INTRODUCTION

TO COUNSELING
R. Shalini
Assistant professor
Department of psychology
DEFINTION- MEANING
● Counselling is a purposeful, private conversation arising from the intention of
one person (couple or family) to reflect on and resolve a problem in living,
and the willingness of another person to assist in that endeavor

● The ultimate goal of a professional helping relationship should be to promote

the development of more effective and adaptive behavior in the clients.
Distinction between counselling and ADVICE

● Advising and counselling are two very different

things. Giving advice is letting people know what
you think is best for them, while counselling is
allowing people to explore and decide what is best
for them.
Distinction between counselling and GUIDANCE

● Guidance is advice given to an

individual concerning matters
such as career. guidance works
by an expert giving ready
solutions to their clients.
● Counseling focuses on discussing
and understanding the problem
at hand. In counseling, an
individual is given the right
support and empowerment to
make the right decisions
concerning the issue at hand.
Distinction between counselling and
psychotherapy

● The argument here is that, although there is a certain amount of overlap

between the theories and methods of counsellors and psychotherapists,
and the type of clients that they see, there is nevertheless a
fundamental difference between the two, with psychotherapy
representing a deeper, more fundamental level of work, over a longer
period, usually with more disturbed clients.
● Counsellors and psychotherapists are basically doing the same kind of
work, using identical approaches and techniques, but are required to use
different titles in response to the demands of the agencies that employ
them.
 The five most common goals of
counseling include:
01 02 03

Facilitating Helping improve Helping enhance

behavioral the client’s the client’s
change. ability to both effectiveness
establish and and their ability
maintain to cope.
relationships.
 The five most common goals of
counseling include:
04 05

Helping promote Development.

the decision-
making process
while facilitating
client potential.
Facilitating behavioral change.
Helping improve the client’s ability to both establish and maintain relationships .
Helping enhance the client’s effectiveness
and their ability to cope.
Helping promote the decision-making process while facilitating client
potential.
Development.
Principles of Counseling

● Counseling is a process. It is necessary for the counselor to

understand that counseling is a process and a slow process.
Failure to understand this will result in annoyance and
disappointment.
● Counseling is for all. Counseling is more developmental and
preventive than remedial in nature.
Principles of Counseling

● Counseling is based on certain fundamental assumptions.

○ (a) every individual in this world is capable of taking
responsibilities for him/herself.
○ (b) every individual has a right to choose his/her own
path, based on the principles of democracy
● Counselor does not deprive the right of self-choice but
simply facilitates choice.
● Counseling is not advice giving.
 Principles of Counseling

● Counseling is not thinking for

the client, but thinking with
the client. Counseling is for
enabling the client to do
judicious thinking.
● Counseling is not problem
solving. The counselor simply
assist the person to find
solution on his/her own.
Principles of Counseling
● Counseling is not interviewing but conversing with the
client in order to help him/her develop self-understanding
● The counselor acts as a facilitator or catalyst only. He creates an
atmosphere which is permissive and non-threatening, through his warm
and accepting relationship with the client which helps the client to
explore himself/herself and understand himself/herself better.
 Counseling process
– A Counseling Process is a planned, structured dialogue between a counselor and a client.
– It is a cooperative process in which a trained professional helps a person called the client
to identify sources of difficulties or concerns that he or she is experiencing.
– Together they develop ways to deal with and overcome these problems so that person has
new skills and increased understanding of themselves and others.
– For example students in a college or university may be anxious about how to study in
university, lack of clarity on educational or career direction, have difficulty living with a
room-mate of another race or religion, have concerns with self-esteem, feelings with being
“stressed out”, difficulties in romantic relationships and so forth.
Phases of
counselling
● PHASE 1: INTERVIEWING STAGE/PHASE

● PHASE 2: WORKING STAGE/PHASE

● PHASE 3: TERMINATION STAGE/PHASE

● PHASE 4: FOLLOW-UP STAGE/PHASE

 01 INTERVIEWING
STAGE/PHASE
• Any counselling process, be it individual or group, starts with
the interview stage. This stage could also be referred to as the
familiarization, orientation or introductory stage.
• This stage is very important because for you as a counsellor to
start well determines the success of other stages and the entire
counselling relationship.
• The counsellor and the client meet for the first time. The
counsellor makes deliberate effort to get acquainted with the
client by establishing rapport. This is done by asking the client
to sit down, so that he or she would be emotionally relaxed in
the counsellor’s office.
 INTERVIEWING STAGE/PHASE
01

● The counsellor inquires about the client’s name, class,

parents, friends, progress in school and his mission to the
counsellor’s office. This should be done with caution so that
the client does not feel as if he or she is being interrogated
● The counsellor further assures the client that whatever is
discussed will be kept confidential. This is to win the client’s
confidence and make him or her open up to say his purpose
for coming to the counsellors’ office.
 02Working stage/ phase
This is the second stage/phase of the counselling process. As the title suggests, it
is the stage where the counsellor fully engages the client in discussion about what
to do and how it will be done concerning the problem of the client. If the client has
not disclosed his/her mission in the first stage, the counsellor now asks the client.

He uses questioning techniques to make the client open up. Questions such as:
Are you okay? Can I help you? What is the matter? What has brought you to my
office? The client now responds.

The counsellor uses techniques such as responding, exploring, restatement,

interpretation, confrontation, unconditional positive regards, empathy, silence and
catharsis to diagnose the problem. Also it is during this stage that the goals for
counselling are set by the client and counsellor.
 02 Working stage/ phase
●GOAL SETTING PROCESS:
●Counseling goals also conceptualizes as either process or outcome goals.

Process goals
 Establish the conditions necessary to make the counseling process
work
Are primarily the counselor's responsibility
Outcome goals
 Specify what the client hopes to accomplish in counseling
 Termination
03 stage/ phase
This stage is the third stage in the counselling process. Termination means
bringing an end to the counselling relationship between the counsellor and client.
Different reasons have been given by many authors on why a counselling
relationship may end or terminate. Some of these reasons are given below for you
to understand.

(1) Counselling Goals are achieved

When these goals have been realised to the satisfaction of the client and
counsellor, the relationship can be called off temporarily or permanently.
 03 Follow up stage/ phase
• This is the stage in a counselling process that you the
counsellor will want to know what is happening to your
client after termination.
• The follow-up aims at finding out whether the client is
carrying out the decisions arrived at before you ended the
session and what problems are being experienced.

However this stage may not be necessary for every client.

E
thical and Professional issue of
counselling

Add your text here.

 Fidelity: honoring the trust
placed in the practitioner
Being trustworthy is regarded as fundamental to
understanding and resolving ethical issues
Practitioners who adopt this principle: act in accordance with
the trust placed in them; restrict any disclosure of confidential
information about clients.
 Autonomy: respect for the
client’s right to be self-
• governing
The principle of autonomy opposes the manipulation of
clients against their will, even for beneficial social ends.
 Beneficence: a commitment to
promoting the client’s well-
being
The principle of beneficence means acting in the best
interests of the client.

It directs attention to working strictly within one’s limits of

competence and providing services on the basis of adequate
training or experience.
Non-maleficence: a commitment
to avoiding harm to the client
Non-maleficence involves: avoiding sexual, financial,
emotional or any other form of client exploitation; avoiding
incompetence or malpractice; not providing services when
unfit to do so due to illness, personal circumstances

.
intoxication
 Justice: the fair and impartial
treatment of all clients and the
provision of adequate services
• The principle of justice requires being just and fair to all
clients and respecting their human rights and dignity.

• Justice in the distribution of services requires the ability to

determine impartially the provision of services for clients.
 Transference
• Transference is a psychology term used to describe
a phenomenon in which an individual
redirects emotions and feelings, often
unconsciously, from one person to another.
• This process may occur in therapy, when a person
receiving treatment applies feelings toward—or
expectations of—another person onto the therapist
and then begins to interact with the therapist as if
the therapist were the other individual.
 Countertransference
• It occurs when a therapist transfers
emotions to a person in therapy, is often a
reaction to transference, a phenomenon in
which the person in treatment redirects
feelings for others onto the therapist.
 Failure to obtain informed
• consent
Failure to obtain legal consent is an issue that is related to
counseling and psychotherapy, especially; in the
management of the client’s records.
• A practitioner whether still practicing or not, still has an
ethical and legal obligation to maintain the records of his
clients in confidentiality and adhere to obtaining of legal
consent in the securing and disposition of a client’s
records.
 Counselors are trained to
understand client’s
concerns and identify
appropriate interventions
for facilitating overcoming
challenges.

This is where you section ends. Duplicate this set of slides as many times you need to go over all your sections.
 COUNSELOR
The counselor Is a ● If we are inauthentic, our
therapeutic person, If we hide behind the clients will probably pick
because counseling is an safety of our
intimate form of learning, that up and be discouraged
professional role, our
it demands a practitioner clients will likely keep by it. Our clients can be
to be an authentic person themselves hidden from encouraged by our way of
in the therapeutic
us. If we strive for being with them.
relationship. It is within
technical expertise ● If we model authenticity by
this context of such a
person-to-person alone, and leave our engaging in appropriate
connection that the client own reactions and self
self-disclosure, our clients
experiences growth. out of our work, the
result is likely to be will tend to be honest with
ineffective counseling. us as well.
Thank
you!
Do you have any questions?

[email protected]
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Ph: 7550005949