Effects of a Workshop on Mental Health Practitioners' Attitudes Toward Homosexuality and Counseling Effectiveness

The effects of a training workshop on mental health practitioners' attitudes toward homosexuality and counseling behavior were compared with the effects of no intervention. Treated subjects (n = 21) were enrolled in a 3-day multimodal workshop about gay/lesbian counseling, and no-treatment comparison subjects (n = 31) were enrolled in other counselor education coursework. Before and after the workshop, subjects completed homosexuality attitude questionnaires and a quasibehavioral gay/lesbian counseling effectiveness measure. Treated subjects improved significantly more than comparison subjects on all measures, and the gains remained in evidence at an 8-week follow-up. The multimodal training workshop thus appears encouraging as a possible means of instilling needed attitudes and skills in counselors of gay and lesbian clients.