We evaluate the potential relevance of virtue ethics to the training and practice of professional psychologists, and we contrast them with principle ethics. Typically, principles are used to facilitate the selection of socially and historically acceptable answers to the question "What shall I do?" when confronted by ethical dilemmas. Virtue ethics, however, generally focus on the question "Who shall I be?" Strengths and weaknesses of each approach are presented. The impact of each is discussed with respect to informed consent and the therapeutic construct "genuineness." We conclude that virtue ethics are an essential component of responsible ethical training and practice.

This study explored the relationships among self-reported attachment styles, gender, and several aspects of subjective emotional experience pertinent to the counseling situation: (a) attention to emotion, (b) intensity of emotion, and (c) emotional expressivity. Four self-report measures, including an adult attachment style questionnaire and 3 measures of emotion, were given to 140 undergraduates. Results show that attachment groups could be distinguished on the basis of their emotional experience along 2 dimensions: (a) expressivity and (b) "intentness," a combination of attention and intensity. Men and women could be distinguished on a combination of all 3 dependent measures. Gender differences were less prominent, however, when men and women within the same attachment style were compared. Implications for counseling are discussed.In the past decade researchers in the area of counseling psychology have demonstrated that attachment theory yields important insights and empirical findings in the sciencepractice domain (e.g.,

Using data generated from a computer-assisted language analysis system, and excerpts taken from two different time periods in each interview from the film series Three Approaches to Psychotherapy, the stylistic complexity of the language of counselor and client was compared. The analysis indicated that the counselors were significantly different from one another on four dependent measures of stylistic complexity: (a) number of sentences, (b) average sentence length, (c) average block length, and (d) average clause depth. The differences were commensurate with expectations derived from what are understood to be the major tenets of each theoretical approach. The client's stylistic complexity also differed significantly on the four measures across the three interviews. Moreover by comparing the data within each interview from Time 1 and Time 2, evidence for concerted action was found. The results support and raise questions about the potency of interpersonal influence in counseling, the effect of the theoretical approach upon the language by which counseling is conducted, and speculations about how counselor and client establish the ground rules for treatment.This study investigates how the counselor and client use natural language to communicate with one another and to accomplish counseling goals. We assume counseling to be a process of social influence whose success requires common understanding and concerted action between participants. We assume further that careful analysis of the language used in the counseling is a fruitful source of information about these phenomena and has implications for research, training, and practice.

This article is based on a thesis and a dissertation submitted by Chau-Ming T. Wong in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the master's and doctoral degrees in the Department of Psychology at the University of Notre Dame.We thank the Notre Dame undergraduates for their help in data collection and coding.

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