ABSTRACT
It is important to note, however, that researchers and educators have been critical of the lack of training that CFTs receive to work with LGB clients (Bepko & Johnson, 2000; Bernstein, 2000; Godfrey, Haddock, Fisher, & Lund, 2006; Long, 1996; Long & Serovich, 2003). For example, Doherty and Simmons (1996) found that in their sample of AAMFT clinical members, nearly half the respondents reported that they felt incompetent to treat lesbian and gay clients. Several studies have found that graduate students in clinical training programs also reported feeling inadequately prepared to provide competent therapy to LGB clients (Anhalt, Morris, Scotti, & Cohen, 2003; Rock et al., 2010; Savage, Prout, & Chard, 2004). For instance, Rock et al. (2010) found that 60.5% of their sample of 190 students in accredited CFT programs reported that they received no training on armative therapy practices with LGB clients. is lack of LGBarmative training is problematic given that these researchers also found that the amount of LGB-armative training CFT students received was predictive of their self-reported clinical competence with LGB clients. In another study, Phillips and Fischer (1998) found that nearly half the 107 clinical graduate students in their sample reported that they had not been encouraged to explore their heterosexist biases. is nding is important because research has also found that the exploration of heterosexist biases predicted students’ readiness to work with LGB clients (Phillips & Fischer, 1998). Given that “therapists typically receive the most intensive part of their training in graduate school . . . if graduate programs do not address gay, lesbian, and bisexual issues, most therapists will probably be inadequate in this area” (Dworkin & Gutierrez, 1989, p. 7). erefore, LGB clients who seek the services of CFTs “are essentially at the mercy of the therapist’s own struggles, prejudices, and intolerance” (McCann, 2001, p. 80).
