Client Cognitive Responses as a Function of Quality of Counselor Verbal Responses

This study examined the relationship between high and low quality counselor responses in four response modes and client cognitions. Twenty-one university students participated in two sessions of brief counseling that included high and low quality counselor responses in paraphrasing, questioning, reflection of feeling, and self-disclosure. After each counseling session, participants used Kagan's (1975) interpersonal process recall method to report their cognitions in response to these counselor responses. Results indicated that the participants had more favorable cognitions toward the counselor associated with high quality counselor paraphrasing and reflection of feeling responses. Participants' cognitions directed toward themselves did not differ in response to any of the four high and low quality counselor responses. Implications of the results are discussed.     

Contextual Themes in Career Decision Making of Female Clients Who Indicate Depression

Difficulties concerning female counseling center clients' career decision making were explored in this qualitative study. The authors reviewed counseling intake and progress notes of 18 female students who sought counseling services at a university counseling center and who presented career concerns and reported feeling depressed. Most women in this study described their career decision‐making difficulties in the context of relationships with their parents or significant others. Both external (i.e., family relationships, family and culture, and relationships with significant others) and internal (i.e., developmental, developmental and mental health issues, and skill deficits) conditions emerged as significantly affecting these women's career decision‐making process.     

VISION: A Model of Culture for Counselors

Current and popular views of multiculturalism emphasize between-group differences attributable to race and ethnicity with little appreciation of within-group differences, the individuality of each person's phenomenal field, or an individual's capacity to participate in different groups. VISION is a model of culture that accounts for within-group and between-group differences, the disappearance of groups, and the emergence of new ones. VISION has program applications pertinent to counselor education in the areas of mental health counseling and in modeling the multicultural training of counselors. A paradigmatic shift from a group level of abstraction to the individual is commonly contemplated among cultural anthropologists, but the need for this shift is illustrated in a counseling context.     

The Effect of Client Demeanor Upon the Verbal Responses of School Counselors

In a study of counselor verbal behavior as a function of client stimulus input, a counseling paradigm was employed using 4 client-actors and 30 counselors. Independent variables were hostile or friendly client behavior, amount of counseling experience, counselor sex and client sex. The dependent variable of counselor verbal behavior was measured by a revision of the Bales Interaction Process Analysis Categories. Analysis of variance led to the finding that all of the independent variables had a statistically significant effect upon the counselors' verbal responses, but the number of response categories affected varied from 1 to 7 depending on the variable involved. Significant interaction effects were also found. From the data, it was concluded that client demeanor and client sex significantly influenced counselors' verbal responses, but counselor experience and counselor sex were relatively unimportant in their effect upon the counselors' behavior.     

Psychological Time in Later Life: Implications for Counseling

Psychological time consists of cognitive constructs, images, and symbolic representations. It has different dimensions such as the experience of time, time perspective, attitudes and beliefs toward time, and the individual's behavior relating to time. Psychological time undergoes changes throughout the life span and is an integral part of the psychological developmental processes. In later life, it may be particularly dissonant with environmental rhythms and require re‐integration of the individual's past, present, and future. This article suggests several guidelines for counseling practice that address the many facets of psychological time in later life and their implications for the mental health and well‐being of older people.     

The Identification and Modification of Defense Mechanisms in Counseling

This article suggests considerations and strategies for identifying and modifying a client's defense mechanisms in counseling. A systematic approach to a client's mechanisms of defense contributes to therapeutic gain. Inappropriate counselor responses intensify an individual's defenses and undermine the counseling relationship. Definitions of individual defenses and indicators for identifying the mechanisms are provided. A literature review focuses on the counseling implications of the defenses. The process of defense mechanism modification is illustrated through a case example.     

Applying Skill-Based Curriculum to Teach Feedback in Groups: An Evaluation Study

Group counseling theory and empirical research indicate that interpersonal feedback is an important element that can lead to insight and change in group members. Yet, managing interpersonal feedback is a difficult skill for novice group leaders to learn. This article examines (a) the role of feedback in counseling groups; (b) the implementation of a skill-based training program to teach novice group counselors how to give, receive, and facilitate interpersonal feedback; and (c) students' evaluation of such a program in which they participated. Recommendations are made to practitioners for incorporating feedback into counseling, and for counselor educators regarding the teaching of the intervention.     

Intervention packages: an approach to self-management

Intervention packages—planned units of instruction and practice designed to deal with specific student problems—offer a systematic, economical strategy for counseling. Not only do the packages allow the counselor more time for counseling individuals and small groups but they also give students a feeling of greater control over their behavior and environment. This article suggests guidelines for developing and administering intervention packages.     

Parental representations and attachment style as predictors of support‐seeking behaviors and perceptions of support in an academic counseling relationship

The role of parental representations and attachment style as predictors of support‐seeking behaviors and perceptions of support in the context of an academic counseling relationship was investigated. Prior to participation in a 10‐hour academic counseling program in college, 91 students completed scales assessing perceptions of their current relationship with their parents and their attachment style. Students' support‐seeking behaviors and counselors' sensitivity, as reported by both participants (students and counselors), were evaluated twice during the counseling process, and general feelings of support were evaluated at the end of the program. Parental representations and attachment style both predicted students' support‐seeking behaviors and perceptions of support in counseling. The strength of the prediction differed as a function of time of measurement and source of evaluation. In addition, student‐perceived counselor sensitivity was found to mediate the relation between parental representations and support‐seeking behaviors in counseling     

AN ANALYSIS OF AND INTERVENTION IN THE SEXUAL TRANSMISSION OF DISEASE

Sexually transmitted diseases are a serious threat to the public health. Indeed, when an individual seeks medical treatment for a sexually transmitted disease, health authorities frequently attempt to identify, procure, and treat that individual's sexual contact(s). We conducted a comparative analysis of three alternative approaches to tracing the sexual partners of individuals diagnosed as having a sexually transmitted disease. The first approach involved counseling individuals (n = 27) infected with either gonorrhea or nongonococcal urethritis and exhorting them to procure their sexual partners for treatment. In addition to counseling, the second and third approaches involved distributing “occasion cards” for patients to use when informing sexual contacts of the need for treatment. Moreover, in the second approach, the counselor (a nurse or physician) informed infected patients (n = 19) that they and their partners could waive the $3 clinic fee contingent upon the partners seeking treatment within 1 week. In the third approach, the counselor asked infected persons (n = 19) to accept a follow-up telephone contact if their sexual partners failed to seek treatment within 1 week. The third approach was most effective. Ninety percent of the partners identified through this approach sought treatment, versus only about 60% of the partners in the other two conditions. The third approach was also the least expensive, costing about $2.95 to procure each partner for treatment.     

Spirituality in Counseling: What Do Counseling Students Think About It?

The author discusses students' reactions to 4 seminars. 1‐hour each, on the topic of spirituality in counseling. Students were enrolled in a master's‐level counseling program, Several issues emerged that have implications for the training of counselors on spiritual issues, including students' level of comfort with discussing spiritual issues, the difficulty of defining spirituality, client and counselor readiness to explore spirituality, and training issues in the area of spirituality.     

White Racial Identity Attitudes and the Ego Defense Mechanisms Used by White Counselor Trainees in Racially Provocative Counseling Situations

This exploratory study examined the relationship between racial identity attitudes and the use of ego defense mechanisms by White counselor trainees during cross‐racial counseling and supervision dyads. The sample consisted of 145 White counselor trainees enrolled in both master's and doctoral programs at 2 small private universities located in the northeastern United States. Results indicated that White counselor trainees at less mature statuses of racial identity attitudes relied on more primitive ego defenses to manage the anxiety experienced during racially provocative counseling and supervision dyads. Implications for counseling and counselor training are discussed in the context of the study's findings.     

A Preliminary Longitudinal Study of Multicultural Competence in Counselor Education

The purpose of this study was to investigate longitudinal changes in master’s-level counselor trainees’ (N = 78) self-perceptions of their multicultural counseling competence over the course of their counseling program. Multilevel modeling results indicated an increase in scores across 3 time points. The authors discuss study limitations and how counselors and counselor educators can incorporate the study’s findings into their practice and into the education and supervision of counselor trainees.     

Approaching Complex Cases With a Crisis Intervention Model and Teamwork

Patients referred for genetic counseling may be in a state of crisis, feeling as though they are incapable of making decisions about the management of their pregnancy, genetic testing options and/or life planning issues. The role of the genetic counselor is to assist a patient through this crisis state by increasing the patient's understanding and by helping to facilitate decision making and adjustment to those decisions. In this paper we present a clinical genetic counseling case that was complicated by numerous medical and psychosocial issues. The wide scope of this case required the involvement of both a prenatal and a medical genetic counselor. Working as a team we utilized a crisis intervention model. Our counseling focused on identifying and isolating the issues, providing factual information, setting a time frame for decisions to be made, and encouraging social support and emotion-focused coping strategies.     

Counselor Trainees' Interprofessional Self-Efficacy After a Career Development Intervention

Career development is a lifelong process of learning, working, and transitions that move a person closer to their preferred future. This study investigated the use of a career development intervention to help counselor trainees in a master's program and allied health students with integrating new perspectives in their future careers. This qualitative study with a diverse group of 12 participants provides important insight into career thoughts, career self-efficacy, and potential career development opportunities through interprofessional engagement career interventions. The findings are novel and have never been addressed in an empirical study for counselor trainees.     

A Decision‐Making Model for Addressing Problematic Behaviors in Counseling Students

Gatekeeping is the subject of continued discourse in the counseling profession. With revisions to the ACA Code of Ethics (American Counseling Association, 2014 ), recent litigation (Keeton v. Anderson‐Wiley, 2010 ; Ward v. Wilbanks, 2009 ), and focused attention on value conflicts in counseling (Francis & Dugger, 2014 ), counselor educators' role as gatekeepers is expanding. In addition to this expanding role, counselor educators are responsible for being culturally and developmentally sensitive in interpreting, applying, and enforcing the codes and standards with counseling students. This article proposes a decision‐making model that integrates feminist, multicultural, systems theory, and social‐constructivist ethical decision‐making principles to address problematic behaviors in counseling students.     

Inclusion of Religious Behaviors and Attitudes in Counseling: Expectations of Conservative Christians

In this study of 118 religiously conservative Christians' expectations of counseling, participants were randomly assigned to 1 of 2 treatment conditions: a Christian counselor or a counselor whose religious beliefs were unknown. Participants rated their expectations for the counselor's attitude toward their religious beliefs and use of religious behaviors in counseling using the Behavior and Attitude Expectancies scale (C. Belaire & J. S. Young, 2002). Participants also rated their general expectations for counseling using the Expectations About Counseling: Brief Form (H. E. A. Tinsley, 1985). Results showed that participants expected both a Christian counselor and a counselor whose religious beliefs were unknown to be respectful and accepting of conservative Christian religious beliefs and values and to include multiple religious behaviors in counseling sessions. Participants had overall positive expectations of the counseling process.