The Pinocchio Syndrome: Lying and Its Impact on the Counseling Process

Surprisingly little has been written in the counseling journals on the topic of lying: that is, why some clients consciously choose to be either dishonest with their counselors or deliberately hold back (i.e., keep secrets) important information from their counselors. This article discusses the dynamics of lying and offers suggestions to counselors on how to work with clients who lie.     

Satanism among adolescents: empirical and clinical considerations.

This paper reviews the literature on adolescent involvement in satanism. Results from a pilot study are presented along with a case study to illustrate factors that may alert practitioners to adolescents who are susceptible to satanic influences. Interventions for dealing with this adolescent subpopulation are discussed.     

The Role of the School Counselor in Facilitating Sexual Development

Because there is a trend in the helping professions toward recognizing sexuality as an integral and important dimension of healthy personality development, school counselors and other school personnel have become committed to assisting students in understanding and dealing with their sociosexual needs and concerns. Yet school counselors need to be better prepared to meet these needs. This article suggests skills and attitudes that are necessary for accomplishing the goals of counseling on issues of human sexuality, and how counselors can acquire these skills and attitudes.     

Occupational Therapist,Biomedical Science Corps Officer and Former Firefighter

Abstract

What the literature reports that adolescents need within their parent-adolescent relationships, as well as what adolescents with serious emotional disturbances may experience within their parent-adolescent relationships are discussed. A framework for providing parent-adolescent group intervention for psychiatrically hospitalized adolescents and their parents to promote positive interaction and co-occupation are provided. Summaries of the parent-adolescent activity group experiences of three families are provided to illustrate how different adolescent psychiatric issues and family dynamics might be addressed in a parent adolescent activity group.     

Family factors and adolescent substance use: models and mechanisms

This article considers the relation of family factors to adolescent substance use, with a focus on the specific pathways by which family factors have their effects. We review findings on four types of variables (family substance use, parental support and monitoring, parent-child conflict, and family life events) and discuss theoretical models of how family risk and protective factors are related to adolescents' outcomes. The evidence favors a transactional model in which family factors have largely mediated effects on adolescent substance use through relations to adolescents' self-control, life events, and peer affiliations; interactions between variables are also prominent. We discuss the implications of mediated effects for theoretical models of human development and consider how the transactional approach opens avenues for preventive intervention.     

How Adolescent Children of African Jamaican Immigrants Living in Canada Perceive and Negotiate their Roles within a Matrifocal Family

This research project examined the adolescent/young adult-parent relationships of African Jamaican immigrants currently living in Canada. Specifically, we focused on the transmission of cultural values and beliefs within these relationships and how the adolescents navigated and negotiated potential changes in these values because of their acculturative experiences. An examination of various mundane family/cultural practices provided insight into perceived transmission attempts by parents and the adolescent/young adult interpretation of these attempts. Twenty in-depth interviews were conducted with adolescent/young adult members of African Jamaican immigrant families living in Canada. Using Grounded Theory methodology (Glaser & Strauss, 1967), several themes emerged during the analysis of the interviews—the most significant being the issue of matrifocality within the African Jamaican family. Issues of respect and adolescent agency are also discussed as they related to the manner in which the adolescent/young adult attempted to negotiate various roles within the family.     

Understanding Dual Career Couples

The increasing number of clients seeking to maintain a dual career life-style has increased the need for counselors to educate themselves to the unqiue set of concerns, needs, and characteristics particular to dual career partners and their families. This article presents an overview of the published literature delineating the variables associated with this life-style, including the numerous benefits or incentives, the common conflicts and stressors, and the personality dynamics shared by these men and women. In addition, the article will describe dysfunctional coping strategies as well as adaptive strategies employed by individuals attempting to manage the coupling of both career and family.     

A crisis mental health intervention service: an innovative model for working intensively with young people on the edge of care

This paper describes the setting up and the first year of running of an innovative outreach service for adolescents on the edge of care that aimed at redressing family breakdown and preventing placements in the care system. It was a collaborative endeavour between social services and a child and adolescent mental health provision to facilitate the engagement of hard to reach young people and families that often presented high levels of risk. This article describes a distinctive model of applied psychoanalytic work with individuals, families and the networks of practitioners and agencies around the case. It focuses on the integration of two perspectives: the individual and the family on the one hand and the organisation on the other. Case examples illustrate how our psychoanalytic and developmental framework illuminated our understanding of frequently extreme acting out behaviour and parental difficulties in terms of underlying intergenerational trauma, which was often re-enacted. This framework also helped in understanding the difficulties that practitioners experienced and how these related to individual and family dynamics. The article describes the significance of containment in the treatment of adolescents and families in crisis as well as in supporting the professional network.     

Family factors in childhood obesity

Abstract

Childhood obesity is reaching epidemic proportions in the United States today. Children become its victims and often carry obesity-producing habits into adulthood. Much research has been reported on obesity, but little has touched on how family dynamics affect childhood obesity. This article explores the family dynamics of childhood obesity, and presents evidence supporting the need for a family-based treatment model.     

Life or Death of Severely Disabled Infants: A Counseling Issue

Due to the death of a severely disabled infant from Bloomington, Indiana, a series of events set in motion by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has resulted in cautions to health care providers. The resulting policies and procedures warn hospital personnel against withholding nutritional sustenance or medical treatment from severely disabled infants. This article presents dimensions that might serve as a background for counselors to assist families in considering options related to disabled infants. These dimensions include the meaning of life, cost to benefit ratio, medical options, legal precedent, and a theological perspective. This issue is related to counseling practice through counselor ethics, values, and the need for information that counselors can provide to parents during the decision process.     

How Chaos and Complexity Theory Can Help Counselors to Be More Effective

Chaos and complexity theory can help counselors to assist clients in new and unique ways. Chaos and complexity theory do not need to replace other counseling theories but can provide an alternative view. Using chaos theory in counseling requires, however, a revaluation of counselors' assumptions about the world, particularly about linearity, prediction, and control. This article uses a case study to illustrate how counselors can use chaos and complexity theory in their work with clients. This theory can offer an alternative framework to assist counselors in conceptualizing their clients and their practice.     

Spirituality and Dream Work in Counseling: Clients’ Experiences

The authors suggest that focusing on dreams in counseling may be a useful framework to explore clients’ spiritual values and beliefs. Because little is known about how spirituality and dream work are integrated in practice, the purpose of this article is to document how some counselors and clients work on spirituality and dreams. Responses of clients who focused on dreams from a spiritual perspective are described and discussed. Relevant clinical issues that counselors may encounter are identified. Recommendations are made for counselors who wish to integrate spirituality and dream work in counseling.An earlier version of this article was presented at the Semi-Annual Meeting of the Association of Mormon Counselors and Psychotherapists, Salt Lake City, Utah, April 2004.     

understanding and counseling transgender clients

Because transgender individuals experience widespread employment discrimination, counselors need to understand and be able to work with members of the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender communities. The aim of this article is to help counselors become more transgender literate by (a) defining gender dysphoric disorder and related terms; (b) discussing the causes, diagnosis, and treatment of gender dysphoria; (c) highlighting career realities faced by transgender employees; (d) touching upon legal issues pertaining to transgender workers; and (e) offering a few suggestions to counselors working with transgender clients.     

Bereavement and triangular relationships in a case of a child suffering from anorexia

This paper describes the mother–child assessment of a five-year-old girl suffering from anorexia since weaning, which was carried out in an Italian NHS neuropsychiatric child and adolescent unit. The author aims to show how she was able to link the little girl’s refusal of food to a death in the maternal family, which occurred soon after her birth. As well as this post-traumatic formulation, the author links the child’s anorexia to two related aspects of the family dynamics: avoidance of the awareness of death and the inability to manage triangular relationships, due to important intrusion and exclusion anxieties. Using extracts from the sessions, the author shows how the little girl was able to begin to work through the death phantasy which was previously inaccessible to her and her family. The concept of the death phantasy is defined and explored and possible analogies between this case and what is observed in some anorexic adolescent girls and their families are described.     

The Disappearing Family: The Role of Counselors in Creating Surrogate Families

For most of the world the nuclear and extended family provide the psychological support needed to mature and deal with life's crises. In the United States the family is changing rapidly. The changes sharply limit the ability of the institution to provide the support and role models formerly available. This article documents the emerging issues counselors and clients need to face. It suggests the value of creating surrogate families to fill the void created by the disappearing family.     

Mothers’ Perspectives on Their Child’s Mental Illness as Compared to Other Complex Disorders in Their Family: Insights to Inform Genetic Counseling Practice

To facilitate the development of a therapeutic alliance in genetic counseling, it is important that the counselor understands how families might perceive the condition that constitutes the reason for the referral. Through training and professional practice, genetic counselors develop a thorough understanding of families' perceptions of the conditions that are common indications for genetic counseling. But, for referral indications that are less frequent, like serious mental illnesses, genetic counselors may feel less confident in their understanding of the family's experience, or in their ability to provide psychosocial support when serious mental illness is reported in a family history. This may impede the establishment of a therapeutic alliance. As research shows that most referrals for genetic counseling related to serious mental illness are for female first-degree family members of affected individuals, we sought to explore how this group perceives serious mental illness. To provide a frame of reference with which genetic counselors may be more familiar, we explored how women perceived serious mental illness compared to other common complex disorders in their family. We conducted semi-structured interviews with women who had a child with a serious mental illness (schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, bipolar disorder) and a first-degree relative with another common complex disorder (diabetes, heart disease, cancer). Interviews were transcribed and subjected to thematic analysis. Saturation was reached when nine women had participated. Serious mental illness was perceived as being more severe and as having a greater impact on the family than diabetes, heart disease, or cancer. Themes identified included guilt, stigma, and loss. Some of the most important issues that contribute to mothers' perceptions that serious mental illness is more severe than other common complex disorders could be effectively addressed in genetic counseling. Developing a heightened awareness of how family members experience a relative's mental illness may help genetic counselors to be better able to provide psychosocial support to this group, whether serious mental illness constitutes the primary reason for referral or appears in the family history during counseling for a different referral reason.     

Relevance and Alliance: Cornerstones in Training Counselors of Men

The need for alliance between women and men is fundamental for fully understanding as well as for effectively countering the negative consequences of gender roles and related strains for both sexes. This article discusses training counselors of men in relation to two questions: Is sexism as relevant an issue for men as it seems to be for women? and What are appropriate goals for training sessions of counselors of men?     

Exploring the Religious-Spiritual Needs of the Dying

After presenting evidence for the heightened need among the dying to explore religious-spiritual issues, the article explains how counselors might best approach this need. The approach that is explicated centers on nonjudgmental openness toward all of the client's religious-spiritual explorations. The last, and largest, portion of the article presents psycho-social tools that can be used to assess, examine, and amplify a client's religious-spiritual strengths.     

The Social Ecology of Parental Monitoring: Parent–Child Dynamics in a High‐Risk Peruvian Neighborhood

While parental monitoring is understood to protect adolescents from engaging in risk behaviors, little is known about how the family dynamics involved in parental monitoring differ across sociocultural contexts. We sought to gain an in‐depth understanding of parent–child relationship dynamics and parental knowledge of adolescents’ activities in an urban Peruvian neighborhood with high levels of crime and adolescent substance use. We conducted 15 in‐depth interviews and two focus groups with adolescents and 12 in‐depth interviews with mothers sampled from a secondary school in Callao, Peru. Our findings emphasize the importance of parent–child confianza (trust) as a foundation for parental awareness of adolescents’ lives and activities. Participants in our sample characterized confianza as encouraging adolescent disclosure and shaping how parental solicitation and rules were interpreted by adolescents. Participants described how confianza was rooted in features of the parent–child relationship, including shared parent–child time, parental affection, adolescent perceptions of parents’ ability to give good advice, and awareness of how parents would react to delicate topics. Participants linked these family dynamics, in turn, to economic hardship, parental feelings of sacrifice and stress, perceptions of neighborhood risk, and gender norms limiting fathers’ involvement in caregiving. Results have implications for the planning and adaptation of family‐based prevention programs for use in high‐risk contexts in Latin America.     

Well-being and Need for Support of Adolescents with a Chronically Ill Family Member

This study investigates whether there are differences in the well-being, need for help and use of support services between adolescents with and without a chronically ill or disabled family member. It also examines the role played by the type of illness, the relationship to the family member and the nature and intensity of the help provided by the adolescent. A Dutch sample of 1581 adolescents (average age 14.6?years) completed a questionnaire in 2010 about mental health problems, pro-social behavior, need for and use of support and the illness of family members and any care tasks performed by the respondent. Young people with a sick family member had more mental health problems than their counterparts without a chronically ill family member. They also reported a greater need for and use of help and support. Performing domestic tasks was found to be a predictor for overall mental health problems. The intensity of the help given was related to the need for help by the adolescent. It is concluded that growing up with a chronically ill family member and spending a lot time performing (domestic) tasks are risk factors for adolescent mental health problems and adolescents’ need for help. Special attention is warranted for those who need support but who do not translate that need into reality by seeking help.