CULTURE AND MENTAL HEALTH BEHAVIOR TRAINING PROGRAM

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The Program in Culture and Mental Health Behavior is dedicated to training students in the theory, methods, data collection and analysis necessary to conduct primary research on similarities and differences in psychological functioning across populations and ethnic communities. This Training Program is broadly concerned with study of environmental contexts and community sociocultural systems in which the person develops and mental well-being or illness results. This program highlights social and psychological forms through which mental duress and illness are classified, diagnosed, and treated, generally seeking to redefine the constitution and ontology of the patient, and to augment the success of relevant healing processes as these are being rethought within the United States. Psychosocial functions of special relevance in the Program include the development of the emotions and moral reasoning, interpersonal functioning, mind functioning, gender and sexual development, and a variety of aspects of psychological well-being and psychopathology. Both optimal mental well-being and psychopathology have been studied in the proceeding five years of training by faculty and students. Secondarily, we are concerned with understanding community mental health and the understanding of ethnic factors and ethnicity more broadly in the care and delivery of services to immigrant and refugee populations within the United States, in the Mexican-American and puerto Rican communities in Chicago. Other ethnic populations under investigation by faculty and students involved in the Program include Japanese-Americans, korean-Americans, African-Americans, and Chinese Americans. Overall the program has two aims: to train research students who show special promise of contributing in creative and applied careers to understanding socio-cultural and environmental predictors of mental health behavior and illness. The Program proposes to admit four Predoctoral students for four years, and three postdoctoral fellows; two Ph.D.'s and one M.D. One current research and training opportunities include a large range of cross-cultural projects internationally as well as nationally, dealing with mental health, optimal development, and psychosocial illness in cultures that span India, China, japan, Korea, Brazil, New Guinea, Europe (Germany and Holland).