Introduction to

Counselling in
Behavioral Psychology

Presented By:
Madam Shehnaz Qayyum
Definition of Counselling

• According to Halm and Mchean (1955) "Counselling is a one

to one relationship between an individual troubled by
problems with which he cannot cope alone and a professional
worker whose training and experience have qualified him to
help others reach solutions to various types of personal
difficulties".
• Smith (1955) defines "Counselling is a process in which the
counsellor assists the counselling to make interpretations of
facts relating to a choice plan or adjustments which he needs
to make"
• According to Stefflre (1970) "Counselling is a learning-
teaching process".
Counselling & Related Fields

Counselling and Psychotherapy

Guidance and Counseling
Instruction and counseling.
Advice and counseling
Principles of Counselling
Principles of Counselling

Counselling is based on n number of principles. These principles are:

1. Counselling is a process. It is necessary for the counsellor to
understand that counselling is a process and a slow process.
Failure to understand this will result in annoyance and
disappointment.
2. Counselling is for all. Especially in the school situation
counselling is mean for all the students and not only for those who
are facing problems or other exceptional students.
3. Counselling 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.
4. Counsellor does not deprive the right of self-choice but simply
facilitate choice. The counsellor should give due respect to the
individual and accept him/herself as he/she is.
5. Counselling is not advice giving.
6. Counselling is not thinking for the client, but thinking with the
client. Counselling is for enabling the client to do judicious
thinking.
7. Counselling is not problem solving. The counsellor simply assists
the person to find solution on his/her own.
8. Counselling is not interviewing but conversing with the client in
order to help him/her to develop self-understanding,
9. The counsellor should determine individual differences and
provide for them.
10. The counsellor has to prepare the client to open to criticism
including self-criticism.
11. The counsellor 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
Goals of Counselling
Goals of Counselling

Achievement of positive mental health

Problem Resolution
Counselling for decision making
Improving personal effectiveness
Help change
Behavioral Modification
Major approaches or
types of Counselling
 Types of Counselling

There are three major approaches to counselling given

as:
The directive approach
The non-directive approach and
The eclectic approach.
The Directive Appraoch

 This approach envisages a more active role for the counsellor.

 The counsellor employs varying degrees of direction to help the
counselee to reach sound solutions.
 Also, through his own specialised knowledge and experience in
scientific diagnosis and interpretation of data, counselees are
helped to reach earlier solutions for their problems.
 According to Frederick Thorne, the proponent of this approach,
the need for direction by the counsellor is inversely proportional
to the individual counselee's potentialities for self-regulation.
 Counselling Steps:
Directive counselling involves six stages. They are as follows:
1) Analysis
2) Synthesis
3) Diagnosis
4) Prognosis
5) Counselling
The non-Directive Approach

 In this approach, the counsellor provides an atmosphere in which

the client can fully explore his/her own thoughts and feelings
freely without any fear or pressure.
 This by making the counselee understands his/her potentialities
the counsellor acts as a catalytic agent.
 Here tile source of data is the client him/herself and the
responsibility for change rests with the counselee rather than the
counsellor.
 The counsellor should not be as passive as trying to keep out
client’s way nor should be as active as to shift the focus from
client to counsellor.
 The Elective Approach

 Here the counsellor bases his/her counselling on concepts taken

from various available viewpoints. He/she owes on specific
theoretical allegiance. Instead, incorporates those procedures and
techniques which he/she believes to be most effective in the case
of that particular counselee, without any prejudice or bias to any
particular school of thought.

 According to Thorne, eclecticism is the most practicable and apt

approach to counselling. Because no two people are able and as
such no single theory of personality could explain the various
behavioural pattern exhibited by individuals. So also each
problem is unique in its content and intensity and a technique or
approach suitable in one case need not even he effective in the
second case.
Counselling process
The process of counselling passes through certain stages which can
be broadly classified as follows:
1) Initial stage: Client self exploration
 First interview
 Initial counselling sessions
2) Middle stage: Deeper exploration and analysis
3) Final stage: Implementation of goals through action.
4) Termination
Initial stage: Client self-exploration:
 In this stage the clients are encouraged in self-exploration and
their concern is clarified.
 General counselling goals are set and the working alliance is
established.
 Also by gathering information and observing the client, the
counsellor arrive at some tentative hypothesis regarding the
nature and complexity of the problem. To help these decisions
assessment devices like psychological tests, questionnaires,
inventories, etc. are widely used.
 The initial stage is sub-divided into :
(a) first interview and (b) initial counselling sessions.
Middle stage :Deeper exploration and analysis:
 This stage is marked by a shift of counsellor attention from
client’s external problem to his internal problems from primarily
cognitive level to emotional level.
 Thus, the client’s disclose his feelings increasingly. Counsellors
explore more intensively with clients, confronts him with
contradictions, stronger interpretations of client's comments,
etc.
 At this point some counsellors use more tests to further explore
into the clients intellectual or personality functioning.
 Thus as the clients move to increased disclosure and awareness,
counsellors and clients begin to develop emotional interactions
like transference, counter transference, resistance, etc.
 Though rooted in psychoanalysis experts are of the opinion that
these are universal phenomena in all counselling relationships.
Final stage: Implementation of goals through action
 At this stage, clients would have started acting upon reality.
They become more self aware, assertive and genuine and start
generalising these to everyday life.
 This is a working through phase in which understanding is put
into constructive action. emphasis is on making changes in
behaviour, attitudes and skills, specified as goals in the initial
stages.
 For those who delay decision-making, specific strategies like
role playing behaviour, rehearsal, assertiveness training, etc. are
used.
Termination:
 If the goals as set in the beginning are met termination follows.
If the counsellor believes the problem has been solved, he may
raise the issue directly.
 Or if the client is sure to have recovered he may bring up the
idea. If the counsellor agrees, termination proceeds.
 However, the counsellor must be alert to the possibility that
effort to termination arise due to lack of progress.
 Also he should be aware that clients signalling termination is a
sign of resistance and should be handled carefully.
Skills of Counselling
Several skills need to be brought into a one-to-one
counselling session. These include:
1. attitudinal skills;
2. listening skills;
3. verbal communication skills; and
4. giving leads.
 1. Attitudes

There is probably nothing which has a greater impact on the

outcome of a counselling session than the helper's attitude. Attitudes
can be positive or reactive. Attitudes are included in this unit on
skills because good attitudes can be learned and practised. They
include the following:
a) Respect
b) Guidance/congruence
c) Unconditional positive regard
d) Empathy
e) Self-disclosure
f) Confrontation
 2. Listening

 Effective listening is more complicated than it seems, since it

involves a counsellors own level of self-awareness, as well as
his/her awareness of the spoken and unspoken cues of the other
person.
 Furthermore, a teacher needs to be able to respond to the
counselee in such a way that he/she feels understood. Being a
good listener entails receiving and sending appropriate
messages.
 Sometimes how counselees communicate is much more revealing
that what they actually say, which may be more concealing than
revealing
3. Verbal Communication

 The use of words in counselling is a skill which, like any other

skill, requires practice to master. Verbal communication takes
place first in the literal or content phase.
 If inappropriate vocabulary is used, rapport and understanding
will be hindered. When this happens, miscommunication occurs.
 Even common words can be misunderstood due to the multiple
meanings they carry.
 There are five more levels of communication. Each of these
levels is valuable in different contexts. The five levels of
communication are:

a) Cliches;
b) facts;
c) beliefs;
d) emotions; and
e) intimacy
 4. Giving Leads

Leads may be defined as statements that counsellors use in

communication with the clients. Leads have been classified into
categories of techniques, namely:
1) Restatement of content
2) Questioning
3) Reflection of feeling
4) Reassurance
5) Interpretation
Theories of Counselling
Three theories of counselling are of prime importance
given as:
1. Client-Centred or Person-Centred Theory
2. Rational-Emotive Theory
3. Behavioural Counselling
1. Client centered Theory

 The core of the theory is that humans have an inherent self

actualizing tendency, a movement towards developing capacities
in ways which serve to maintain and enhance the individual.
 By following this innate drive, people can meet their needs,
develop a view of themselves, and interact in society in a beneficial
way.
 This may not occur without distress or ‘growing pains’, but
theoretically, if humans can be helped to follow their nature, they
will move towards a state of relative happiness, contentment, and
general psychological adjustment (Patterson, 1980)
1. Client centered Theory

 Problems in the personality development process arise when

significant people in our lives, (for example, parents, teachers,
peers), place a condition of worth upon us, rather than accept us
unconditionally.
 The key to healthy personality development and self-generated
rehabilitation of psychological problems, lies in the ‘necessary and
sufficient conditions of personality change’ (Rogers, 1957).
1. Client centered Theory

 These conditions consist in the counsellor expressing, and the

client perceiving, unconditional positive regard, empathetic
understanding, and congruence, or honesty.
 When clients interact with counsellors who behave in this
manner, they begin to share their experience; the self-actualization
tendency is activated; they question and cast off conditions of
worth, and move towards unconditional acceptance and respect.
2. Rational Emotive Theory

 Rational-emotive theory was developed by Albert Ellis, a clinical

psychologist. Underlying the practice of rational-emotive theory
and its applications to counselling, is a set of theoretical
hypotheses about the emotional-behavioural functioning of
humans and how it can be changed
(Ellis, 1977).
 At the centre of these hypotheses is the concept that events do not
force people to have emotional behavioural reactions. It is rather
their interpretation or thoughts about events that
precipitate emotion and behaviour.
2. Rational Emotive Theory

 Ellis theorizes that humans have the capacity to interpret reality

in a clear, logical and objective fashion, and avoid unnecessary
emotional-behavioural upsets,
 But also says that humans are predisposed to irrational
interpretations. They are susceptible to crooked thinking, draw
illogical conclusions which are not objective, and are cognitive
distortions of reality.
2. Rational Emotive Theory

An irrational interpretation of reality, such as the foregoing, usually

has two or three standard characteristics (Ellis, 1979):
 It demands something unrealistic of the world, other
people, or yourself;
 It exaggerates the awfulness of something you dislike;
 It concludes that you cannot tolerate the thing you dislike; and
 It condemns the world, other people, or yourself.
For example, an irrational interpretation occurs when (a) parents
scold a child because of
spilt milk; (b) the child concludes ‘I am a bad and inept person’ and
consequently (c) feels
threatened and hurt and withdraws from the scene.