Counseling Through Community Conditions: Integrating the Social Determinants of Mental Health across Practice Settings

Counseling through Community Conditions represents a comprehensive and contemporary resource for counselors and related mental health professionals across settings who wish to embody an approach to their practice that accounts for the full range of community conditions that influence development. Social determinants of mental health (SDMH) not only serve as a lynchpin that unifies the myriad bio-psycho-social-cultural-political influences on mental health but also as a skeleton key that can unlock pathways to mental health based on client-specific cues about well-being. This text represents the first of its kind within the counseling literature to provide a depiction of how an SDMH framework can serve as an ontological impetus for holistic and developmentally focused counseling practice that is firmly rooted in social justice and equity-minded action. The
SDMH have been embraced by related health professions such as psychiatry, clinical psychology, counseling psychology, and social work with each providing specialized periodical and text resources through their member organizations.

Kaprea F. Johnson, PhD, LPC, NCC, is a tenured Full Professor and Associate Vice Provost for Faculty Development and Recognition at The Ohio State University in Columbus Ohio. In the state of Virginia she is a Licensed Professional Counselor, a former Licensed School Counselor in Washington, DC, and a National Certified Counselor. Dr. Johnson received her B.A. in Psychology from Norfolk State University, M.Ed in Counseling from Howard University and PhD in Counselor Education and Supervision from The Pennsylvania State University. Throughout her tenure in academia, Dr. Johnson has served in various leadership positions, including department chair, program director, and track coordinator, as well as faculty-focused

leadership positions related to faculty development, research, recruitment and retention. As a school and mental health counselor educator, she has taught counseling and allied health students at the undergraduate, master's, and doctoral levels. Dr. Johnson has also been recognized and awarded for her professional engagement, with the most recent being the David K. Brooks Distinguished Mentor Award (2023), a national award from the American Counseling Association.

Dr. Johnson is a nationally recognized scholar, and public-facing academic, who is energized by the ability to discover and change inequitable systems to support and serve communities across the lifespan. Her research is focused on creating and evaluating interventions and training healthcare professionals to address the social determinants of health (SDOH), which are nonmedical factors, such as food insecurity, discrimination, and healthcare access that influence health and wellness outcomes for all people. As a principal or co-principal investigator, her research is funded through federal, state, and local grants such as the American Heart Association, Health Resources and Services (HRSA), and Johnson & Johnson. Dr. Johnson's work, research, and collaborations have resulted in three books with the most recent titled "Developing Anti-Racist practices in the helping professions: Inclusive theory, pedagogy, and application" published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2022; 81 peer-reviewed journal articles; and

over 150 speaking engagements internationally and nationally. Outside of academia Dr. Johnson enjoys spending time with her family, traveling, reading, art, and community engagement.

A. Stephen Lenz, PhD, LPC-S is a Professor of Counselor Education at Texas A&M University San Antonio. He is a 16-year licensed professional counselor who holds degrees in counselor education, clinical psychology, and community health promotion. Dr. Lenz is interested in the

development and evaluation of approaches to prevention and intervention at the individual and community levels that support well-being across the lifespan. His work is grounded in empowerment-based approaches to program development and evaluation that is situated within a social determinants framework and emphasizes stakeholder inclusion, capacity building, and relational pathways to sustainable change. He has served as a community program developer and/or evaluator for projects in the Texas Rio Grande Valley, Mississippi Delta, and southern Louisiana Delta, as well as, numerous educational, healthcare, and behavioral healthcare settings.

Dr. Lenz is the past-president of national and state divisions of the Assessment and Research in Counseling. He is currently the Editor for Measurement and Evaluation in Counseling and Development and has served as editor for Counseling Outcome Research and Evaluation,

Associate Editor for the Journal of College Counseling, and Guest Editor for the Journal of Counseling and Development special issues for the social determinants of mental health (Volume 101, Issue 4) and single-case research designs (Volume 93, Issue 4). Dr. Lenz has over 100 professional publications including several peer-reviewed journal articles, 22 book chapters, and 3 books (ACA, Pearson, Routledge). Dr. Lenz is a Fellow of the American Counseling Association and also a recipient of their Best Practice and Professional Development awards. He has received outstanding publication awards from several ACA-family associations including the Association for Assessment and Research in Counseling, the

Association for Counselor Education and Supervision, and the Association for Specialists in Group Work.