May 09, 2007
Queens, N.Y. -
A group of faculty members, graduate students and undergraduates
from St. John’s University Department
of Psychology will travel to Vietnam on May
13 to take part in a two-week academic service-learning program
that will introduce an American model of psychology to a leading
university in Hanoi. The research trip comes on the heels of a
Vietnam excursion made by
St. John’s women’s volleyball team, which traveled to Ho Chi
Minh City yesterday to participate in a volleyball tournament
featuring several Asian national teams.
During its trip, the St. John’s psychology team will engage in
intensive, for-credit coursework, while collaborating with
psychology professors and students from Hanoi National University
of Education (HNUE) to help them gain a better understanding of
contemporary psychology methods. Such methods have been slow to
develop in Vietnam, a country that traditionally has regarded
psychology as a philosophy rather than an empirical science.
According to Hung P. Le,
D.A., Assistant Dean for the Graduate Division of St. John’s
College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and principal engineer of the
partnership, the Vietnamese public’s appreciation of mental health
has risen sharply during the past decade, in correlation with the
country’s surge in globalization.
“In Vietnam, there has always been a stigma to psychological
therapy,” explains Le. “People viewed their psychological problems
as moral issues and responded by going to see the Buddhist monk,
the parish priest or the village elders to gain help with decision
making.”
Now, says Le, the country is developing into one of the powerful
nations of the East, with a stalwart economy, new membership within
the World Trade Organization and an enhanced core of Western
values, such as advanced rights for women. The bad news, though, is
that many of the new progressions have been accompanied by
psychological stressors, leaving many Vietnamese grappling with
mental health disorders like anxiety, schizophrenia and manic
depression and problem behaviors such as prostitution and
drugs.
“With modernization come modern problems that need solutions,”
says Le, who earned a master’s degree in psychology. “The
Vietnamese are beginning to realize that the American model of
psychology — which is based on applied research, as opposed to
theory — works. That’s what drove us to teach the subject at Hanoi
University.”
He has spent the last two years formalizing the partnership with
HNUE, with the assistance of
Jeffrey Fagen, Ph.D., Dean of St. John’s College of Liberal
Arts and Sciences. Fagen, who is also a St. John’s Professor of
Psychology, says it is clear that the majority of Vietnamese
educators support an “overhaul” in the training of the country’s
psychologists and counselors.
The professors at HNUE concur. “Now that Vietnam is globalizing,
cultural and education exchange are very crucial to the country’s
development,” says Tran Thi Le Thu, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology
and Education. “Young students need to catch up as soon as
possible. And because America is one of the leading countries in
terms of psychology, the time to start this initiative with St.
John’s is now.”
St. John’s will offer two classes at HNUE: “Early [Childhood]
Intervention,” a graduate-level course taught by
Mark Terjesen, Ph.D., Associate Professor; and “Theories of
Personality: Cultural Perspectives,” an undergraduate course taught
by
Kate Walton, Ph.D., Assistant Professor. Fifteen St. John’s
students are participating in the program for academic credit, and
several HNUE students and professors are planning to attend each
class.
Terjesen, who is the Director of St. John’s school psychology
program, and a handful of his students plan to meet with several
HNUE researchers in face-to-face settings outside of the classroom,
to discuss the steps HNUE must take in order to launch its own
masters-level school-psychology/counselor program. Several HNUE
students have already expressed interest earning a post-graduate
degree in school psychology, and some are preparing to take courses
in the subject at St. John’s in the fall.
If a school-psychology graduate program is launched, says Le, it
will be the first of its kind in Vietnam. “We are facing an awesome
task,” he proclaims.
Spreading Seeds of
Vincentianism
Terjesen’s “Early Intervention” course is structured to include a
heavy academic service-learning component that will send students
from both countries out into the field, to places like orphanages
and childcare centers that cater directly to Vietnamese citizens —
many of whom are still hobbled by remnants of country’s older,
poorer economic infrastructure.
“We’re basically helping a third-world country become more
modern, which falls in line with the University [Vincentian]
mission to help the disadvantaged,” says Walton. “We’re also
emphasizing to our students the importance of diversity — stepping
outside our comfort zones and seeing what life is like for [a
certain subgroup of] underprivileged students.”
Indeed, the St. John’s researchers say they expect — and welcome
— a certain degree of culture shock, which they say will help shape
their assessment of the country’s indigenous needs. Kimberly
Kassay, a first-year doctoral student from Miller Place, NY, who
plans to collect data for her dissertation on Vietnamese mental
health services during the trip, says just because Vietnam
psychologists are ready to adopt Western practices, no one should
presume that the entire U.S. system of psychology will be
transferable.
“We can’t just expect to go over there and teach them exactly
what we learn over there, because it might not be applicable to
them,” explains Kassay, predicting that Buddhist concepts like
karma and reincarnation will come into play.
Speaking about her own course, Walton adds, “It will be nice for
the students to see how Eastern and Western perspectives differ in
the way they influence one’s personality.”
The trip will culminate May 25 when several members of the St.
John’s research team will deliver lectures at a nationally
televised conference on school counselors and psychologists.
Le, who is of Vietnamese descent, has worked on various Vietnam
projects for several years and recently was honored by the online
newspaper VietNamNet with the Vietnam Glory Award, in recognition
of his contributions to both the United States and his native
country. His ultimate goal, he says, is to secure a grant that
would fund a long-term St. John’s clinical psychology training
program at HNUE. If successful, the program would filter advanced
Vietnamese researchers through St. John’s for further
collaboration.
Volleyball Team Competes in International
Tournament
During their stay in Vietnam, the St. John’s researchers will
reside in hotels and take part in several cultural field trips. On
May 15 and 16, they will gather in Ho Chi Minh City to cheer on St.
John’s women’s volleyball team, in town as the first-ever U.S. team
to participate in the Vietnam Television International Women’s
Volleyball Cup. The volleyball team, which opens the tournament May
12 against Zhong Cai, China, recently compiled its best season in
program history.
Research commitments won’t prevent the psychology scholars’ from
supporting their team in full force, predicts Le. “There will be
Lots of Red Storm fans in the stadium,” he says. “We’re all one
big, happy family.”
The team’s appearance marks the second Vietnamese trip made by a
St. John’s athletics team. Last year, the men’s soccer team was
invited to the country by the Vietnamese Sports Commission to
participate in a series of exhibition matches against local
squads.