables in subsequent analyses. Analyses of variance revealed a significant main effect of ethnic match on both dependent variables, with ethnic match leading to enhanced perceptions of the qualifications and cultural sensitivity of the clinician. A significant main effect of language match was found only for perceptions of the clinician\u27s professional qualifications. Contrary to hypotheses, no significant interaction between matched ethnicity and language emerged. Results demonstrate language matched clinicians, regardless of ethnicity, were seen as more qualified than unmatched clinicians, but only clinician ethnicity was related to a sense that cultural factors would play a role in treatment decisions

Incremental Clinical Utility of ADHD Assessment Measures With Latino Families

Objective: This study examined the incremental clinical utility of parent and teacher reports of ADHD symptomatology and functional impairment in Latino youth, as well as parent and teacher agreement with the final clinical judgment on a diagnostic structured interview. Method: Participants included 70 Latino youth (47 males, 23 females; M age = 8.13 years, SD = 2.51 years) and their parents and teachers; 60 participants were diagnosed with ADHD. Correlations, percent agreement, kappas, and regressions were utilized. Results: Results demonstrated that teachers agreed with the final clinical judgment more often than did parents. Results additionally demonstrated that functional impairment did not statistically significantly improve diagnostic models already including ADHD symptoms; follow-up analyses were run and are discussed. Finally, results demonstrated that teacher reports statistically significantly improved diagnostic models already including parent reports. Conclusion: The current findings suggest the importance of including both parent and teacher reports of both ADHD symptomatology and functional impairment when assessing ADHD in Latino youth

Acculturation and Depression Among Hispanics: The Moderating Effect of Intercultural Competence

In the present study the authors examined the relative contributions of typical acculturation indicators, general coping, and intercultural competence in predicting depression among 96 Hispanic adults. The results indicated that intercultural competence served to moderate the relationship between acculturation and depression. The combination of high acculturation and high intercultural competence was associated with fewer symptoms. General coping accounted for significant amounts of variance in predicting depression, over and above traditional acculturation variables alone, suggesting that an active problemsolving style was associated with a healthier outcome. The findings are discussed within the context of integrating competence-based variables into psychological conceptualizations of cultural adaptation and the importance of group-specific abilities as potential buffers against negative mental health consequences

Initial Development and Validation of the Mexican Intercultural Competence Scale

The current project sought to develop the Mexican Intercultural Competence Scale, which assesses group-specific skills and attributes that facilitate effective cultural interactions, among adults of Mexican descent. Study 1 involved an exploratory factor analysis (N = 184) that identified 5 factors including Ambition/Perseverance, Networking, the Traditional Latino Culture, Family Relationships, and Communication. In Study 2, a confirmatory factor analysis provided evidence for the 5-factor model for adults of Mexican origin living in the Midwest (N = 341) region of the United States. The general findings are discussed in terms of a competence-based formulation of cultural adaptation and include theoretical and clinical implications