Towards a Cultural–Clinical Psychology Andrew G. Ryder 1,2 *, Lauren M. Ban 1,2 and Yulia E. Chentsova-Dutton 3 1 Concordia University 2 Sir Mortimer B. Davis-Jewish General Hospital 3 Georgetown University Abstract For decades, clinical psychologists have catalogued cultural group differences in symptom presenta- tion, assessment, and treatment outcomes. We know that ‘culture matters’ in mental health – but do we know how it matters, or why? Answers may be found in an integration of cultural and clinical psychology. Cultural psychology demands a move beyond description to explanation of group variation. For its part, clinical psychology insists on the importance of individual people, while also extending the range of human variation. Cultural–clinical psychology integrates these approaches, opening up new lines of inquiry. The central assumption of this interdisciplinary field is that culture, mind, and brain constitute one another as a multi-level dynamic system in which no level is primary, and that psychopathology is an emergent property of that system. We illustrate cultural–clinical psychology research using our work on depression in Chinese populations and conclude with a call for greater collaboration among researchers in this field. Horace Cho 1 is a 57-year-old businessman from Hong Kong who has resided in Vancouver for fif- teen years, referred for insomnia, fatigue, loss of appetite, gastrointestinal distress, and depressed mood. Mr. Cho was raised in Hong Kong, completed his MBA in California, and moved to Van- couver to join his wife’s family and start a new business. Despite Mr. Cho’s excellent English and knowledge of North American practices, his business is in difficulty. He attributes business troubles to the effects of his physical symptoms, rather than seeing these symptoms as resulting from psychoso- cial stress. Mr. Cho lives in a majority Chinese suburb and encourages his children to stay close to Chinese traditions; however, his daughters desire greater participation in North American society. He describes his wife as much more traditional than he is, but to his surprise it is she who encourages the children to participate in mainstream society. At the initial interview, Mr. Cho denies depressed mood but agrees that symptoms, business difficulties, and values conflicts in his family are ‘upsetting some- times’. What is Mr. Cho’s ‘culture’, and is it the same as his wife’s? Does he have a mental health problem and, if so, what is it? In what ways does culture shape the experience, expression, and communication of his distress? Where can psychologists look for ways to think about such questions? Over the past few decades, scholars from several disciplines have examined the interrela- tion of culture and mental health. Many more have taken on cross-cultural comparisons in mainstream psychology. That ‘culture matters’ in clinical psychology is nothing new, although it bears frequent repetition in an era of biological reductionism. Rather, our claim is threefold: first, that there is relatively little cultural research in clinical psychology that aspires to explanation, to telling a culturally-framed story about what is observed; second, that the means for achieving this can be found in greater integration of cultural and clinical Social and Personality Psychology Compass 5/12 (2011): 960–975, 10.1111/j.1751-9004.2011.00404.x ª 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd