The Influence of Training on Counselor Responses in Actual and Role‐Playing Interviews

Research on Training Counselors and Clinicians

“…Comparisons with comparable (Aldrich & Barnhardt, 1963;Anderson, 1969) and approximately comparable (Bernstein, 1972(Bernstein, -1973Perlman, 1972Perlman, , 1973 notraining control groups have demonstrated that supervised experience in conducting therapy produces positive changes in trainee personality characteristics, knowledge, and communication skills. However, Green (1973), Ornston et al (1970), and Roark (1969) reported that such experience did not add significantly to didactic seminars and lectures or supervised experience in simulated counseling. Furthermore, the only studies using truly comparable comparison groups produced negative (Green, 1973), mixed (Anderson, 1969), or only near significant (Aldrich & Barnhardt, 1963) results.…”

“…Six studies either approximated (Carter & Pappas, 1975;Gade & Matuschka, 1973;Hountras & Redding, 1969;Roark, 1969) or achieved (Doyle, Foreman, & Wales, 1977;Matarazzo, Phillips, Wiens, & Saslow, 1965) this ideal; the first four were limited in that they utilized behavior categories that were not specifically and exhaustively operationally defined. All other studies that used response-frequency counts did so in analogue therapy interviews or oral responses to taped or written client statements, and failed to report any concurrent validity data demonstrating that their data were generalizable to real therapy interviews.…”

“…Very few studies reported conforming to the latter two guidelines. Many studies also failed to observe the first two precautions, or failed to check reliability at all, or reported low (i.e., less than .75) reliability coefficients on some (Bailey, Deardorf, & Nay, 1977;Berenson, Carkhuff, & Myrus, 1966;DiMattie & Arndt, 1974;Dooley, 1975;Frankel, 1971;Ivey, Normington, Miller, Morrill, & Haase, 1968;Lambert, 1974;Martin & Carkhuff, 1968;Perry, 1975;Rappaport, Gross, & Lepper, 1973;Ryan & Budner, 1970;Selfridge, Weitz, Abramowitz, Calabria, Abramowitz, & Steger, 1975) or on all dependent variables data (Blane, 1968;Canada, 1973;Carkhuff & Truax, 1965;Carlson, 1974;Carter & Pappas, 1975;Delaney, Long, Masucci, & Moses, 1969;Dowd & Blocher, 1974;Gade & Matuschka, 1973;Hountras & Redding, 1969;Kanfer & Pomeranz, 1965;Kingdon, 1975;Kuna, 1975;Miller, Morrill, Ivey, Normington, & Uhleman, 1973;Miller, Morrill, & Uhleman, 1970;Ornston, Cicchetti, & Towbin, 1970;Roark, 1969;Saltmarsh & Hubele, 1974;Schoch, 1966;Silverman & Quinn, 1974;Ward, Kagan, & Krathwohl, 1972;Werner & Schneider, 1974).…”

“…Such training programs run from 6 weeks to 1 or 2 academic terms. "Traditional" training programs have been shown to have successfully taught interview skills to "paraprofessional" counselors (Karlsruher, 1976;Rioch, Elkes, Flint, Usdansky, Newman, & Silber, 1963), counselor trainees (Burck et al, 1973;Demos & Zuwayliff, 1963;Roark, 1969;Schoch, 1966), and medical students (Johnson, Sribbe, Crowder, Zall, & Wolkon, 1974;Matarazzo, Phillips, Wiens, & Saslow, 1965;Thurnblad, Muslin, & Loesch, 1973;Werkman, Landau, & Wakeland, 1973), as well as behavior therapy skills to medical students and social work and clinical psychology trainees (Houts, Note 3;Poser, 1972), and to produce positive personality changes in counselor trainees (Anderson, 1969;Ashmore, 1968 "Traditional" training's efficacy has been called into question by IDET research's reporting that more advanced trainees in "traditional" clinical programs are less facilitative than less advanced trainees, and that traditional indexes (e.g., GRE, GPA) used to evaluate and select clinical trainees correlate nonsignificantly (and often negatively) with therapist facilitativeness measures (e.g., Bergin & Jasper, 1969;Bergin & Solomon, 1970;Carkuff et al, 1968). Similarly, Havens (1968) found no pre-post changes, associated with a traditional practicum, in trainees' abilities to communicate facilitatively with clients.…”

A Prepracticum Laboratory Training Experience

“…Unfortunately, not all practicum experiences are relevant and meaningful. Using the Bales System of Interaction Process Analysis, Roark (1969) found differences between counselor-trainee responses in roleplaying and actual interviews. Havens (1968), using the Counselor Situational Analysis Inventory, found evidence that the practicum experience appeared to have little effect on counselor performance.…”