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The Effects of Professional Counselor Training on Empathy: Continued Cause for Concern
Author(s) -
BATH KENT E.,
CALHOUN ROBERT O.
Publication year - 1977
Publication title -
counselor education and supervision
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.608
H-Index - 40
eISSN - 1556-6978
pISSN - 0011-0035
DOI - 10.1002/j.1556-6978.1977.tb01054.x
Subject(s) - empathy , psychology , professional development , counselor education , medical education , clinical psychology , training (meteorology) , applied psychology , selection (genetic algorithm) , social psychology , psychotherapist , higher education , pedagogy , medicine , physics , artificial intelligence , meteorology , political science , computer science , law
The evidence reviewed, especially that from the most methodologically sound studies, indicates that professional training in counseling generally fails to increase trainees' empathy. Further, professional status may establish social distance between counselor and client, and posttraining experience in counseling cannot be counted on to have uniformly positive, empathy‐enhancing effects. The review points to the needs for: (a) the incorporation into professional programs of brief, effective empathy‐skills training, (b) supplementing intellectual program selection methods with more counseling‐relevant measures, (c) defining and upgrading of acceptable posttraining empathy levels and retention of training effects, and (d) research into differences between professional programs that do and do not enhance empathy.