The process of juggling between American and Arab ethnic identities can be a challenge for Arab Americans, particularly in the face of discrimination and a hostile anti-Arab and Islamophobic socio-political context. Moreover, when researching this cultural adaptation process, scholars have faced their own challenges as well. This presentation highlights some of the peculiar – and in some ways absurd – dilemmas and limitations that psychologists have faced when attempting to study Arab American acculturation from the theoretical frameworks and methodologies dominant in the traditional psychological acculturation literature.

About the Speaker: Mona M. Amer, PhD, is a Professor of Psychology and was founding chair of the Department of Psychology at the American University in Cairo, where she has received the university’s annual teaching and service awards. She completed her doctorate at the University of Toledo and postdoctoral fellowship as an APA Minority Fellow at Yale University School of Medicine. Her work revolves around ethnic/racial disparities in behavioral health, with specializations in the Arab and Muslim minorities. As a clinical-community psychologist she is interested in risk and protective factors that impact disparities, and ways to eliminate inequities through culturally competent services, community-based programming, and social policy. Her publications include two articles in American Psychologist and two landmark co-edited Routledge books: Handbook of Arab American Psychology and Counseling Muslims: Handbook of Mental Health Issues and Interventions. Dr. Amer co-founded and served as the first elected president of the American Arab, Middle Eastern, and North African Psychological Association (AMENA-Psy).