A more diverse field would be better – But how do we get there?

Despite a general desire to increase diversity in the field of clinical psychology, only 6.7% of psychology PhDs (across subfields) conferred in 2017 were awarded to African Americans, 8.6% to Latino/a’s, and 0.3% to Indigenous Peoples based on National Science Foundation data (NSF, 2018). For clinical psychologists specifically, diversification of our field not only affects us inside the academy, but also has ramifications for our patients (e.g., treatment dropout, Wintersteen, Mensinger, & Diamond, 2005). This talk proposed some of the “mechanisms of change” for increasing diversity at each level of academia (e.g., from undergrad to tenured faculty). The focus was on actionable recommendations for how to affect diversity at the individual lab and institutional programmatic levels for 1) increasing diversity of, and improved mentorship of, undergraduate and post-baccalaureate research assistants, 2) increasing graduate applications from underrepresented minorities to your lab specifically and your program generally, 3) meeting the unique needs of your current minority graduate students, and 4) increasing diversity of postdoctoral fellows and faculty members in your department. Enjoy!

[Download ABCT 2019 Talk Slides](./ABCT 2019 talk.pptx)