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Should psychotherapists apologise after microaggressions? An empirical analogue study of perceptions of therapists
Author(s) -
Overstreet Abigail K.,
Pomerantz Andrew M.,
Segrist Daniel J.,
Ro Eunyoe
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
counselling and psychotherapy research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.38
H-Index - 32
eISSN - 1746-1405
pISSN - 1473-3145
DOI - 10.1002/capr.12315
Subject(s) - vignette , psychology , psychotherapist , perception , social psychology , neuroscience
Microaggressions are common slights, invalidations or insults directed towards individuals belonging to groups devalued within a society and are often committed by individuals who are unaware that their words/actions may have harmful or marginalising effects. When a therapist commits a microaggression against a client, should the therapist apologise? The use of apology by therapists has received little empirical attention, and the use of apology by therapists specifically after a microaggression has received virtually none. In the current study, participants ( N = 230) read and responded to questions about a randomly assigned vignette in which the therapist committed a microaggression towards a client and then apologised (microaggression with apology condition); the therapist committed a microaggression towards a client and did not apologise (microaggression without apology condition); or the therapist committed no microaggression at all (no microaggression condition). The results indicated that for all three dependent variables intended to capture impressions of the therapist in the vignette (perceived multicultural competency, vicarious retention and overall impression of the therapist), no significant differences emerged between the microaggression with apology and microaggression without apology conditions. Both of these conditions received significantly less favourable ratings on all three dependent variables than the no‐microaggression condition, suggesting that apologising after a microaggression may not restore the impression of the therapist back to the level it would have remained if the microaggression had not occurred. The implications of these results for clinical practice are discussed, along with limitations in the method and generalisability of this study.