The DMH + UCLA Public Mental Health Partnership has launched a new bias reduction training series designed especially for providers working with individuals experiencing or at risk for homelessness, and experiencing mental illness that moves beyond introductory cultural competency concepts. Please join us in uncovering and learning to mitigate biases to provide more equitable and individualized services to clients of all backgrounds and experiences.

Dr. Dana E. Crawford is a clinical psychologist and developer of the Crawford Bias Reduction Theory and Training (CBRT). Dr. Crawford acknowledges that everyone carries implicit and explicit biases that inform interactions with those who have different cultural identities, experiences, and worldviews. Bias-driven behavior can be incredibly harmful, even when unintentional (also known as implicit), and especially when providing support to community members who experience severe mental illness, housing instability, and/or engage in substance use, on top of other cultural identities and/or experiences where bias occurs.

To address biases, prejudice, and racism in the mental health workforce, cultural competency and humility trainings have become the norm. CBRT goes beyond introductory concepts to provide practical instruction on how to, in real-time, increase self-awareness of your own biases that may be implicit, understand how biases negatively impact client wellness, and determine how to reduce that impact to provide the caliber of support all community members deserve.

In this four-part series, Dr. Crawford will review the biases that everyone has, including those that relate to one’s culturally held assumptions and values, attitudes related to cultural identities (e.g., race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender, mental illness, housing status, etc.), and worldviews (such as one’s political, health, religious, financial, and moral values). The Crawford Bias Reduction Theory and Training (CBRT) workshop series focuses on three core components:

1. The awareness component introduces a theory of bias, prejudice, and racism as a system to acquire and distribute human resources, which is maintained by fear and social norms. 
2. The investigation component examines how bias, prejudice, and racism manifest individually, interpersonally, and institutionally. 
3. The reduction component teaches specific anti-bias skills such as internal regulation, implementing a bias-reduction plan, and engaging in strategic and sustainable anti-bias work.

Dr. Crawford creates a safe space for discussion where participants can reflect on their personal and professional journeys through a series of experiential exercises conducted via self-reflection prompts, breakout rooms, and group discussions. The goal of this training is for participants to have more awareness of their biases and concrete skills to reduce the impact of their biases. More specifically, during this training series, participants will have the opportunity to dig deeper into building bias-reduction skills that can benefit the communities they serve.

Please note that CEs are only available by attending the live virtual training, not the anytime session. The anytime session was recorded on April 23, May 7, May 21, and June 4, 2024.