Promoting children’s health and wellbeing across diverse communities (Part 2)
Communication can be challenging, especially when communicating across cultures and languages. Navigating unfamiliar languages, customs and cultural norms can easily create misunderstandings due to differences in communication styles, non-verbal cues and contextual meanings. Language barriers may be difficult to overcome, as intended meaning, cultural expressions and phrases, and tone can be easily misinterpreted. Cultural differences in accepted ways of communicating, such as the degree of directness or indirectness, can lead to confusion or offense if not understood and respected.
Cultural brokers and interpreters
Cultural brokers enhance inclusivity and understanding by bridging cultural gaps. They provide translation, mediate conflicts, and offer cultural education to promote awareness and sensitivity (Kayrouz et al., 2021).
Working with interpreters ensures clear communication, equitable access to services, and fosters cultural sensitivity. Interpreters build trust, facilitate meaningful interactions, and help families express themselves. For free interpreting services, contact the Australian Government Department of Home Affairs’ Translating Information Service (TIS National) at 1300 655 082.
While cultural brokers and interpreters bridge cultural gaps, practitioners often independently build trust, ensure accurate assessments, and provide appropriate services through cultural humility and curiosity (Mental Health Australia, 2021).
In the following video (1 minute, 44 seconds) parent and Emerging Minds family partner Mohamed shares an experience where a misunderstanding resulted in his friend’s unwanted medical treatment. Parent and Emerging Minds family partner Lana then highlights an important consideration when working with an interpreter. Emerging Minds’ Senior Child Mental Health Advisor, Julie Ngwabi also emphasises the importance of using trained interpreters instead of relying on children for interpretation when working across cultures.
Four key domains of understanding the mental health of children in culturally diverse communities
When working with families from cultures different to your own, practitioners and parents have identified four key domains to consider that influence the mental health of children:
- migration and acculturation journeys
- cultural identities
- cultural family practices; and
- racism and unconscious bias.
These domains are introduced in the following Emerging Minds online course Understanding children’s mental health in culturally diverse communities.
Migration and acculturation journeys
Understanding a family’s migration journey and their experiences of adapting in Australia helps practitioners recognise the cultural beliefs, values, traditions and customs that the child and family bring with them, as well as what they may be seeking to change. The cultural changes that come from migrants continuing to practise and share their existing cultural behaviours while adopting cultural elements of their new home is known as ‘acculturation’. To define it academically, acculturation is ‘the process of group and individual changes in culture and behaviour that result from intercultural contact’ (Berry, 2019).
As children and families adapt to a new country, their acculturation process is something practitioners can support through therapeutic interventions (Foundation House, 2023).
Cultural family practices
Cultural family practices are the diverse ways in which families nurture their relationships and uphold their values, beliefs and community ties, drawing upon the collective wisdom and knowledge that reflects their cultural heritage. These practices enable families to deepen their cultural understanding and develop a range of skills that are essential to their children’s wellbeing (Henderson, 2020; Huang, 2018).
Interpersonal racism, unconscious bias and microaggressions
The fourth key practice consideration for working with culturally diverse children and families includes understanding experiences of racism. Racism is a widespread social problem characterised by discrimination, prejudice and unequal treatment based on people’s race or ethnicity. It can take various forms, ranging from explicit acts of hatred to subtle biases (Priest et al., 2018).
Unconscious biases are automatic stereotypes and attitudes toward specific groups, that shape behaviour and decision-making, which can lead to disproportionate health inequities. They are often unrecognised as racist; however, unconscious biases fuel inequality and racial marginalisation (Tascón, 2019; Tsipursky & McRaney, 2020).
Interpersonal racism may also take the form of microaggressions, which are subtle and often unintentional forms of prejudice, such as offhand comments or insensitive remarks. While many of these actions are not intended to harm, they also have cumulative and ongoing impacts on the health, wellbeing and adaptability of children and families in a new country (Priest et al., 2018).
Self-reflective practice
Unconscious bias and microaggressions can go unnoticed by practitioners, so critical self-reflective practice is fundamental in supporting practitioners’ ongoing cultural learning and development. Self-reflective practice serves as a valuable method for raising awareness of, and addressing, cultural biases and microaggressions for practitioners.
By engaging in self-reflective practices, including supervision, practitioners can systematically identify their assumptions, biases and prejudices. With an understanding of cultural nuances and diverse perspectives, reflective practice helps practitioners recognise and address the unintentional and implicit cultural biases in interactions or decisions, with the aim of preventing the perpetuation of microaggressions. Such self-awareness not only allows for better self-analysis of actions, responses and decision-making in a cultural context, but promotes cultural humility and sensitivity (Cox & Simpson, 2020).
Cultural humility and curiosity
Humility
Cultural humility encourages self-reflection, acknowledges biases and recognises the fluidity of intersecting identities. Rather than assuming a fixed state of understanding, the culturally humble practitioner maintains a curious approach, while being willing to learn from families and privilege their beliefs, customs and values (Hook, 2017).
Curiosity
By taking a curious stance, practitioners are well positioned to understand and demonstrate their interest in cultural differences, rather than viewing differences as a problem. Using curiosity helps practitioners to approach families independently of any preconceived ideas, avoiding stereotypes and assumptions. A culturally curious mindset fosters authentic relationships and empowers families to use their wisdom for problem-solving and positive perspectives (Mosher, 2017).
Maintaining curiosity might be challenging where families position practitioners as the expert. Families may invite practitioners to offer ideas and advice based on professional expertise and/or unconscious bias (Zurn, 2021). But recognising children and families as experts in their own lives, learning from their skills and knowledge, and encouraging them to make decisions using their own shared wisdom will help practitioners effectively provide support for children’s experiences.
