Identifying and enhancing the necessary ingredients for cultural humility in supervisory relationships

Cultural humility is an oft-studied construct in psychotherapy and supervision and, as such, has multiple definitions and frameworks and is frequently contextualized as the organizing pillar of the multicultural orientation framework (MCO; alongside cultural comfort and cultural opportunities; Davis et al., 2018; Owen, 2013). Many definitions of cultural humility emphasize a high level of self-awareness, openness to feedback, empathy, and curiosity toward others' cultural experiences (Davis et al., 2018; Foronda et al., 2016; Hook et al., 2013; Zhang et al., 2022). Despite empirical evidence linking cultural humility processes, and MCO more generally, to indicators of successful psychotherapy and supervision (e.g., Davis et al., 2018; Wilcox, Drinane, et al., 2022), little guidance exists for how supervisors may assess and foster their supervisees' cultural humility. Drawing from the literature, we delineate what we see as effective pedagogy and assessment of the key ingredients of cultural humility and provide recommendations for how supervisors can use the supervisory relationship to cultivate in their supervisees each of the necessary ingredients. Given cultural humility's key role in the MCO framework, we discuss how the ingredients required for cultural humility lay the groundwork for cultural comfort and cultural opportunities. Supervision vignettes and additional resources for supervisors are included. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).