Recent research has produced ambiguous results as to whether traditional training in multicultural development, awareness, knowledge, and skills is necessary to produce counseling competence. To explore this question, a study of multicultural counseling competence prior to multicultural counseling training is reported here. For the study, a…

Empathy has been defined as the single most important dimension in establishing a counseling relationship. This paper describes a study that compares counselor trainees' and a general population of African American males' empathy ratings of racially mixed videotaped counseling sessions. The report addresses the following questions: "Do…