Chapter 3
Concept of psychosocial counseling
Course contents
Concept, nature, goal and importance of counseling
Evolution of counseling practice
Personal and professional aspect of counseling
Ethical practice and values in counseling (also include ethics related to assessment)
Power in counseling
Legal aspects of counseling
The context of cross-cultural counseling
Concept, nature, goal and importance of counseling
Counseling
Counseling is distinguished from other mental health disciplines by both its history and its emphasis. It
focuses on development and the prevention of serious mental health problems through education and
short-term treatments. It emphasizes on growth as well as remediation. It focuses on providing therapeutic
treatments to clients who experience a wide variety of symptoms. It is also one of the largest specialty
areas within psychology.
Counseling as a profession is relatively new. It grew out of the guidance movement, in opposition to
traditional psychotherapy. In order to understand what counseling is, you must first understand these
concepts.
Counseling is often performed face to face in confidential sessions between the counselor and client(s).
However, counselling can also be undertaken by telephone, in writing and, in these days of the Internet,
by email or video conferencing. Counselling can and may take many different formats to bring a person
to a better understanding of himself and others. It can therefore be seen that counselling can be of benefit
to a person experiencing problems in finding, forming, and maintaining relationships.
It is the ability to listen and respond in a way that will help others solve their own problems and attain
their potential. It is the art of helping others arrive at the right answer by their own analysis of the
situation and the facts. It has to be done skillfully without an attempt to influence the values and beliefs of
the client.
Counseling involves talking with a person in a way that helps the person solve a problem or helps to
create conditions that will cause the person to understand and/or improve his behavior, character, values
or life circumstances. It is a process that enables a person to sort out issues and reach decisions affecting
their life. Often counselling is sought out at times of change or crisis, however it need not be so as
counselling can also help us at any time of our life.
It emphasizes on exploration and understanding the problem and stresses the idea of professional
relationship and the importance of self-determined goals (of course by the client). It should be
differentiated from advice giving or directing. It should be noted that counselling is a principled
profession.
Biswalo (1996) defines counselling as a process of helping an individual to accept and to use information
and advice so that he/she can either solve his/her present problem or cope with it successfully.
Counselling depends heavily on information.
According to British Association for Counseling and Psychotherapy (2002), counseling takes place when
a counselor sees a client in a private and confidential setting to explore a difficulty a client is having,
distress that the client may be experiencing or perhaps the client’s dissatisfaction with life or loss of a
sense or direction and purpose.
Both the American Counseling Association (ACA) and Division 17 of the American Psychology
Association have defined counseling on numerous occasions. These definitions contain a number of
common points, some of which are as follows:-
Counseling is a profession.
Counseling deals with personal, social, vocational empowerment, and educational concerns.
Counseling is conducted with persons who are considered to function within the normal range.
Counseling is theory based and takes place in a structured setting.
Counseling is a process in which clients learn how to make decision and formulate new ways of
behaving, feeling and thinking.
Counseling encompasses various subspecialties.
