The Big Five and HEXACO Personality Traits as Predictors of Multicultural Counseling Competencies of Turkish Counselor Candidates

Abstract

The diversity and unique psychological needs of individuals, groups, and communities have become challenging issues for the mental health profession. In light of these challenges, the extent to which mental health professionals can provide culturally appropriate psychological services has emerged as an important topic of research. The definition of multicultural counseling competencies has led to the examination of professionals’ individual, sociocultural, and professional competencies, but research on counselor personality is relatively limited and inconsistent. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the associations between counselor personality and multicultural counseling competencies. The research participants included 267 counselor candidates, ranging in age from 21 to 47 years (M_age = 22.9, standard deviation [SD] = 2.97, 76% female), in Türkiye. The results of structural equation modeling indicated that the traits of openness/intellect and extraversion were significant predictors of the participants’ multicultural counseling competencies. The practical implications and educational outcomes of the present study were highlighted.