Counselling Psychology

Victoria Galbraith, Victoria Galbraith

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781317235163
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Psicología
• Subtopic: Historia y teoría en psicología

This is the first textbook to provide a complete overview of counselling psychology. Covering not only the underlying principles and philosophy of the profession, it offers a uniquely applied perspective in a concise, student-friendly format.

From the relationship between research and practice to key ethical and professional issues, the book is written by some of the most eminent academic and practising psychologists in the field. It initially defines what counselling psychology and a therapeutic relationship involves, before outlining the range of approaches that can be taken with clients, from CBT to psychodynamic perspectives, and the journey of training through to working as a counselling psychologist.

Supported by case studies and a range of features to illustrate how theory can be applied to practice, this is the ideal companion for courses in applied counselling psychology. The integrated and interactive approach covers the personal and professional issues which counselling psychologists face, making this the definitive introduction for any student of this growing field of study.

Section 1
Background

1
What is Counselling Psychology?

Pamela E. James

This initial chapter begins with a description of Counselling Psychology. The rationale for this approach is clear, as when considering the nature of the discipline, it is possible to think about its origins, form, function and future aspirations. Its emergence is reflective and informative as links with philosophy, psychotherapy and psychology are apparent.

Counselling psychology’s form and function are included within Chapter 1, but elaborated much further in subsequent chapters. Forward-looking perspectives, for me, must be held in a cultural context. In fact, in a discipline that aims to relate with people where they are currently, then this aspect must always be in focus.

Describing and defining

This question invites the reader to consider a description of this discipline. It is one of the areas of psychology in application that has division status in the British Psychological Society (BPS), along with Clinical, Educational, Forensic, Health, Occupational, Sport and Exercise Psychology. This means that in the BPS, these disciplines each have a training syllabus that defines the material for learning when becoming a qualified psychologist who is eligible to become chartered by the BPS.

Counselling psychology is a helping profession, where the perspective or frame of reference of the other (i.e. the people receiving help) is of central value. The helping process occurs in relationship with the other; it is intended to be facilitative rather than giving directives.

Looking further reveals a multi-faceted discipline that reflects to some extent its name, i.e. a joining up of counselling and psychology. However, although this concerns the way in which psychological theories are applied to enhancing well-being, there are aspects of the discipline that need further exploration, elaboration and explanation.

Woolfe and Strawbridge (2010) describe counselling psychology as emerging in the context of a humanistic-valuing system. In addition, I am noting (James, 2016: 400) that in the UK the discipline can be seen in:

the western perspective on the development of the self, acknowledging how learnt experience can affect responses to perceived distress;

the need to examine both old and current relationships between philosophy and psychology;

revisiting the philosophy that states that knowing about a person involves talking to them and hearing their perspective located in context;

sees the person in the context of their relationships in their family and community groups;

and finally, sees the person in the context of the historical perspectives of their current presenting issue, rather than accepting psychopathology.

(Douglas and James, 2014)

Counselling psychology is more than its component parts

If the component parts of psychology and counselling are taken separately, then counselling psychology is more than the sum of its parts. In the ‘bringing together’ and formation of the discipline taking place in the 1980s and early 1990s, the following are landmark dates:

In 1982, the BPS Counselling Psychology Section and in 1989, BPS Special Group of Counselling Psychology were set up. In 1989: the BPS Diploma in Counselling Psychology with a training syllabus outlined the learning material for becoming a counselling psychologist who would be eligible for chartered status by the Society. In 1994, full Division Status was achieved. Sections, Special Groups and Divisions represent collections of colleagues; they represent a gradual increase in size and status in the Society.

Consider psychology

Looking firstly at the formation of the discipline of psychology, there were notable figures that carried influence. In the way that a river rises in the hills and picks up smaller streams or tributaries, so the early thinkers about nature of human beings brought their contributions to knowing about mind and behaviour. Reading about the history of psychology and its close association with philosophy, for example, Chung and Hyland (2012), will give a much fuller picture. However, at this point in the chapter, some salient writers are noted. In the 1850s Wilhelm Wundt’s (1832–1920) view was that psychology was the study of consciousness. The resulting methodology was self-inquiry or introspection of feelings and experiences. William James (1842–1910) supported the centrality of inter-relationships in subjective experience. Philosophical thinking that accords with these beliefs, namely phenomenology and existentialism was pursued by Husserl (1859–1938); see for example, Polkinghorne (1983). This illustrates the close relationship with philosophy at the source of the river of psychology. Its enquiry or ‘need to know’ forms the basis of a human science, or human knowledge, where the word science comes from ‘scio’ in Latin, meaning ‘I know’; the word epistemology means theory of knowledge.

Whilst these tributaries were arising in Europe, at nearly the same time in America, at the inter-face between psychology and sociology, symbolic inter-actionists Charles Cooley (1864–1929) and George Herbert Meade (1863–1931) were thinking about the formation of the self-concept. In this process, these writers both gave credence to place of inter-action with others, language, meaning and self-reflection.

By 1913, with the rise in technology and machinery in different parts of the world, a more mechanistic way of thinking about the nature of human being was developing. John B. Watson (1878–1958) in America, and Ivan Pavlov (1849–1936), primarily a physiologist, in Russia, both focussed on the study of human behaviour. In bringing this contribution to the stream of psychology, behaviourism comes to the foreground, where the focus of enquiry is observable and measurable behaviour. Skinner (1904–1990) espouses that beliefs in human freedoms actually hold back the science of human behaviour, see Skinner (1971).

The methods of enquiry of natural science, employing positivism, the testing of theories and hypotheses formation, now flow to meet with phenomenology. The forming river of psychology now contains contributions from the study of both mind and behaviour. The reader may wish to pursue finding out the extent to which turbulence and confluence was caused in these earlier years in psychology. However, it is sufficient to note that these founding schools of thought coming from upstream would have their constant repercussions in thinking downstream as seen currently, both in psychology and in counselling psychology.

Turning away from behaviourism, and perhaps in reaction to it, about 40 years later, other notable American psychologists were in the foreground, namely Abraham Maslow (1908–1970) and Carl Rogers (1902–1987). They were speaking and writing about the need to value human beings holistically, not just as behavioural entities, but as sentient beings. These views reflect to some extent the European phenomenological schools of thought. Maslow and Rogers, however, bring humanism to the stream of psychology. Humanism is itself described as a philosophy; it upholds the value and agency of human beings. Rogers’ (1951) 19 propositions underpin his client-centred theory. This base has been applied to the area of learning (Rogers and Freiberg, 1994); well-being (Rogers, 1961) and inter-personal communication. Although Rogers’ work is often described as client-centred (later person-centred) counselling, he used the terms counselling and psychotherapy interchangeably.

Influence of humanism and other main approaches in the formation of counselling psychology

Rogers applied humanism and its human valuing and prizing to working with psychological distress; this begins the formation of the river that becomes counselling and psychotherapy and counselling psychology. Hence humanism flows from the main stream of psychology, furrowing its own path and bringing with it all the ideas from upstream. Other major contributions need to be noted as humanism is not the only influence in counselling psychology. Looking retrospectively, i.e. at the time of writing this chapter, the discipline has grown and expanded and included other approaches, whilst retaining its emphasis on the other’s perspective, seen in context.

Sigmund Freud’s (1856–1939) major contribution arising from working with distressed and ‘neurotic’ people puts forward his theory of personality; a drive theory where sex and aggression play prominent parts, as does the notion of the unconscious mind. Psychoanalysis and its subsequent transitions over recent years to various post-Freudian psychodynamic theories (including object relations theory) formed a major influence on the development of psychotherapy, a ‘sister discipline’ to counselling psychology.

In actual time, Freud precedes Rogers; both have theories of personality that have been applied to help people and form theories of psychotherapy. These exist in mainstream psychology, and emerge as theories that have their application in working with and to facilitate and help people who are distressed. However, looking back in time, upstream in the psychotherapy river from both Rogers and Freud, there are approaches and schools of psychotherapy that go back hundreds of years, often including more medical views, see Douglas (2014) where she discusses the history of psychotherapy.

Looking forward in time in mainstream psychology, cognitive theorists were beginning to stress their view that human beings’ perception of their worlds influenced their thought and that interpretations were made on this basis. In the 1950s cognitive theories were abundant, perhaps as a reaction to or an emergence from behavioural approaches. When applied to helping people, Aaron Beck (1921 [Beck, 1967]) and Albert Ellis (1913–2007) are prominent, and in the last decade, cognitive-behaviour therapy came into the foreground. In itself, this view was influenced by the philosophical thinking of Epictetus, in the first century, who said that people are distressed not by the event itself, but by the view that they take of this.

Activity Box 1.1

Make a list of the major contributors discussed above, from Wundt to Ellis, in chronological order. Include a couple of sentences showing their viewpoints and emphases. Consider the origins and development of counselling psychology.

This spans the years1832–2007. Reflect on developments outside psychology at this time, including science and technology, conflict and war.

Forming and naming counselling psychology

Counselling psychology, currently, employs a broad theoretical basis, and can trace its main influences from mainstream psychology and psychotherapy. Yet how does this discipline actually find form and shape in the early 1980s? Ralph Hetherington (1983: 7), then President of the BPS, writes:

The Section came into being at a time when … counselling as an enterprise has sadly lacked a coherent theoretical foundation and equally seriously has lacked systematic evaluation. There has been no lack of interest in the development of a large number of psychotherapies for people with problems which make them unable to cope with life unaided. These are the clients which doctors might be disposed to call ‘neurotic’, while for psychologists the important factor would be the client’s inability to cope.

This illustrates an aspect of the nature of the Society’s view; however the discipline’s emergence is attributed to the thinking, discussing and reflecting of early counselling psychologists such as Strawbridge and Woolfe, and those others who had the reflective capacity and awareness to see that within psychology at that time, there was a tendency to view and work with people objectively. This approach almost disregarded the emphasis within psychology on consciousness and subjectivity. The relationship between mind and body, its potential for separateness and reconciliation, and its philosophical underpinning as seen by Descartes (1596–1650) has been threaded through psychology since its inception.

With the advent of the influence of humanism and its principles in the 1960s and 1970s, possibly here was an opportunity to take a more holistic relational view as to the nature of human beings. Looking back, the writer suggests that the ground was then prepared for forming a nucleus of like-minded psychologists who wanted to work and think in this way. The concept of psychology as an applied therapeutic science gradually now begins to emerge; the description scientific practitioner begins to be used. The chapter by Strawbridge and Woolfe (2003) is helpful in providing a fuller discussion of this development; see also Chapter 11 in this text.

However, its naming was a matter of considerable discussion at the time. It has been said in informal discussions that in choosing the word counselling in conjunction with psychology, that the potential for confusion began to occur. This debate has stayed with counselling psychology. It can be clearly seen from the above discussion, that this discipline arose from within mainstream psychology; it can also be seen that the contributions from psychologists were also psychotherapists. Whilst Rogers is usually seen as holding the primary influential position, Freud, Ellis, Bec...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• CONTENTS
• Contributors
• Preface to the series second edition
• Preface
• SECTION 1 Background
• SECTION 2 Principles of clinical practice
• SECTION 3 Applications of theory to practice
• SECTION 4 Personal and professional issues in counselling psychology
• SECTION 5 Evidence-based practice and practice-based evidence
• SECTION 6 Developments, training, roles and competencies
• Index