Questioning Turkish Psychological Counselor Trainees’ Prejudices towards Some Clients: Reﬂections of the Social Context

The purpose of this study is to reveal the prejudices of psychological counselor trainees towards some clients and the sources of these prejudices on a group of Turkish undergraduates of psychological counseling department. The qualitative data obtained from 39 participants were subjected to content analysis. The themes and the categories reached as a result of the analysis were discussed in line with the literature on prejudice in psychological counseling and preview studies been conducted.


Introduction
Multicultural counseling and social justice counseling competences are emphasized as main component of counseling intervention and an integral part of the professional identity of counselors (Ratts, Sing, Nassar-McMillian, Butler & McCullough, 2016).From this perspective, social and cultural values that one has, shapes mental health (Sue, 1998).Consultants' having multicultural counseling competence contributes positively to the consulting process (Kagnıcı, 2013) and clients.E.g., therapeutic alliance, consultation satisfaction (Dillon et al., 2016).
One of the biggest obstacles to multicultural counseling is people's (consultant candidates) prejudice towards a group or ideological idea (Hays, 2020).First multicultural counseling competence is stated as being aware of the prejudices of the psychological counselors (Sue, Arredondo & McDavis, 1992).Professional and qualified psychological counselors should be able to estimate the impact of prejudices on counseling process and clients and they should prevent them (Sue & Sue, 2003).
Prejudices are examined in two groups as implicit vs explicit.While explicit prejudices are those that are clearly expressed and the individual is aware of, implicit prejudices are that the individual does not express openly or even in some cases the individual is not aware of (Greenwald, Poehlman, Uhlmann & Banaji, 2009).A counselor who does not want to conduct psychological counseling with people belonging to a particular minority group displays an explicit prejudice, while counselors who do not express such a thing but unintentionally establish an insincere rapport relationship with minority people display implicit prejudice.Boysen and Vogel (2008) found that counselor candidates did not report prejudice in their selfassessment, but prejudices emerged because of implicit measurement.This situation shows that counselor candidates need more information about prejudice and sources of prejudices.
It is seen in the literature that counselor candidates have prejudices against clients with extraordinary sexual experiences (Hillier, 2018), refugees (Kassan, Rose-Green ve Nathoo, 2017), different ethnic groups (Chang ve Berk, 2009) and LGBT people (Bidell, 2013).On the other hand, it is stated that rape victims, exconvicts, albinos, drug addicts, alcoholics, individuals with HIV and survivors of insanity, cannot benefit from mental health due to stigmatization and prejudices (Efiom, Abuo ve Akpan, 2020).Studies conducted in Turkey show that, there are cultural obstacles to help seeking (Kagnıcı, 2013).
Turkish counselor candidates live with people who have different cultural aspects of life in Turkey (Kagnıcı, 2013).Due to these social and political features of Turkey, multicultural perspective is even more important (Akcaoglu & Arsal, 2018).The fact that Turkey has both a rich cultural structure and refugee crisis inevitably brings multicultural psychological counseling to center of counselor education (Kagnıcı, 2013).Sometimes cultural diversity can lead to prejudices, and it is possible that counselor candidates are directly or indirectly affected by possible prejudices against cultural differences (Meydan & Kagnıcı, 2018).
Others, situations etc. throughout their cognitive development processes and try to make sense of the outside world by creating cognitive schemas about them (Allport, 2016).Although it is likely that an erroneous and dysfunctional schema will occur in the mind of the individual during this categorization process, its transformation into a prejudice is mostly related to the social environment in which the individual lives, providing experiences to support this schema to become stronger (Crandall & Warner, 2005).Direct or indirect messages acquired from family, friends and media throughout the life and stored in the mind shape these dysfunctional schemas (Almond, 2010;Abreu, 2001).On the other hand, curriculum for Turkish undergraduates has really important role to train culturally sensitive psychological counselors (Buyruk-Genç & Yüksel-Şahin, 2018).Therefore, preventive studies to be carried out during the bachelor's degree are considered important in reducing or eliminating prejudices.
Accordingly, the aim of this research is to discover the prejudices related to psychological counseling process and clients and possible sources of these prejudices of psychological counseling and guidance undergraduate students from their perspectives that may prevent them from performing a professional psychological counseling process in the coming years.In line with aim of this study, research questions are; 1) What are the prejudices that psychological counseling and guidance undergraduate students have?2) What are the Sources of Prejudices of Undergraduate Psychological Counseling and Guidance Students?

Method
Qualitative research method was chosen for this study.Qualitative research has an important place in psychological counseling, which is associated with multiculturalism, because it allows revealing previously unidentified multicultural dynamics (Morrow, Rakhsha ve Castaneda, 2001) and its social validity (Morrow, 2005).In addition, the data were carried out using the content analysis method within the framework of the inductive approach.General Inductive Approach allows the emergence of frequent, dominant, or important themes inherent in raw data (Thomas, 2006).According to Crewsell (1995) while the phenomenological approach tries to reveal the meaning of an experience, the inductive approach tries to reveal the main meanings, themes or categories that stand out in the text in relation to the determined assessment or research objectives.

Participants
The participants of this study, carried out as qualitative research, consisted of 39 Turkish psychological counseling and guidance undergraduate students.27 of the participants were female and 12 were male students, all of whom continue their education in the third year.The ages of the students varied between 20 and 23.They are from different parts of Anatolia region in Turkey.Participants were chosen with criterion sampling method, one of purposeful sampling methods.Participants consist of psychological counselor undergraduate students who are in the third year of education and who have not previously practiced counseling with individuals or groups.

Procedure
As part of the counseling course students took in the sixth semester spring term, they were told about the aim of the current research while they were dealing with the topic of multicultural counseling, and it was explained that students who were volunteer could participate in the research.Data were collected in writing format and a structured form was created for this.The form consisting of 2 open-ended questions was sent online to 150 students' e-mail addresses and 60 students participated in the study.Participants returned within 1 week.At the first glance, 21 forms were excluded from the study because they were not filled, and 39 students' answers were found to be suitable for the study.Also, only gender-related demographic information was requested to maximize participation and open sharing of prejudices.The following question was directed to the volunteer students in writing; "Do you have any prejudices that disturb and force you, you want to get rid of and that will prevent you from professionally conducting a psychological counseling process?If so, which areas are these prejudices related to?Where might these prejudices come from?" Below the question, a blank section was left for the students to express their reflections and the students wrote in this part.Students were encouraged to express their reflections and were given time to do so.There is no ethics committee approval for the research.Students were given informed consent form to fill out.

Analysis
In analysis of the qualitative data, the content analysis method was used Content Analysis aims to reach concepts to explain the qualitative data.During analysis, four stages were followed (Şimşek & Yıldırım, 2011).These stages may be listed as follows; firstly, data coding procedures were performed, coded data were classified according to common characteristics to determine categories then the categories were re-organized to main themes and finally definition and interpretation of findings was completed.Content analysis is a useful technique in terms of low cost, opportunity to review the changes, unobtrusiveness feature, repeatable and valid results (Kondracki, Wellman ve Amundson, 2002).Open coding was chosen to name and categorize the data (Strauss & Corbin, 1990).Although the general inductive approach is like the embedded theory, open coding can be used in the coding process.Besides, theorizing in the general inductive approach is limited to the presentation and definition of the most important categories (Thomas, 2006).Open coding includes the analysis of defining, naming, categorizing, and explaining the structure in raw data (Saldana, 2015).Since aim of this research is not to develop a new theory but to comprehensively reveal the prejudices and sources of prejudices of counselor candidates, only the open coding procedure was used as a tool to create categories that reflect biases and sources.
Data were collected by first author.Then each author analyzed data independently, after that, analysis was shaped by making joint decisions.In this way, it was aimed to prevent individual prejudices or prejudices towards the study.To ensure internal reliability in the study, it was ensured that the data were presented directly without adding comments, inter-coder reliability study was carried out in data analysis (LeCompte ve Goetz, 1982) and the data was mechanically recorded.Agreement percentage of the reliability between coders during the open coding phase was determined as 87% and it has been found to be reliable according to Miles and Huberman (1994).By discussing the different encodings, the coding process was finalized.On the other hand, the findings of the study were sent to two experts in the field of psychological counseling, and feedback was received after expert examination.

Findings
The findings were presented in two titles.The first title is the findings related to the prejudices and the second title is the findings related to the sources of the prejudices.

Findings Related to the Prejudices
Findings related to prejudices were presented in two tables.In Table 1, the coded written expressions of the students were placed under categories according to their common features.In Table 2, these categories were combined in higher structures and main themes were reached.The numerical values in the brackets in Table 1 show the number of times the code was repeated.The two related tables and their explanations are presented below.

Table 1
Categories Related to the Prejudices of Undergraduate Psychological Counseling and Guidance Students (Table 1 here) The prejudices of psychological counseling and guidance undergraduate students regarding the psychological counseling process and clients were classified under eight categories after being coded.These categories were determined as, sexual criminals, violent criminals, non-patriotic people, different ethnic groups, discriminatory people, religious people, and personal issues.Some of the statements about the prejudices of the participants are as follows,

Prejudices about Violent Crime
The first thing that comes to my mind when I think of my own bias is the people who use violence against women.
I do not want to work with terrorists, sexual abusers, murderers and rapists.I don't think I can act objectively towards them during the psychological counseling process (Female).

Prejudices about Different Ethnic Groups
As I grew up, I learned that there were other identities besides Turkish identity.I realized that the parents, whose children went to the compulsory military service in the eastern Turkey, were not happy at all.I often heard that our soldiers died in the east region.While conducting the psychological counseling process with the group and individually, I can assume that these experiences will create a problem against our Kurdish clients (Male).
The environment I grew up in does not like the culture of Eastern Anatolia and Southeast Anatolia at all.Many people look at the Kurds with a different grudge and anger.There are reasons for this, too (Male).

Prejudices about Non-Patriotic People
The most difficult and unwanted situation is conducting counseling with a terrorist.I do not think I can work with a traitor, a terrorist person.Apart from that, thinking about a situation in which I will have to work with a rapist individual makes me nervous.I do not think that I can dominate myself when I encounter such a situation (Female) Prejudices about LGBT People I think that the biggest situation that will prevent me in the psychological counseling process is the people who sympathize with those who betray this homeland.I have become a very flexible person since my childhood.While I could not even respect LGBT people, I matured and started to respect.But I'm very sensitive about patriotism (Male).
Although I grew up in a tolerant environment against differences, some of the experiences I have experienced have led me to prejudice in a way that will negatively affect the counseling process with LGBT people.Actually, it created fear in me rather than bias and I had the feeling of not knowing what to do (Female).

Prejudices about Conservative People
The situation where I can experience bias is to work with a client who is overly dependent on any religion (Female) In addition, I can say that I have developed bias against members of strict religious organizations (Male)

Prejudices about Personal Issues
In counseling with couples or the opposite sex, I cannot predict what to do or how to react if the subject comes to a point about sexual life.I think I will have trouble when I speak to them openly.Besides, I do not know how to behave towards people who have different sexual orientation or who think so.I cannot predict how I can truly understand how they feel (Female) Table 2 Themes Related to the Prejudices of Undergraduate Psychological Counseling and Guidance Students (Table 2 here) The eight categories reached were deeply examined and placed under five themes in line with the messages they expressed.These themes were determined as, crime domain, nationalism domain, LGBT people domain, conservative people domain, and personal domain.
The trainees of psychological counselor included in this study stated that they will experience difficulties in the psychological counseling process when working with people who have committed crime, people they see as a threat to the nation, LGBT people and conservative people.In addition, they stated that various individual prejudices could force them in the psychological counseling process.
While the most expressed prejudice theme was crime domain (46 items), nationalism domain (18 items) and LGBT people domain (7 items) followed, respectively.

Findings Related to the Sources of Prejudices
The codes obtained from the statements regarding the sources of prejudices were presented in Table 3 under the categories.The numerical values in the brackets show the number of times the code was repeated.The main themes related to the sources of prejudices formed by the categories were presented in Table 4. Table 3 Categories Related to the Sources of Prejudices of Undergraduate Psychological Counseling and Guidance Students (Table 3 here) When examining how the prejudices related to the psychological counseling process and clients might have been occurred, it was seen that there were various sources classified in six categories.These categories were determined as, individual experiences, aspects of social circle, origin family interactions, frequent visual exposure, cultural aspects, and individual aspects.Table 4 Themes Related to the Sources of Prejudices of Undergraduate Psychological Counseling and Guidance Students (Table 4 here) Six categories that express the sources of prejudices about the psychological counseling process and clients were classified under three themes after their in-depth examination, according to their common features and messages.These themes were determined as, interpersonal domain, personal domain, and media domain.
Interpersonal domain (38 items) was found the most often mentioned theme as the source of prejudices.This domain includes social environment and origin family transferences on the individual and effect of culture.
In the second-place personal domain (18 items) includes the subjective life of the individual.Lastly, Media domain (8 items) includes related frequents stimuli in mainstream media and social media.

Discussion
The results of this study reveal the prejudices of Turkish counselor candidates towards individuals from different cultures in terms of being aware of their own attitudes, beliefs, and prejudices (Sue et al., 1992), which is one of the multicultural counselor competencies.On the other hand, it is seen that the cultural elements and experiences of the counselor candidates are effective in the sources of prejudices.These findings are discussed below within the framework of the literature.
Even though there is progress in multicultural counseling, social justice, and advocacy for psychological counseling area in Turkey ( Çelik-Örücü, 2015;Keklik, 2010) it's thought that counselor candidate will avoid working with clients who are not similar to their culture.On the other hand, it's possible that these results were reached because counselor candidates are in the beginning of their degree.For example, Crook (2010) suggests that experienced psychological counselors tend to have more competence in multicultural counseling.
When crime domain, which is one of the most common prejudices among participants, examined similar findings were reached with in previous studies.According to Shields and Moya (1997), counseling with individuals in the criminal category is difficult.Detainees and convicts in Turkey are frequently exposed to prejudicial attitudes and behaviors (Cengil & Çimen, 2019;Toper, 2016).In this case, the display on the increase of sexual offenses against children and women in Turkey is thought to be effective.On the other hand, it is noteworthy that psychological counselor's experience, education, and the status of the victim positively affect the attitude towards people with this characteristic (Nelson, Meredith;Herlihy, Barbara, 2002).
It is possible to explain the theme of nationalism domain with the Modern-Symbolic Prejudice Theory.This theory states that the dominant groups in a society behave group-oriented rather than individual-oriented when evaluating minority groups (Henry& Sears, 2002).According to this theory, practices and opinions that improve the social welfare of minority groups and ensure social equality in society harm the traditional values of dominant groups and this creates anti-minority feelings (Whitley & Kite, 2010).Ekici (2019) examined 25 articles investigating the negative attitudes and prejudices of Turkish society towards Syrians and reported that Syrians are seen as a threat to cultural structure, social and moral order, economic functioning, security, and access to basic service areas.

When
LGBT people domain theme is examined, most of the trainees who expressed their prejudices to these people stated that they could experience uneasiness during counseling process because they do not know how to communicate and work with them.Considering the studies on attitudes towards LGBT people in Turkey, mostly university students participated, and it was observed that the attitudes of university students towards these people were mostly negative (Gelbal & Duyan, 2006;Sakallı-Ugurlu, 2006).It is seen that psychological counselor candidates lack knowledge on LGBT (Bekirogulları, 2012).Çabuk (2010) interviewed lesbian and gay people who received mental health service in Turkey, and the participants' statements included that mental health professionals are not empathic to them as much as they want, and participants are reluctant to share their sexual orientation with the professionals because they don't feel comfortable enough with them.
The conservative people domain theme includes the categories of religious people and discriminatory people.It is stated that psychological counselors can try to force clients by ignoring the religious and moral views that clients have, and counselors can attempt to work on good and bad thing in a moral way with the client (Christopher, 1996).Religious and spiritual values in Turkish Culture, as in many traditional cultures, shape social and individual life significantly (Akdogan & Ceyhan, 2011).It is stated that many psychological counselors are empathetic towards a religious perspective but feel inadequate in expressing religious issues to the client (Holden, Watts & Brookshire, 1991).
In the second part of the study, the sources of prejudice that psychological counselor candidates may have been emphasized.When the prejudice sources of psychological counselor trainees are examined, it was seen that the biggest share is in the interpersonal domain.The dominance of this theme can be explained by the fact that Turkish culture has collective features (Imamoglu, 1998) and therefore, high rate of being affected by the social environment.In Turkish culture, the level of differentiation of people from the origin family is low, especially in young adulthood, and therefore it takes time to create their own emotional and behavioral patterns (Kurt, 2019).
Another source of prejudice of psychological counselor trainees was found as the aspects of social circle .It was seen that the perspective of the social environment has an impact on the prejudices of the psychological counselor trainees, especially on minority groups.In recent years, emerging refugee crisis in Turkey caused many people to think negatively towards refugees.Negative attitudes of people towards refugees increase as they get older (Uner Yılmaz, 2019).It can be argued that the trainees of psychological counselor in the young adulthood period are influenced by the older people in their social environment and origin families and they develop prejudices about the refugee issue.
When personal domain is examined as the source of prejudices, it is seen that the negative experiences of the individual about prejudice patterns are effective.This situation can be explained by the negative cognitive structures that the individual has.The negative experiences experienced by the individual cause them to form stereotypes about the people and situations who are the subjects of these experiences (Beck, 1993).Another explanation may be when the individual is not able to provide an explanation in intellectual and moral dimensions to the behavior of those with whom he or she is prejudiced.This can be explained by the lack of information, one of the main causes of prejudice (Kelman & Pettigrew, 1959).
When looking at the media domain , it is seen that the information and visuals that people are frequently exposed to play an important role in the formation of prejudices, especially on social media.This finding, which is in parallel with the results of the study conducted by Druckman, Fein and Leeper (2012), points out that the impressions of people on social media shape their prejudices.In addition, another study has revealed that people expect and want media organizations to broadcast news including various prejudice features to support their own prejudices (Wallace, Wegener & Petty, 2020).
As a result, having prejudices is a natural and frequent phenomenon in people (Duckitt, 1994).When prejudices and sources of prejudices of psychological counselor trainees who will work with many different people and groups are examined, it is seen that this situation is not very different.It is thought that new trends such as multicultural psychological counseling and culture sensitive psychological counseling, which have recently increased their popularity both in Turkey and in the world, may be effective in changing this emerging picture.Beside those preventive studies are important for counselor candidates to have the competence of multicultural counseling.

Limitations and Future Directions
Since the research was conducted based on self-reports of the participants, it was limited to the answers given by the counselor candidates, so implicit bias could not be measured.It can be thought that the psychological counselor candidates gave their answers within this framework due to social acceptance errors.Experimental research is needed to explore how students' perceptions of multicultural competence develop throughout their programs, as suggested by Gonzalez-Voller et al. (2020).This study will shed light on the preventive work to be carried out to make candidates aware of their prejudices.In this respect, it is recommended to include courses on this subject in the curriculum to increase the competence of psychological counselors' candidate on multicultural counseling.At the same time, psycho-educational programs can be prepared.On the other hand, working micro under the supervision of a multicultural competent supervisor will strengthen the multicultural counseling competence of the candidates.Considering it can be said that counselor and counselor candidates working in the field should reconsider their multicultural counseling competencies, and they can also receive supervision on issues they feel lacking.