206 journal of Multicultural counseling and developMent ? July 2015 ? Vol. 43

? 2015 American Counseling Association. All rights reserved.

Received 12/31/13
Revised 10/14/14

Accepted 01/01/15
DOI: 10.1002/jmcd.12015

Assessing the Impact of a Race-Based
Course on Counseling Students:

A Quantitative Study
Tina R. Paone, Krista M. Malott, and Jason J. Barr

This study sought to determine changes in 121 White counseling students
following their participation in an experiential, race-based course taught in a
group format. Pre- and postoutcomes were reported based on instruments that
measured White racial identity development, White privilege, color blindness,
and the costs of racism. Findings indicated significant changes according
to the majority of measures, although with certain distinctions. Findings are
discussed in light of the current literature.

Keywords: multicultural counselor training, racism, Whiteness, counselor
education, group counseling

Este estudio trat? de determinar los cambios en 121 estudiantes blancos de
consejer?a despu?s de su participaci?n en un curso experiencial basado en
la raza que se ense?? en formato de grupo. Se comunicaron los resultados
previos y posteriores bas?ndose en instrumentos que midieron el desarrollo
de la identidad racial blanca, el privilegio blanco, la falta de percepci?n de
color y los costos del racismo. Los hallazgos indicaron cambios significativos
seg?n la mayor?a de mediciones, aunque con ciertas distinciones. Se discuten
los hallazgos a la luz de las investigaciones actuales.

Palabras clave: formaci?n multicultural de consejeros, racismo, identidad
blanca, educaci?n de consejeros, consejer?a en grupo

Racism persists in contemporary society, albeit often in more subtle and complex forms, and there is copious evidence of its negative effects on the health and mental health of people of color (Nadal, Griffin, Wong,
Hamit, & Rasmus, 2014; Pieterse, Carter, & Ray, 2013). Across the field of
mental health, studies have documented the surfacing of racism in cross-racial
counseling dyads, often unconsciously enacted by White clinicians (Neville &
Carter, 2005; Ridley, 2005). For example, White counselors? negation of the
salience of race and the effects of racism on people of color, a phenomenon
often referred to as color blindness (Neville, Spanierman, & Doan, 2006), has
been shown to result in distorted assessments of clients of color (Gushue,
2004) and has been correlated with lower multicultural counselor competency
(Spanierman, Poteat, Wang, & Oh, 2008) and a reduction in a counselor?s
ability to demonstrate empathy (Burkard & Knox, 2004). Additionally, studies
have found that clients of color who perceived racial bias in White counselors

Tina R. Paone, Department of Speech Pathology, Educational Counseling, and Leadership, and Jason J.
Barr, School of Education, Monmouth University; Krista M. Malott, Department of Education and Coun-
seling, Villanova University. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Tina R. Paone,
Department of Speech Pathology, Educational Counseling, and Leadership, Monmouth University, 400
Cedar Avenue, West Long Branch, NJ 07755 (e-mail: [email?protected]).

journal of Multicultural counseling and developMent ? July 2015 ? Vol. 43 207

were less likely to indicate positive alliances or satisfaction with therapy (Owen
et al., 2011) and were more likely to give lower ratings of their counselor?s
cultural competence (Chang & Berk, 2009).
In an effort to reduce the presence and harmful effects of racial bias across
mental health practices, scholars have asserted the need to provide race-
based education to White counselors-in-training (Helms, Guerda, & Green,
2012; Ridley, 2005). Such trainings, however, can evoke powerful and nega-
tive reactions in White students (Chick, Karis, & Kernahan, 2009). Intense
emotions, such as empathy, guilt, and fear, have been dubbed as a kind of
psychosocial cost of racism that affects Whites? behaviors toward people of
color as they come to realize or, conversely, work to deny the presence and
impact of racism in self and society (Spanierman & Poteat, 2005). Although
in no way commensurate to the costs experienced by people of color, there
is a growing recognition that racism is a phenomenon that also negatively
affects Whites in multiple ways (Todd, Spanierman, & Poteat, 2011).
Counselor educators have sought to promote White counseling students? ra-
cial identity growth through multicultural instruction. The fostering of White
racial identity growth is assumed to correlate with prejudice reduction, and
there is some research to support the idea that racial identity can be linked
with racial bias (Carter, 1990; Gushue & Constantine, 2007). In turn, general
multicultural training has been shown to develop students? racial identities and
levels of interracial comfort (Parker, Moore, & Neimeyer, 1998), and, overall,
more multicultural training has been correlated with improved racial identity
attitudes (Evans & Foster, 2000).
There are few actual studies in counseling that describe the content, peda-
gogical format, and outcomes of race-related trainings. For those that do exist,
the findings are promising in that they have shown that multicultural training
can positively affect racial growth (Castillo, Brossart, Reyes, Conoley, & Phoum-
marath, 2007; Heppner & O?Brien, 1994; Neville, Lilly, Duran, Lee, & Browne,
2000; Parker et al., 1998; Rothman, Malott, & Paone, 2012). Scholars in those
studies applied a similar mixture of pedagogical practices (e.g., didactic and
experiential) to multicultural trainings that were largely general in nature (e.g.,
addressing various topics, such as gender, culture, and race). All of these studies
reported the tenets of their race-based courses to allow tentative conclusions
regarding effective instructional practices in race-based multicultural counselor
training. Those conclusions included the following: (a) Addressing counselor
knowledge, awareness, and skills related to race can potentially positively affect
White students? learning, such as increased knowledge and skills in work across
race, increased awareness of personal bias, and, in some cases, a reduction in
racial bias; (b) a combined use of didactic and experiential activities were rec-
ognized by students as helpful in learning in race-based trainings, particularly
in relation to exposure to the perspectives and experiences of people of color
(Heppner & O?Brien, 1994; Neville et al., 2000); and (c) course topics gener-
ally followed recommendations for race-based trainings and therefore seemed
effective in student learning. Recommendations included addressing students?

208 journal of Multicultural counseling and developMent ? July 2015 ? Vol. 43

racial identities, personal biases, traits or experiences of people of color, the
presence and effects of racism and privilege, and skills in cross-racial counseling.
Although such studies lend direction and support for race-based counselor
trainings, several weaknesses were present, which reduced the generalizabil-
ity of findings. These included small sample sizes, generalized multicultural
curriculum in two of the five studies (e.g., making duplication of the study
and pedagogical practices impossible, while reducing the ability to determine
whether the race-based or non-raced-based aspect of the curriculum influenced
outcomes), and limited use of race-based outcome assessments. Only two of
the five studies directly assessed outcomes related to positive changes in bias
(Castillo et al., 2007; Heppner & O?Brien, 1994). Consequently, most studies
lacked specific measures of prejudice reduction, which is a primary objective
of race-based counselor trainings (Locke & Kiselica, 1999). Hence, there is a
continued need for the development and verification of race-based counselor
training, with a call for more in-depth, race-specific training details as well as
increased participant numbers and race-based outcome assessments (Sanchez-
Hucles & Jones, 2005). To extend the scholarly and critical examination of this
phenomenon, we examined outcomes from a race-focused, advanced-level
multicultural counseling course. We sought to respond to Spanierman and
Poteat?s (2005) call to assess ?multiple interacting factors? (p. 515) inherently
present when studying Whites in relation to race, and to honor the complex-
ity of racism and its effects on Whites. Hence, we incorporated several inter-
related measures to determine the nature of the effect of the training. The
training uniquely focused on race-based topics rather than including myriad
other general multicultural topics. It was provided to master?s-level counseling
students in an effort to develop their racial awareness and antiracist skills and
as a response to the call for increased social justice advocacy of mental health
practitioners in eradicating racism that affects clientele (Spanierman & Poteat,
2005). Specifically, our research sought to examine the following hypotheses:

Hypothesis 1: Participants will demonstrate an increased awareness of the
costs of racism from pretest to posttest.

Hypothesis 2: Participants will demonstrate an increased awareness of
White privilege from pretest to posttest.

Hypothesis 3: Participants will demonstrate reduced levels of color blind-
ness, resulting in greater awareness of the presence of racial privilege
and discrimination from pretest to posttest.

Hypothesis 4: Participants will demonstrate positive growth in their White
racial identity from pretest to posttest.

method
participants

Participants totaled 121 White master?s-level counseling students at a private
university in the northeastern United States who were enrolled in an advanced-

journal of Multicultural counseling and developMent ? July 2015 ? Vol. 43 209

level multicultural counseling course. There were approximately 10 students
in each course section. Of the participants, 107 were women (88%) and 14
were men (12%), with a mean age of 26.5 years (SD = 5.4), ranging from 20
to 53 years old. At the inception of the study, participants had completed
a mean of nine courses (SD = 3.6) in their graduate program. Nineteen
participants (16%) had completed four to six courses and/or workshops
in multiculturalism, whereas 89 (74%) had completed one to three courses
and/or workshops in multiculturalism. Thirteen (11%) had never completed
a multicultural course before the intervention; the percentages do not total
100 because of rounding.

procedure

Data were collected from 17 different course sections over a span of 5 years.
Study procedures were approved by the university?s institutional review board.
The course required students to participate as group members in an expe-
riential group course. Students were read an invitation script on the 1st day
of class by an instructor who did not teach the course, to indicate that study
participation was optional. Participants were assured that they could continue
in the course regardless of participation in the study and that they could ter-
minate study participation at any point. In the 1st week of class, participants
took pretest assessments. At the final group session, they all completed those
same assessments.

Measures

A demographic questionnaire asked participants to provide their ethnicity,
gender, age, master?s academic degree program, and information on their
multicultural training experiences. To assess for changes in participants?
awareness of the costs of racism, we used the Psychosocial Costs of Racism to
Whites Scale (PCRW; Spanierman & Heppner, 2004). The PCRW is a 16-item
self-report assessment of the psychosocial costs of racism for White individuals
and is scored on a 6-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 6
(strongly agree), with higher scores indicative of greater experiences of the
costs of racism. The PCRW has three subscales: the White Empathy sub-
scale, which measures reactions of sadness, helplessness, and anger to racism
(pretest a = .45, posttest a = .55); the White Guilt subscale, which measures
remorse regarding unearned advantages (pretest a = .76, posttest a = .72);
and the White Fear subscale, which measures irrational fear and distrust of
people of color (pretest a = .63, posttest a = .58).
To assess participant changes in awareness of White privilege, we used the
White Privilege Attitudes Scale (WPAS; Pinterits, Poteat, & Spanierman, 2009).
The WPAS is a 28-item scale that assesses the multidimensional nature of White
privilege attitudes, including affective, cognitive, and behavioral dimensions,
and is scored on a 6-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 6
(strongly agree), with higher scores indicating higher White privilege attitudes.

210 journal of Multicultural counseling and developMent ? July 2015 ? Vol. 43

The WPAS has four subscales: the Willingness to Confront White Privilege
subscale, which measures an individual?s willingness to confront instances of
racial privilege (pretest a = .91, posttest a = .87); the Anticipated Costs of
Addressing White Privilege subscale, which measures individual affect associ-
ated with addressing one?s own privilege (pretest a = .78, posttest a = .78);
the White Privilege Awareness subscale, which measures recognition of White
privilege (pretest a = .77, posttest a = .68); and the White Privilege Remorse
subscale, which measures affective responses to benefiting from White privi-
lege (pretest a = .88, posttest a = .90).
We used the Color-Blind Racial Attitudes Scale (CoBRAS; Neville et al., 2000)
to assess for changes in participants? levels of color blindness. The CoBRAS
is a 20-item self-report assessment of the cognitive dimensions of color-blind
racial attitudes and is scored on a 6-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly
disagree) to 6 (strongly agree), with higher scores indicating greater levels of
blindness or unawareness. It has three subscales: the Racial Privilege subscale,
which measures blindness to the existence of White privilege (pretest a = .77,
posttest a = .65); the Institutional Discrimination subscale, which measures
limited awareness of the implications of institutional discrimination and exclu-
sion (pretest a = .71, posttest a = .64); and the Blatant Racial Issues subscale,
which measures unawareness of general and pervasive racial discrimination
(pretest a = .61, posttest a = .51).
We used the White Racial Consciousness Development Scale?Revised (WRCDS-
R; Claney & Parker, 1989; Lee et al., 2007) to determine changes in participants?
racial identity growth. The WRCDS-R is a 40-item scale that measures White
racial identity statuses on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree)
to 5 (strongly agree). The WRCDS-R has four subscales: Contact, which reflects
naive thoughts and ignorance about racial differences (pretest a = .90, posttest
a = .81); Reintegration, which represents feelings of anger and resentment to-
ward persons of color (pretest a = .84, posttest a = .78); Pseudo-Independence,
which reflects an increasing awareness of the effect of White dominance and
privilege on racist attitudes and behaviors (pretest a = .74, posttest a = .75);
and Autonomy, which represents a nonracist White identity with appreciation
of racial differences and similarities (pretest a = .81, posttest a = .76).

INTERVENTION: WhITENESS COuRSE

In addition to a general multicultural course, students in the counseling
program were required to take an advanced, 15-week multicultural counsel-
ing course premised on Whiteness. The course (described in Table 1) was
graded as pass/fail and was facilitated in a group format that lasted 3 hours
per week. The activities were creative and experiential in nature, such as the
use of movement, expressive arts, game-like activities, videos, and role play-
ing. Homework was limited to weekly journals, in which students were asked
to reflect on any affective reactions, and the creation of a family genogram
related to personal ethnicities.

journal of Multicultural counseling and developMent ? July 2015 ? Vol. 43 211

Course content was grounded conceptually in the empirical and theoreti-
cal literature on Whiteness, as drawn from the fields of education, sociology,
counselor education, and counseling psychology (e.g., Carter, 1990; Helms,
1990; Katz, 2003; Miller & Fellows, 2007; Roediger, 2006; Spanierman et al.,
2008). Course tenets were addressed in the following order: (a) the historical
construction of race and ethnicity and its relation to racism in the United
States, (b) current individual and systemic racial inequities and their effects
on people of color and Whites, (c) individual student racial bias, (d) White

Table 1

Curriculum of advanced-level, Race-based Course

Session and Topic

Session 1
Course introduction

Sessions 2?3
Ethnic and racial identity

Sessions 4?5
Racism

Sessions 6?9
Privilege

Sessions 10?14
Antiracist action

Session 15
Sustaining future antiracist action

activity

aEach session allows multiple opportunities for student processing of reactions to content.

Sample (instructor) genogram
Discussion: What does it mean to be White?
Identifying intersectionality of all identities
Course processinga

Exploring personal race stories/learned messages
Video: Race history and genetics
Student-constructed genograms
Identifying personal valuesa

Identifying assumptions/values of White culture
Identifying types of racism
Racial microaggressions
Identifying personal racism and underlying causes
Examining the costs of racism to Whitesa

Racial privilege walk
Examining the meaning of Whiteness
Deconstructing Whiteness in the media
Examining intersectional identities and related privileges

and oppressions (e.g., race, gender)
Assuming different racial perspectivesa

Assessing one?s own antiracist behaviors
Cases: Practicing systemic antiracist action
Identifying solutions for creating equity
Writing antiracist letters
Video: Examples of ways to confront racism
Role plays: Directly confronting racism
Indirectly confronting racism
Cases: Responding to situational racism
Role plays: Student-identified personal experiencesa

Identifying difficulties in sustaining antiracist action
Inspirational quotes
Bead activity: Identifying ways to diversify our world
Identifying antiracist White role models (and their coping

strategies for antiracist work)
Promise posters (creating a plan for future racial growth

and antiracist activity)a

212 journal of Multicultural counseling and developMent ? July 2015 ? Vol. 43

cultural norms and related power and privilege, and (e) skill building in an-
tiracist advocacy. Across the span of the course, students examined affective
responses as they emerged (e.g., White guilt, fear, and empathy) through
journaling, experiential exercises, and discussions (Locke & Kiselica, 1999;
Paone & Malott, 2014).

data analyses

Before testing the intervention effects, we explored the demographic differ-
ences in the pretest data on all four scales and their subscales. We explored
gender differences in the pretest data using independent-samples t tests.
We explored previous multicultural experience differences with a series of
one-way analyses of variance (ANOVAs) with least significant difference post
hoc analyses. We calculated intervention effects through a series of repeated
measures ANOVAs comparing the pretest and posttest results on all four
scales and their subscales, with gender and previous multicultural experiences
entered as between-subjects variables.

results
For the CoBRAS pretest, men scored significantly higher than women on Bla-
tant Racial Issues, t(119) = 2.18, p < .05, d = 0.40. Participants with four to six
previous multicultural experiences scored significantly lower on Racial Privilege
than those students with one to three previous multicultural experiences, but
those with four to six and one to three previous multicultural experiences did
not score significantly lower on Racial Privilege than those with zero previous
multicultural experiences, F(2, 119) = 4.35, p < .05, ?2 = .07. When comparing the
pretest and posttest for the CoBRAS, we found that participants overall scored
significantly lower on the posttest in Racial Privilege, F(1, 115) = 45.6, p < .01, ?2

= .28; Institutional Discrimination, F(1, 115) = 81.13, p < .01, ?2 = .41; and Blatant
Racial Issues, F(1, 115) = 17.95, p < .01, ?2 = .14. For Institutional Discrimination,
there was a significant interaction with gender, F(1, 115) = 5.99, p < .05, ?2 = .05;
whereas men and women had similar scores at the pretest and both significantly
lowered their scores, men scored significantly higher than women at the posttest.
For the PCRW pretest, women scored significantly higher than men on
White Empathy, t(119) = 2.68, p < .01, d = 0.48. Participants with four to six
previous multicultural experiences scored significantly lower on White Fear
than those with one to three previous multicultural experiences, and those
with one to three previous multicultural experiences scored significantly
lower on White Fear than those with zero previous multicultural experi-
ences, F(2, 119) = 6.24, p < .01, ?2 = .10. When comparing the pretest with
the posttest for the PCRW, we found that participants overall scored sig-
nificantly higher on the posttest in White Guilt, F(1, 115) = 42.02, p < .01,
?2 = .27. Participants? scores did not change significantly on White Fear or
White Empathy from pretest to posttest.

journal of Multicultural counseling and developMent ? July 2015 ? Vol. 43 213

When comparing the pretest with the posttest for the WPAS, we found
that participants overall scored significantly higher on the posttest in
Willingness to Confront White Privilege, F(1, 115) = 28.59, p < .01, ?2 =
.20; Anticipated Costs of Addressing White Privilege, F(1, 115) = 14.41, p
< .01, ?2 = .11; White Privilege Awareness, F(1, 115) = 20.83, p < .01, ?2 =
.15; and White Privilege Remorse, F(1, 115) = 26.18, p < .01, ?2 = .19. For
Willingness to Confront White Privilege, there was a significant interaction
with gender, F(1, 115) = 4.39, p < .05, ?2 = .04; women scored significantly
higher than men at the pretest, and that difference was even more pro-
nounced at the posttest. For White Privilege Awareness, there was also
a significant interaction with gender, F(1, 115) = 12.52, p < .01, ?2 = .10;
whereas men and women had similar scores at the pretest, women scored
significantly higher than men at the posttest.
For the WRCDS-R pretest, women scored significantly lower than men
on Reintegration, t(119) = 2.11, p < .05, d = 0.39. Participants with four to
six previous multicultural experiences and those with one to three previ-
ous multicultural experiences scored significantly lower on Contact than
those with zero previous multicultural experiences, F(2, 119) = 4.43, p <
.05, ?2 = .07. Participants with four to six previous multicultural experi-
ences scored significantly lower on Reintegration than those with one to
three previous multicultural experiences, but participants with four to six
previous multicultural experiences and one to three previous multicultural
experiences did not score significantly lower on Reintegration than those
with zero previous multicultural experiences, F(2, 119) = 4.62, p < .05, ?2

= .07. When comparing the pretest with the posttest for the WRCDS-R, we
found that participants overall scored significantly lower on the posttest
in Reintegration, F(1, 115) = 59.73, p < .01, ?2 = .34; significantly higher
on the posttest in Pseudo-Independence, F(1, 115) = 19.22, p < .01, ?2

= .14; and significantly higher on the posttest in Autonomy, F(1, 115) =
6.37, p < .05, ?2 = .05. Participants? scores did not change significantly on
Contact between pretest and posttest. For Pseudo-Independence, there
was a significant interaction with gender, F(1, 115) = 9.61, p < .01, ?2 =
.08; whereas men and women had similar scores at the pretest and the
men?s scores significantly increased from pretest to posttest, women scored
significantly higher than men at the posttest.
To better understand the changes in the WRCDS-R subscales, we calculated
changes in scores in Reintegration, Pseudo-Independence, and Autonomy
by subtracting the posttest scores from the pretest scores for each subscale.
Then, we conducted a series of partial correlations among the change
scores of the four subscales of the WRCDS-R, controlling for gender and
previous multicultural experiences. Reintegration was negatively related
with Pseudo-Independence and Autonomy, and scores in Reintegration
significantly decreased from pretest to posttest. Scores in both Pseudo-
Independence and Autonomy significantly increased.

214 journal of Multicultural counseling and developMent ? July 2015 ? Vol. 43

discussion
This study sought to determine the effects of an experiential, race-based
multicultural counseling course on master?s-level students. Unique from
other race-based trainings studied, this training offered an experiential and
group-based model that solely had a race-specific curriculum. Findings are
particularly meaningful in that, unlike many other studies of race-based
trainings, this study included several interrelated measures to determine the
nature of the effects of the training (Spanierman & Poteat, 2005), as well as
a larger participant number.
The four hypotheses of this study predicted positive growth in the following
areas: increased awareness of the costs of racism, increased awareness regard-
ing White privilege, a reduction in participants? levels of color blindness (and
a resulting increase in awareness of racial privilege and discrimination), and
positive racial identity growth. Findings indicated positive changes for partici-
pants in most measures, from the beginning to the end of the course. There
were, however, some differences according to groups or certain measures.
Hypothesis 1 predicted increases in participants? awareness of the costs of
racism, with the use of the PCRW scale to measure outcomes. Results from
the scale demonstrated partial changes in participants from the pretest to the
posttest, with increased levels of guilt across participants but no changes in
fear and empathy. This finding is consistent with other studies demonstrating
increased guilt for Whites who participated in multicultural trainings (Todd
et al., 2011). Moderate levels of guilt in other studies have been correlated
with positive actions or perspectives of Whites, with examples including in-
creases in prominority attitudes (Spanierman & Heppner, 2004; Spanierman
et al., 2008), support for affirmative action (Harvey & Oswald, 2000), greater
multicultural competence, and likeliness of incorporating cultural and racial
factors into their case conceptualizations (Spanierman et al., 2008).
However, according to the PCRW subscales, findings indicated no overall
changes in participants? levels of fear and empathy. In trying to understand
the nuances of those scores, we assessed differences according to gender and
to the number of previous multicultural courses. It was found that women
scored significantly higher than men according to empathic reactions, both
pretest and posttest. However, it is unclear why neither the male nor the
female participants changed in their levels of empathy. It is possible that in-
creased levels of guilt inhibited participants? abilities to feel empathy, because
some experts have suggested that guilt potentially hinders Whites? abilities
to experience empathy for people of color (Spanierman & Heppner, 2004).
Also consistent with previous studies (Todd et al., 2011), pretest assess-
ments found that those with more multicultural training experiences scored
significantly lower on White fear of people of color than those with fewer
experiences, suggesting the positive effect of multicultural training on Whites?
irrational fear of people of color. However, it is unclear as to why this par-

journal of Multicultural counseling and developMent ? July 2015 ? Vol. 43 215

?