Open AccessWhiteness Scholarship in the Counseling Profession: A 35-Year Content Analysis
Author(s) -
Hannah B. Bayne,
Danica G. Hays,
Luke Harness,
Brianna Kane
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
the professional counselor
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2164-3989
DOI - 10.15241/hbb.11.3.313
Subject(s) - scholarship , content analysis , psychology , identity (music) , racism , white (mutation) , medical education , clinical psychology , social psychology , gender studies , sociology , medicine , social science , political science , biochemistry , chemistry , physics , acoustics , law , gene
We conducted a content analysis of counseling scholarship related to Whiteness for articles published in national peer-reviewed counseling journals within the 35-year time frame (1984–2019) following the publication of Janet Helms’s seminal work on White racial identity. We identified articles within eight counseling journals for a final sample of 63 articles—eight qualitative (12.7%), 38 quantitative (60.3%), and 17 theoretical (27.0%). Our findings outline publication characteristics and trends and present themes for key findings in this area of scholarship. They reveal patterns such as type of research methodology, sampling, correlations between White racial identity and other constructs, and limitations of White racial identity assessment. Based on this overview of extant research on Whiteness, our recommendations include future research that focuses on behavioral and clinical manifestations, anti-racism training within counselor education, and developing a better overall understanding of how White attitudes and behaviors function for self-protection.