The effect of supervisor and trainee therapist gender on supervision discourse

The effects of supervisor and trainee therapist gender on supervision discourse were examined in this study. Forty episodes of supervision discourse, with ten drawn from each of four types of supervision systems were videotaped. The systems were (1) male supervisor and male trainee therapist; (2) male supervisor and female trainee therapist; (3) female supervisor and male trainee therapist; and (4) female supervisor and female trainee therapist. The episodes of supervision discourse were analysed using a supervision discourse coding system which showed adequate inter-rater reliability. For supervisors, the coding system allowed a directive discourse style and a collaborative discourse styled to be coded. A cooperative discourse style and a resistant discourse style could be coded for trainee therapists. Two statistically significant findings of considerable theoretical and clinical importance emerged. First, contrary to stereotypic expectations, discourse characterized by a directive supervision style and a resistant trainee therapist style was more common for systems containing a female supervisor than for those containing a male supervisor. Second, for same gender supervisor-trainee-therapist supervision systems, a collaborative systemic supervision style was correlated with both cooperative and resistant trainee therapist styles. This discourse pattern did not occur for opposite gender supervision systems, indicating that a collaborative supervision discourse style is consistently associated with trainee therapist parti-cipation (either cooperatively or resistantly) within same gender pairings of supervisors and trainee therapists. These results are discussed in light of relevant literature on gender, power and supervision process and the limitations of the study are considered.     

Gender and conversational behaviour in family therapy and live supervision

The association between supervisors' and therapists' gender and the conversational behaviour of four supervisors, nineteen trainee family therapists and twenty clients before, during and after eighty-eight live supervisory phone in events were examined in this study. Clients' co-operation was not directly related to the gender of therapists and supervisors. The quality of supervisors' collaborative behaviour was highest for events in systems where male supervisors were supervising male therapists and lowest for events in systems where male supervisors were supervising female therapists. In systems containing female supervisors and male therapists, therapists engaged in frequent collaborative behaviour and less frequent teaching behaviour with their clients. The quality of therapists' collaborative and supportive behaviour was highest in these systems. The unexpected results of this study suggest that the way supervisors interact with therapists and therapists interact with clients does not conform to gender stereotypic conversational behaviour in which males are directive and females affiliative. It may be that individuals whose conversational behaviour does not conform to gender stereotypes decide to become family therapists or that family therapy training helps people develop alternatives to gender-stereotypical conversational behaviour.     

The relationship of supervisor and trainee gender match and gender attitude match to supervisory style and the supervisory working alliance

Background: Gender‐related events have the potential to impact the supervisory relationship. Gender events might be related to the match between supervisors and supervisees on variables such as gender or gender attitudes. Method: In this study, we sought to determine whether gender match and gender attitude match were related to supervisory style and the supervisory working alliance in 94 supervisory dyads using four instruments: the Gender Attitude Inventory; Operationalisation of Gender Match; Supervisory Styles Inventory; and the Working Alliance Inventory/Supervision. Results: Progressive dyads (in which supervisors have more liberal attitudes about societal issues and culturally defined roles for women than their supervisees) were perceived by supervisors as more task‐oriented than parallel‐high dyads (in which supervisors and supervisees both had liberal attitudes). Implications for counselling supervision are discussed.     

Electronic Communication in Supervisory Relationships: A Mixed Data Survey

Much has been written about online communication between therapists and clients, particularly regarding the feasibility, ethics, and frequency of such practices. Little, however, has been published with regard to electronic communication patterns between therapists and their supervisors. The purpose of this study was to understand if and how electronic communication is used between marriage and family therapy (MFT) supervisees and supervisors. To accomplish this, we administered a mixed data survey to MFT supervisors and supervisees across the United States regarding frequency of interaction via electronic methods. We also assessed comfort level with online supervision, how supervisory participants make determinations when to use online supervision, and when online communication is believed to be most appropriate within MFT supervision. We report both qualitative and quantitative findings regarding the use of online technologies in supervision. Implications for research, training, and supervision are discussed.     

The Soul of Supervision: Counselor Spirituality

Because spirituality training for counselors and supervisors is vital to counselor development, the authors examined the relationships between purpose in life, the integration of spirituality into supervision, and the supervisory working alliance among a sample of supervisors and trainees. Supervisors reported a greater sense of purpose and spiritual discussion during supervision than trainees. Trainees' personal sense of purpose was positively related to spiritual discussions with a supervisor and to an emphasis on client issues in supervision.     

Supervisory styles index: Examining supervisees' perceptions of Supervisory Style

The goal of this research was to develop an instrument, the Supervisory Styles Index (SSI), that would examine supervisory style. Style has been described as the way in which the personality and convictions of the supervisor are demonstrated in the supervisory relationship (Leighton, 1991). This study focuses on the interplay between supervisory style and the influence of sex and gender. The findings of this study reveal that female supervisees discern their supervisors to be more self-disclosing than do male supervisees. Implications of the findings and utilization of the index are discussed.Portions of this paper were presented at the 52nd annual conference of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy, Chicago, Illinois, November, 1994.     

Gender and power in counselling and supervision

The need to reflect on how the dynamics of gender and power can articulate together and adversely affect counselling and supervision relationships is addressed. It is suggested that automatically incorporating a social analysis into supervision will help the counsellor clarify the political nature of some of the therapeutic issues and result in the addressing of gender stereotypes which otherwise might contaminate the process of counselling. It is further argued that using a feminist approach, in which there is a commitment to facilitating equality and personal power between women and men, is helpful in establishing a constructive and facilitating supervisory style.     

Through the looking glass: women and ministry supervision

Issues pertaining to women and clinical pastoral supervision are identified and examined in this essay. An in-depth literature review regarding the relationship between gender and supervised pastoral training provides the basis for the identification of the following themes: the relative lack of female supervisors; how and why we ought to talk about gender and ministry supervision; the contextual relevance of systemic marginalization to ministry supervision; the relationship between pastoral care and the "feminine"; the relevance of a panentheistic God to gender and ministry supervision; and, lastly, the relevance of gender to the supervisory relationship. Although the focus is on the ways in which gender dynamics can affect the female supervisee's experience, the author also takes a brief look at how female supervisors might experience the relevance of their gender to the art of supervision.     

Three Aspects of the Therapeutic Conversation in Couples Therapy

Abstract

Feminist scholars have revealed the importance of examining the influence of gender on the therapeutic process. Gender differences in the treatment of clients may reveal inequitable or traditionally Stereotypie treatment of clients by therapists. This study examined gender differences in three conversational strategies widely used by therapists: expressions of empathy or understanding, compliments or praise, and challenges or requests for change. Fourteen tapes of live therapy sessions conducted by “master” therapists were examined using an exploratory, qualitative methodology based on Conversation Analysis. Results of this exploration revealed that therapists who are not self identified as “feminist challenged female clients more than male clients, and complimented male clients more than female clients. Feminist therapists challenged male clients more than female clients, and complimented female clients more than male clients. Feminist therapists used more challenges designed to facilitate non-stereo-typic gender behavior in both male and female clients. Only male therapists used disrespectful challenges of female clients, and were more often disrespectful to female clients than to male clients. Implications for the therapist-client relationship and the feminist critique are provided.     

Self‐supervision,surveillance and transgression

Transgression is not only an inevitable part of systemic supervision but is also necessary if we are to work towards innovative and inclusive supervisory and therapeutic practice. Defying culturally generated ‘rules’ of systemic practice can allow for more relevant and productive ways of talking. Systemic practitioners are increasingly finding themselves trying to practice systemic therapy in employing authorities and training courses which are dominated by inflexible professional narratives and manualised procedures. Our profession is committed to ethical inner and outer dialogue, to self‐ and relational reflexivity as distinct from the rule‐bound surveillance culture in which we live and work. Systemic supervisors and therapists may find themselves at odds with monological institutional discourse and attempts from within our own profession to manualise practice. I introduce examples from supervisory conversations to illustrate how supervisors can develop more culturally sensitive practices through supporting practitioners to hear and have heard their own marginalised and oppressed voices and those of their clients.     

Erotic Countertransference and Clinical Social Work Practice: A National Survey of Psychotherapists' Sexual Feelings,Attitudes, and Responses

Male and female social work psychotherapists were surveyed on sexual feelings toward clients, sexual behavior with clients, and utilization of erotic countertransference. Relationships between these variables and therapists' self-reports of training in erotic counter-transference, utilization of supervisory consultation, length of clinical experience, and theoretical orientation were also examined. Male therapists were significantly more likely than females to report sexual attraction toward clients, and to report using erotic countertransference to further treatment goals. The frequency of therapists' discussion of sexual feelings toward clients in supervision was related to the reported frequency of utilization of sexual feelings in treatment. The majority of therapists reported that their social work training did not prepare them adequately to work with erotic countertransference.     

Trainee therapists’ views on the alliance in psychotherapy and supervision: a longitudinal study

The shape of alliance in psychotherapy and supervision using growth curve modeling was examined for clinically inexperienced trainee therapists, who were engaged in long-term cognitive behavioral - or psychodynamic individual psychotherapy at a Psychology Clinic in Sweden. Trainee therapists rated their view of the alliance with their clients and their supervisors on the Working Alliance Inventory at five time points. The alliance to the client show a consistent, positive development throughout the therapy. The alliance to the supervisors show initially a decrease, followed by an increase, and then again, the rate of increase in the supervisory alliance ratings slowed down indicating a more complex view of the supervisory alliance compared to the view of the alliance in psychotherapy.     

Homonegativism and sexual orientation matching in counseling supervision

The present study examined the effects of sexual orientation matching and supervisory role on supervisory style and satisfaction with homonegativism as a covariate. Supervisory style significantly correlated with satisfaction for supervisors when trainees were heterosexual but not when trainees were lesbian, gay, or bisexual. Regardless of supervisor or trainee sexual orientation, the supervisors’ homonegativism significantly negatively correlated with trainees’ satisfaction and ratings of supervisors’ style. No significant differences in supervisory style were found among supervision dyads cross-matched for sexual orientation while controlling for homonegativism.     

Group Supervision of Novice Clinical Supervisors: Eight Recurring Issues

The authors describe one approach to the supervision of novice clinical supervisors. A central feature of this group approach to supervising supervisors is the eight recurring supervisory issues: supervisor anxiety, intervention choices, group cohesion, responsibility, parallel process, power struggles, individual differences, and sexual attraction. Our experience suggests that assessing and successfully confronting these supervisory issues seem to be an integral part of supervisor supervision. Suggestions for addressing these issues are offered.     

Transitional Dynamics of Three Supervisory Styles Using Markov Chain Analysis

Counseling supervision is a critically important process that depends on the establishment of a supportive, collaborative, and developmentally enhancing working relationship. However, the actual verbal exchanges within the supervisory dyads are infrequently examined in the literature. In this study, we used Markov chain analysis to explore supervision dynamics of 34 supervisory dyads and how these dynamics varied within three supervisory styles (i.e., attractive, interpersonally sensitive, and task oriented). Among the three styles, the interpersonally sensitive supervisory style was the only discriminant variable based on which supervisory dyads exhibited statistically different state-transitional patterns (i.e., movement patterns across six supervision events). The results of this study provide implications for clinical supervisors, counselor educators, counselors-in-training, and researchers who are interested in studying process features at the microlevel.     

The impact of supervisors' cognitive styles on the quality of research supervision in management education

Background: An aspect of teaching and learning that has been seriously overlooked in higher education is the process of research supervision. High failure rates for research dissertations in the social sciences have been partly attributed to student dissatisfaction with supervision and poor student‐supervisor relationships. One personality variable that has been shown to be partly responsible for shaping the effectiveness of supervisory relationships is cognitive style. Aims: The study examined the effects of supervisor cognitive style on the quality of supervision for students undertaking a research project in the field of management education. Sample: Both parties in each of 118 supervisor‐student dyads within a university business school in the UK participated in the study. Method: Data were collected using the Cognitive Style Index to measure subjects on the analytic‐intuitive dimension of cognitive style. A self‐developed Thurstone attitude scale was used to measure students' perceptions of the quality of supervision. The scale's validity was assured by making extensive use of subjects' (N = 100) judgments from the population of interest in the scale's development. A second parallel scale was developed to test the instrument's reliability characteristics. Results: Findings revealed that students perceived the quality of supervision to increase significantly with the degree to which supervisors were analytic in their cognitive style. Students whose supervisors were more analytic also achieved significantly higher grades for their dissertations. Conclusions: Whilst there may be many factors influencing interpersonal relationships of this nature, this study demonstrated the potential relevance of cognitive style, which may prove to be a fertile area for further investigation.     

What Is Unique About Supervising Couple Therapists?

Abstract

What is unique about supervising couple therapists? To answer this question I highlight three important therapeutic processes in CT and their accompanying supervisory implications. The first process, the attending to values and beliefs about the meaning of coupling to couples and therapists and its influence on CT, is facilitated by supervisors who help supervisees uncover values and beliefs about coupling. The second process, developing the therapeutic alliance which has a unique complexity in CT, is facilitated by the processing of the therapeutic alliance in supervision and discovering ways of strengthening it. The final process, attending to emotion prevalent in CT, is facilitated by supervisors who assist supervisees in becoming comfortable with the expression of emotion and work with it constructively in CT. After briefly describing each process and why it is viewed as important in CT, I suggest ways supervisors can assist supervisees' becoming more proficient in them. An abbreviated supervision illustration ends each section.     

Sex differences in perceptions of interpersonal work style,career emphasis,supervisory mentoring behavior,and job satisfaction

This study examined the perceptions of career-oriented men and women with respect to their interpersonal work style, career emphasis, supervisory behavior, and job satisfaction based on their current or most recent work experience. The results show that women subjects in this study perceived themselves to be less assertive in work situations and also continued to emphasize home life over their career success and advancement when compared to men. In the context of supervisory behavior, women subjects perceived male supervisors as exhibiting less mentioning behavior towards them and had lower job satisfaction when compared to male subjects under male supervisors in the study. Some implications of these results with respect to training and career management were also discussed.     

What Works for the Gander Does Not Work as Well for the Goose: The Effects of Leader Behavior

This study examines the effects of leader behaviors and leader gender on employees' perceptions of support from the organization and employee commitment to the organization. Ninety-one employees completed a survey measuring leader behaviors, perceived organizational support, and organizational commitment. Results confirmed the hypothesis that a high interpersonal orientation and high task orientation had the most positive effect on employee attitudes. However, the high interpersonal orientation and high task orientation were not equally effective for both female and male leaders. Employees perceived more support from the organization when their supervisors, either female or male, used a high consideration–high initiating structure style than when they used a low consideration–low initiating structure style. On the other hand, only those employees who work for a male supervisor who is high in consideration and high in initiating structure were more committed to the organization.