Organizational and client commitment among contracted employees

This study examines affective commitment to employing and client organizations among long-term contracted employees, a new and growing employment classification. Drawing on organizational commitment and social exchange literatures, we propose two categories of antecedents of employee commitment to client organizations. We tested our hypotheses using a survey collected from employees in four UK contracting organizations delivering a service on behalf of a government entity. The results suggest that perceived client organizational support and attractiveness of the client organization relate positively to employees’ affective commitment to the client organization. Furthermore, affective contractor commitment explained unique variation in client affective commitment beyond that accounted for by the client-based predictors, suggesting that employees’ commitment to their own contracting organization is important to explaining employees’ commitment to the client organization. We suggest that a greater reliance on social exchange theory may provide a basis for understanding commitment in its different forms and foci.     

Nondiscriminatory career counseling?

Client data from nine church-related career development centers were studied with two questions in mind: (1) How well do the client assessment rating data predict the counselor recommendations given to clients? (2) Are there discriminatory effects due to referral source and/or to gender? Analyses were done separately for Professional Church Workers and Candidates. In addition to a general profile of these two client types, findings show that assessment ratings account for most of the explained variance in recommendations, and that neither client gender nor referral source is a basis for discrimination in recommendations. Counselor gender does make a difference, however, and differences between men and women counselors suggest the useful distinction between gender bias and gender effect.     

Client,Treatment, and Therapist Variables Related To Outcome in Brief,Systems-Oriented Family Therapy

Client, therapist, and treatment characteristics were examined with respect to how much of the variance they could account for in a variety of outcome measures. Multiple regression analyses were used to examine relationships among each of the client, therapist, and treatment characteristics studied and the various outcome measures. For the 219 families that were treated with brief family therapy, only a relatively low amount of variance in any of the outcome measures could be accounted for. The amount of explained variance, however, varied considerably from one outcome measure to the other. When the more homogeneous groups of clients (single parents or adolescent identified patients) were considered, the amount of explained variance generally showed an increase. Different sets of client, therapist, and treatment variables accounted for the variance in these outcome measures across client groups, demonstrating both the complexities of the relationships and the relative independence of various outcome measures. New variables are suggested for future research.     

How does clients' method of payment influence psychologists' diagnostic decisions?

To what extent does payment method (managed care vs. out of pocket) influence the likelihood that an independent practitioner will assign a Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (American Psychiatric Association, 1994) diagnosis to a client? When a practitioner does diagnose, how does payment method influence the specific choice of a diagnostic category? Independent practitioners responded to a vignette describing a fictitious client with symptoms of depression or anxiety. In half of the vignettes, the fictitious client intended to pay via managed care; in the other half, the fictitious client intended to pay out of pocket. Payment method had a very significant impact on diagnosis such that relative to out-of-pocket clients, managed care clients were much more likely to receive diagnoses and more likely to receive adjustment disorder diagnoses in particular. We discuss implications involving informed consent and other ethical issues.     

Synergistic person x situation interaction in distributive justice behavior

A person x situation interaction is synergistic when a personality trait amplifies the effect of a situational factor. The present study tested how individuals' justice attitudes and situational factors jointly affect the allocation of financial burdens. Six insurance cases were described to 80 participants. Economic status of client (high, low) and responsibility of client for damage of the insured (high, low) were manipulated between subjects. Participants suggested a percentage of the total costs that they considered a fair contribution by the client. In accordance with the synergistic model, justice attitude (person factor) and responsibility for damage (situation factor) interacted and explained 5% of the variance of the dependent variable. With increasing negativity of attitude toward equality, the effect of responsibility was larger. Several cognitive mechanisms, such as motivated perception, selective attention, and the availability of attitude congruent situation schemas, that may account for synergistic interactions in justice behavior and in other domains were discussed.     

Client Quest—A Key to Counseling

The expression quest is proposed to represent any unifying theme of client purposes. Counseling is then defined as an interview in which client quest is superordinate to counselor quest. It is suggested that client quests be classified by their direction. Thus, quests may be for understanding or change, and, at a higher level, for mastering self or environment. The identification, clarification, and management of client quests becomes central to effective counseling. Ideally, as an expert in human learning and development, the counselor is a hypothesis maker who works with his client to facilitate conquest. Dissonance is said to occur when the purposive balance is inappropriate to counselor or client quests. The congruent counselor reduces dissonance by discussing changes in the purposive balance openly with the client and by avoiding professional roles in which client quests are subordinated.     

Confidentiality in end-of-life and after-death situations

Confidentiality is one of the foundations on which psychotherapy is built. Limitations on confidentiality in the therapeutic process have been explained and explored by many authors and organizations. However, controversy and confusion continue to exist with regard to the limitations on confidentiality in situations where clients are considering their options at the end of life and after a client has died. This article review these 2 areas and provides some suggestions for future research.     

The therapeutic alliance in adolescent substance abuse treatment: a one-with-many analysis

Studies of the therapeutic alliance typically use a one-with-many (OWM) design in which each therapist (the one) treats multiple clients (the many). This study used Kenny, Kashy, and Cook's (2006) OWM method to examine the composition of the therapeutic alliance and to analyze the association between alliance and outcome in a sample of 398 adolescents treated for substance abuse by 14 therapists. Both the client and therapist alliance ratings yielded large relationship variances, with limited consensus among clients treated by the same therapist about the quality of the alliance. If a client reported an especially strong alliance with his or her therapist, the therapist was likely to also report an especially strong alliance with that client (dyadic reciprocity). The association between the components of the alliance and treatment outcome was complicated, with different levels of measurement and different components of the alliance (perceiver, partner, or relationship) derived from different informants (therapist or client) relating to different outcomes.     

Pragmatic causal distortion in counselling

A person's actions are caused by the interaction between external environmental forces and internal personal forces. Attributing actions to one or the other set of forces is an arbitrary distortion. In therapy, attributing actions to external forces - particularly past events - relieves the client of guilt and helps him to make sense out of his actions. Attributing actions to internal sources provides a means by which the client can change his actions by changing his ideas, interpretation of events, and attitudes. Using both of these distortions of cause, a method of therapy is presented which emphasises the client's responsibility for his actions, and is aimed at developing the client as an active causal agent in his own life.     

An Adaptation of the Tyler Vocational Card Sort

An assessment method originated by Tyler is modified and extended. Supplementary comments on the administration of the technique are included. Through the sorting of occupational title cards, the method elicits client attitudes and information regarding occupations as well as views that the client holds pertaining to himself. A rationale drawn from Kelly's Personal Construct Theory is described that places the Tyler method within a broader conception of the vocational counseling process. This process involves the identification and clarification of possible motives for choosing occupations, followed by a reduction of the number of motives that the client would attempt to satisfy with his vocational choice.     

Can Counselor Trainees Apply Their Skills in Actual Client Interviews?

The authors compared a skill-based training method (Carkhuff's human relations development model) with a conceptual-based training method by measuring (a) trainees' skill application in actual client interviews and (b) client outcomes. Participants were 14 male and 34 female master's degree trainees. Counseling skills were measured by rating segments of audiotaped sessions with field placement clients. Interrater reliabilities of .94 and above were achieved. A self-report instrument measured client outcome. Although the groups did not differ in responding skills at pretest, the skill-based group exhibited greater skill application in client interviews and superior client outcome ratings at posttest. Results support the use of skill-based training methods to increase trainees' skill application in applied settings.     

Pilot test of a measure to assess clients’ perceptions of their home visitors

Home visiting services for caregivers of infants and young children have been found to be an effective method for promoting child development. Unfortunately, such services suffer from high rates of attrition, suggesting the need to identify factors related to client retention in services. Research has indicated that the client-provider relationship is an important predictor of client retention in home visiting services; however, measures to assess this relationship are limited. This study reports on a pilot test of the Client Perceptions of Home Visitors Questionnaire, developed to assess home visiting clients’ perceptions of their relationship with their home visitor. The measure was completed by 39 diverse home visiting clients during pregnancy in a midwestern town in the United States. The scale was found to have good internal consistency. Validity analyses found that the scale was positively associated with client satisfaction with services and perceived provider cultural sensitivity. The scale was also positively associated with retention in services at an 8-month follow-up. Additional research should examine the measure's psychometrics with larger samples.     

Therapist activities preceding therapy setbacks in a poor-outcome case

Progress in psychotherapy is typically irregular, as advances alternate with setbacks. This study investigated the therapist’s activities prior to two main types of setbacks, one involving the client following therapist proposals and one involving the client failing to follow from therapist proposals, in the case of a poor-outcome client treated with a linguistically-oriented kind of cognitive therapy. Setbacks were defined as decreases of at least one level on an index of therapeutic progress, the 8-level Assimilation of Problematic Experiences Scale (APES), in adjacent client passages. Therapist activities were coded in 361 setback episodes that each included a client pre-setback passage, a therapist passage, and a client setback passage; both client passages had been previously rated on the APES. The main categories of therapist activities showed distinctive patterns in relation to the two main types of setbacks, the therapeutic zone of proximal development and the balance strategy. The two main patterns were described as an exploratory and a challenging configuration. These patterns of therapist activities and setbacks showed how the therapist seemed to persevere with approach-guided interventions while this poor-outcome client continued to have setbacks to low APES levels.     

Becoming Fully Human: The Promotion of Meaning and Spirituality in Professional Relationships and Contexts

Many intake interviews begin, explicitly or implicitly, with the expectation that there is something “wrong” with the client. The structure of many psychological assessments supports this dominant pathogenic belief. They are often composed of checklists in which the client is asked to note any past illnesses, addictions, suicidal behavior, and so on. This emphasis on pathology from the beginning may cause an already vulnerable client to feel further destabilized. Moving away from a pathology-focused intake assessment can instead be viewed as an excavation of the client's often problematic dominant story and of the implicit endorsement of the client as “fused” with his or her problem. A narrative approach is uniquely situated to assist the client in excavating hope in the intake interview by inspiring use of questions that are attuned to gathering stories of strength alongside stories of difficulty.     

‘I never talked about,ever’: A comprehensive process analysis of a significant client disclosure event in therapy

Aims: The present study was intended to examine how a particular client disclosure came about and what made it important to the client. Method: A client‐identified significant therapy event involving disclosure of childhood abuse was analysed using Comprehensive Process Analysis (CPA), a qualitative interpretive method for examining the process, effects and context of significant events in therapy. Results: The analysis identified therapist invitation and client universalisation as the key elements of the disclosure event. The context analysis showed how the event linked to the client's symbolisation of her fear earlier in the session and in the previous session. The client gained insight into how the earlier abuse had affected her life, linking it to the victimisation that was her primary reason for seeking therapy, and to her relationship with her mother. The therapist facilitated the event by following up the client's hints, trusting the strength of the alliance, and staying close to the client's frame of reference. Conclusion: The findings suggest that the initial significance of an invited disclosure event may diminish for a client over the course of therapy.     

Applying REBT to workaholic clients

This paper draws attention to the use of rational emotive behaviour therapy (REBT) in counselling clients who are workaholics. Essential REBT theoretical tenets can help to reveal and explain the causes of workaholic behavior, while REBT techniques can be used effectively in assisting workaholic clients to cope with their cognitive, emotive and behavioural biases. Having explained the general characteristics of workaholism, this paper utilizes a case illustration to demonstrate the basic tenets and techniques of REBT that can be used to help a workaholic client.     

Creative Supervision for Counselors Working in a Hospice Setting

The number of individuals receiving hospice care in the United States is on the rise. Many individuals who suffer from debilitating health issues use the care of helping professionals in a hospice environment. Supervision approaches for counselors who encounter grief, loss, death, and bereavement issues in hospice settings are needed. The authors introduce three creative interventions for use with supervisees in one of the four stages of the integrative developmental model of supervision. One intervention, the “Rock Talk,” is more thoroughly explained and then demonstrated in a case illustration of a supervisee using the intervention to say goodbye to a hospice client.     

Executive Coaching and REBT: Some Comments from the Field

Executive Coaching comprises personal counseling, business advice, and advice about managing for people who are in executive management. This involves a one-to-one helping relationship between coach and client. In each case for which executive coaching is sought, there are problems the client has encountered which requires changes in client behavior. REBT, with its blend of easy understandability and direct applicability to client problems, is an ideal tool for use in executive coaching. Clients readily understand the A-B-C-D connections and are able to effect changes in behavior. The article includes case examples.     

A comparison of three methods of identifying reliable and clinically significant client changes: commentary on Hageman and Arrindell

Objectives of this commentary are to (1) note major similarities and differences of three methods of identifying reliable and clinically significant client changes, (2) demonstrate how graphs can be used to identify reliable and clinically significant client changes with each method, (3) describe uses and interpretations of overlaid graphs, (4) draw attention to an alternative to the Hageman and Arrindell method of estimating true score changes, and (5) caution users of the three methods against interpreting reliable and/or clinically significant changes which occur in psychotherapy as evidence of therapy 'efficacy' or 'effectiveness'.