Components of Supervisors’ Ratings of Therapists’ Skillfulness

Abstract

A questionnaire was developed to assess the skillfulness of therapists from the perspective of the supervisor. This supervisor report yielded two scores: one for psychotherapeutic techniques and one for the educational alliance. These scores had high internal consistency and were relatively independent of one another. Ratings of proficiency in psychotherapeutic techniques accounted for 54% of the variance in supervisors' rating? of global skillfulness; educational alliance contributed an additional 12%. Compared with other supervisors, those who espoused self psychology based more of their appraisal of skill fulness on the trainee's use of the supervisory relationship.

Experiences of novice therapists in prepracticum: Trainees', clients', and supervisors' perceptions of therapists' personal reactions and management strategies.

“…The test–retest reliabilities for the three subscale scores range from .77 to .87 (Spearman–Brown corrected; Krasner, Jones, & Howard, 1994), with internal consistency scores (alpha) ranging from .90 to .92. Jones et al (1992) also demonstrated validity by comparing scores of skillfulness across different theoretical orientations. Higher scores on the Supervisor's Report indicate greater therapeutic skill.…”

“…Supervisor's Report (Jones, Krasner, <£ Howard, 1992). This 25-item questionnaire is used by supervisors to assess supervisees' therapeutic skills and performance, typically in psychodynamic psychotherapy.…”

Field supervisors' assessments of trainee performance: Are they reliable and valid?

“…Some studies that reported high reliabilities employed pretraining sessions for raters and focused on more specific counselling behaviours (e.g., frequency of minimal encouragers or empathic responses), that constitute a small part of the knowledge and skills that trainees are supposed to acquire during placements (e.g., Aronson, Akamatsu, & Page, 1982;Hill, Charles, & Reed, 1981). Jones, Krasner, and Howard (1992) reported high reliabilities for supervisor reports, but were actually describing agreement between ratings on two aspects of therapy by the same supervisor, rather than high interrater reliability. Finally, a recent survey (Robiner, Saltzman, Hoberman, Semrud-Clikeman, & Schirvar, 1997) indicated that most supervisors (59%) acknowledged that their own ratings were biased and also believe that other supervisors' assessments were biased in some form, with only a small percentage (11%) believing otherwise.…”

Psychotherapeutic Skill Following Group Supervision According to Supervisees and Supervisors

“…The questionnaire consisted of 122 items with five narrative summaries. Another questionnaire, the Supervisor Report, was developed by Jones et al (1992) to measure supervisors' assessment of supervisees' skill in psychotherapy. The Supervisor Report was also used in two different studies by Krasner et al (1998;.…”