Dr. Rawan Atari-Khan receives Distinguished Dissertation Award

Dr. Rawan Atari-Khan, Assistant Professor of Counseling Psychology in the College of Education at Purdue University, recently received the Distinguished Dissertation Award from American Arab, Middle Eastern, and North African Psychological Association (AMENA-Psy) for her dissertation, “Capturing the Meaning of Well-being among Arab Americans.”

Dr. Atari-Khan’s dissertation focuses on two primary areas: first, to accurately define what well-being means for Arab Americans; and second, to design a well-being instrument that specifically measures this meaning for Arab Americans.

 “Well-being is an important concept in psychology and has implications for our work as practitioners when providing care to the Arab community,” says Dr. Atari-Kahn. “But because our current understanding of well-being is largely based in Western values such as autonomy and individualism that don’t align with the values often emphasized in collectivist cultures, we don’t have a good understanding of what well-being means for diverse communities, such as Arab Americans.”

Dr. Atari-Khan worked alongside experts in Arab mental health and members from the Arab American community to create a new, culturally sensitive measure of well-being to develop a greater understanding of the meaning of well-being for this population. The final measure, the Arab American Well-being Scale (AAWS), includes the following six dimensions: positive experiences, spirituality, collective decision-making, growth fostering encounters, and safety in identity.

 “To have my dissertation recognized by AMENA-Psy, an organization I’m grateful to call my professional home, is re-energizing and inspiring because it reminds me why it’s necessary that we include our own voices and identities into our work,” explains Dr. Atari-Kahn “As an Arab American woman, it is truly an honor to be able to amplify voices within my community, particularly in spaces where they have historically been made invisible.”

Learn more at these links:

Dr. Rawan Atari-Khan: https://education.purdue.edu//faculty-profiles/name/rawan-atari-khan/
American Middle Eastern North African Psychological Association (AMENA-Psy): https://www.amenapsy.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=Page.ViewPage&pageId=536

Source: Dr. Rawan Atari-Kahn, ratarikh@purdue.edu

Writer: Katie Cockerill, kcockeri@purdue.edu