Racial microaggressions in everyday life: Implications for clinical practice.
2007/05/01 by Derald Wing Sue, Christina M. Capodilupo, Gina C. Torino +6 · 5,488 citations
Psychology · Social Sciences · #Alliance #Counseling Practices and Supervision #Dyad #Ethnic group #Everyday life #Gender studies #Mentoring and Academic Development #Narrative #Psychology #Racial and Ethnic Identity Research #Racism #Social psychology #Sociology #White (mutation)
paper · doi:10.1037/0003-066x.62.4.271
published in American Psychologist 62(4), 271-286 (American Psychological Association)
openalex publication_date 2007/05/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Abstract
Racial microaggressions are brief and commonplace daily verbal, behavioral, or environmental indignities, whether intentional or unintentional, that communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative racial slights and insults toward people of color. Perpetrators of microaggressions are often unaware that they engage in such communications when they interact with racial/ethnic minorities. A taxonomy of racial microaggressions in everyday life was created through a review of the social psychological literature on aversive racism, from formulations regarding the manifestation and impact of everyday racism, and from reading numerous personal narratives of counselors (both White and those of color) on their racial/cultural awakening. Microaggressions seem to appear in three forms: microassault, microinsult, and microinvalidation. Almost all interracial encounters are prone to microaggressions; this article uses the White counselor--client of color counseling dyad to illustrate how they impair the development of a therapeutic alliance. Suggestions regarding education and training and research in the helping professions are discussed.
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