Cultural Humility Scale
Also known as: CHS
The Cultural Humility Scale (CHS) is a self-report instrument designed to assess healthcare providers' capacity for cultural humility—a stance of openness, self-reflection, and power-sharing with patients from diverse cultural backgrounds. Originating from theoretical work by Tervalon and Murray-García (1998) and operationalized by Hook and colleagues (2013), the CHS measures clinicians' willingness to acknowledge limits in cultural knowledge, receptiveness to patient perspectives, and commitment to lifelong learning about culture. The instrument is widely used in medical, nursing, counseling, and other health professions education to evaluate trainees' readiness for culturally humble practice.
Key highlights
- Captures a contemporary and theoretically grounded conceptualization of cultural competence that emphasizes humility, self-reflection, and power awareness rather than mastery
- Directly addresses the limitations of earlier cultural competence models, resonating with current thinking in health equity
- Brief administration supports feasibility in education and practice settings
- Subscale structure reveals specific dimensions of humility, supporting targeted development
Intuition
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How it works
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When to use it
The CHS is appropriate for healthcare providers across disciplines—medicine, nursing, psychology, social work, counseling—in diverse settings. It is particularly valuable in educational programs preparing clinicians to work across cultural differences and in healthcare organizations prioritizing equitable, patient-centered care. The instrument is useful for both individual development and organizational assessment of readiness for culturally humble practice.
Strengths & limitations
- Captures a contemporary and theoretically grounded conceptualization of cultural competence that emphasizes humility, self-reflection, and power awareness rather than mastery
- Directly addresses the limitations of earlier cultural competence models, resonating with current thinking in health equity
- Brief administration supports feasibility in education and practice settings
- Subscale structure reveals specific dimensions of humility, supporting targeted development
- Self-report format is vulnerable to social desirability bias; respondents may report humility they do not genuinely embody
- The construct of cultural humility is still evolving in the literature; psychometric evidence varies across different CHS versions
- Cultural humility is deeply personal and context-dependent; group-level scores may mask individual variation
- High scores on the CHS do not guarantee culturally humble behavior in actual clinical encounters
Common pitfalls
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Applications
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Frequently asked
How is cultural humility different from cultural competence?
Cultural competence implies developing mastery of cultural knowledge and skills; cultural humility emphasizes awareness of limits, ongoing learning, self-reflection, and power-sharing. Humility is a posture; competence is a skill set. Both are important, but humility may be more foundational.
Can clinicians be both culturally humble and clinically skilled?
Absolutely. Cultural humility is about the attitude and approach a clinician brings; clinical skill is about the quality of care delivered. Ideally, clinicians combine humility with strong technical competence and cultural knowledge.
How long does it take to develop cultural humility?
Cultural humility is a lifelong developmental process, not a fixed achievement. Clinicians can show measurable growth in CHS scores and attitudes over months or years through intentional reflection, diverse experiences, and patient feedback.
What does a high CHS score mean for patient care?
High CHS scores suggest the clinician is likely to approach patients with openness, recognize power dynamics, and value patient perspective. While promising, actual care quality also depends on clinical knowledge, organizational support, and system-level factors.
Sources
- 1.Tervalon, M., & Murray-García, J. (1998). Cultural humility versus cultural competence: A critical distinction in defining physician training outcomes in multicultural education. Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved, 9(2), 117–125.
- 2.Hook, J. N., Davis, D. E., Owen, J., Worthington Jr., E. L., & Utsey, S. O. (2013). Cultural humility: Measuring openness to culturally diverse clients. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 60(3), 353–366.
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Cite this page
ScholarGate. (2026, June 3). Cultural Humility Scale. ScholarGate. https://scholargate.app/transcultural-nursing/cultural-humility-scale