A Publication of the American Counseling Association August 23, 2010 COUNSELING TODAY (HTTP: / / CT. COUNSELING. OR G/ CATEGOR Y/ COUNSELING-TODAY/ ), R EA DER V IEWPOINT (HTTP: / / CT. COUNSELING. OR G/ CATEGOR Y/ R EA DER -V IEWPOINT/ ) A case for personal therapy in counselor education Amanda E. Norcross Among the many factors that influence a counselor’s abilities, I have long believed that personal therapy is the most crucial. I was therefore quite surprised that when applying for my licensed professional counselor intern license, I had to formally appeal for acceptance of five personal therapy credits on my transcript. Through this process, I realized that the value of this vital learning experience is not necessarily recognized across the field, so I am petitioning here for what should be the central place of personal therapy in counselor education. Some of the reasons I present for personal therapy echo classic arguments put forth since the early days of analytic training. Many of today’s most admired clinicians still emphasize these points. For example, Irvin Yalom in The Gift of Therapy calls personal therapy a tuning of the “therapist’s most valuable instrument … the therapist’s own self.” Other insights stem from my particular experiences and growing understanding of how extensively counselors’ self-explorations influence the clinical experience. Incidentally, all the reasons I present make it clear that personal therapy benefits not only beginner counselors but also all other mental health practitioners regardless of their years of experience. Increasing empathy As counselors, we ask much of our clients in the process of therapy. We entreat them to sit with a stranger and, over time, reveal themselves, explore difficult emotions, strive for self-awareness and work to transfer what they have learned to their lives outside the consulting room. This is a demanding, courageous act. How can beginner counselors understand what they are asking of clients unless these counselors have undergone their own therapy? I believe sitting in the client’s chair weekly – experiencing exactly what it is like to be the client – would greatly increase beginner counselors’ empathy. No other aspect of counselor education provides this firsthand knowledge of the client experience: the frustrations, the successes, the challenges. Counselors who have participated in their own personal therapy will have greater empathy for their clients because they have been there. As the psychologist James Hillman wrote in a 1982 newsletter for the Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture, “Confronted with the unbearable in my own nature, I show more trepidation – which is after all the first piece of compassion.” Even if a counselor feels mentally well-balanced, through personal therapy he or she will still learn what it feels like to sit across from a counselor and to be understood (or, just as valuable, to be misunderstood) by a counselor. Wha.

1. A Publication of the American Counseling
Association
August 23, 2010
COUNSELING TODAY (HTTP: / / CT. COUNSELING. OR G/
CATEGOR Y/ COUNSELING-TODAY/ ), R EA DER V
IEWPOINT
(HTTP: / / CT. COUNSELING. OR G/ CATEGOR Y/ R EA
DER -V IEWPOINT/ )
A case for personal therapy in counselor education
Amanda E. Norcross
Among the many factors that influence a counselor’s abilities, I
have long believed that personal therapy is the most crucial. I
was therefore quite surprised that when
applying for my licensed professional counselor intern license, I
had to formally appeal for acceptance of five personal therapy
credits on my transcript. Through this
process, I realized that the value of this vital learning
experience is not necessarily recognized across the field, so I
am petitioning here for what should be the central place
of personal therapy in counselor education.
Some of the reasons I present for personal therapy echo classic
arguments put forth since the early days of analytic training.
Many of today’s most admired clinicians still

2. emphasize these points. For example, Irvin Yalom in The Gift
of Therapy calls personal therapy a tuning of the “therapist’s
most valuable instrument … the therapist’s own
self.” Other insights stem from my particular experiences and
growing understanding of how extensively counselors’ self-
explorations influence the clinical experience.
Incidentally, all the reasons I present make it clear that personal
therapy benefits not only beginner counselors but also all other
mental health practitioners regardless of
their years of experience.
Increasing empathy
As counselors, we ask much of our clients in the process of
therapy. We entreat them to sit with a stranger and, over time,
reveal themselves, explore difficult emotions,
strive for self-awareness and work to transfer what they have
learned to their lives outside the consulting room. This is a
demanding, courageous act. How can beginner
counselors understand what they are asking of clients unless
these counselors have undergone their own therapy?
I believe sitting in the client’s chair weekly – experiencing
exactly what it is like to be the client – would greatly increase
beginner counselors’ empathy. No other aspect of
counselor education provides this firsthand knowledge of the
client experience: the frustrations, the successes, the challenges.
Counselors who have participated in their
own personal therapy will have greater empathy for their clients

3. because they have been there. As the psychologist James
Hillman wrote in a 1982 newsletter for the Dallas
Institute of Humanities and Culture, “Confronted with the
unbearable in my own nature, I show more trepidation – which
is after all the first piece of compassion.”
Even if a counselor feels mentally well-balanced, through
personal therapy he or she will still learn what it feels like to sit
across from a counselor and to be understood (or,
just as valuable, to be misunderstood) by a counselor. Whatever
the extent of the counselor’s personal issues, the experience of
being a client forms an authentic, indelible
client perspective in the novice counselor’s mind that balances
and augments the counselor-centric perspective.
Increasing patience and tolerance of uncertainty
By becoming clients themselves, beginner counselors gain an
inner steadiness that increases their ability to help others. In
learning self-acceptance and patience through
personal therapy, beginner counselors will find it easier to be
patient with clients and to respect each individual’s unique
process and pacing. It will also become less of a
challenge to tolerate the inevitable uncertainty and ambiguity of
clinical work.
In my 2009 master’s thesis research, the clinicians I interviewed
said both clinical and personal experiences with uncertainty
made it easier for them to tolerate uncertainty
with clients. In that vein, I believe undergoing therapy is a

4. personal encounter with uncertainty that greatly increases a
counselor’s comfort with not knowing. In the face of
clinical uncertainty or client pressure, such a counselor is less
likely to hastily intervene or diagnose in an unconscious attempt
to run away from his or her discomfort, thus
leaving space for the potential of true therapeutic progress. All
the clinicians I interviewed said allowing themselves to remain
in uncertainty forestalled premature action on
their part and allowed unforeseen possibilities to arise.
Personal therapy helps new counselors learn patience and
calmness in the unpredictable waters of clinical work. Without
personal therapy, I believe counselors are more
susceptible to acting prematurely and subverting the difficult
and fallow periods so crucial to therapeutic progress.
(Counselors must remember, however, that some clients
might be harmed by sustained uncertainty and require more
structure in clinical work.)
Facilitating therapy
The self-knowledge gained through personal therapy is a vital
tool for counselors. One of the less often discussed benefits of
this self-knowledge is that it facilitates
therapy. Counselors’ heightened awareness of their feelings
provides, as Yalom describes, “the best source of reliable data”
about clients.
Counselors’ spontaneous responses to their clients are a unique,
and sometimes uncannily accurate, window into clients’

5. experiences. Further, an enhanced awareness of
their feelings can help counselors discern projective
identification, which is the therapist’s internalization of a
feeling the client is experiencing but is not aware of or cannot
tolerate. In short, if beginner counselors are not fully aware of
and comfortable with their feelings, they lose a valuable
resource for understanding their clients.
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Preventing client harm through self-knowledge
I believe the self-knowledge gained through personal therapy is
also central to a counselor’s ethical responsibilities. The ACA
Code of Ethics states that “Counselors act to
avoid harming their clients” (Standard A.4.a.) and “Counselors
are aware of their own values, attitudes, beliefs and behaviors
and avoid imposing values that are inconsistent
with counseling goals” (Standard A.4.b.). This suggests to me
that self-knowledge is critical to avoid doing harm.
Most essentially, the self-awareness gained from personal
therapy provides crucial insight into sources of
countertransference with clients. A working understanding of
personal behaviors and feelings dramatically increases beginner
counselors’ awareness of their unique biases, neurotic issues
and blind spots and how these might

6. surface in clinical work. Without such awareness, a new
counselor could, unknowingly and with good intentions,
respond to clients in a manner that is rooted in the
counselor’s own unexamined issues. Having undergone personal
therapy, counselors are more likely to recognize, and pause to
reflect on, sources of impulses with
clients.
Preventing client harm through self-care
Personal therapy is a core component of counselor self-care,
which is another means of preventing client harm. Standard
C.2.g. of the ACA Code of Ethics says,
“Counselors are alert to the signs of impairment from their own
physical, mental or emotional problems and refrain from
offering or providing professional services when
such impairment is likely to harm a client or others. They seek
assistance for problems that reach the level of professional
impairment.”
Though this ethical obligation is one of the more obvious
arguments for personal therapy, my concern is that the climate
in the mental health field is such that some
counselors seek personal therapy only as a reactive measure in
difficult situations.
Requiring therapy as part of counselor education, on the other
hand, would teach counselors early in their careers to recognize
and cope with difficult personal mental or
emotional circumstances and decrease chances that such

7. problems would go untended for long periods. In fact, the level
of stress experienced by novice counselors –
who are attending graduate school, embarking on a new career
path and sitting with therapy clients for the first time – makes
the counselor education curriculum an ideal
forum for teaching the importance of self-care through personal
therapy. Building personal therapy into the educational process
would also mitigate any initial tendencies
by beginner counselors to casually dismiss the impact of their
personal circumstances on work with clients.
Decreasing the stigma of psychotherapy
Counselors are sometimes reluctant to seek personal therapy,
worried that it indicates they are less capable or flawed as
helpers. We should consider the message this
double standard sends to our clients and the public. In the
September 2009 New Perspectives column in Counseling Today,
clinician Jason King said, “If we refuse to
participate in the services for which we advocate and base our
career, what example are we setting for society and those
marginalized and disenfranchised by oppressive
systems? If we fear social stigma of counseling and diagnosis,
then we are covertly reinforcing the shame and stigma
associated with our profession.”
The experience of personal therapy for novice counselors
benefits not only the clinical dyad but also the profession
overall because it decreases the stigma of therapy.

8. Emphasizing personal therapy in the educational process would,
early in counselors’ careers, instill therapy as an accepted
mental hygiene option, thus normalizing it,
encouraging them to view it as another available tool and
teaching them not to negatively judge its use by other
counselors.
Going beyond supervision
In considering the importance of personal therapy for beginner
counselors, I want to briefly emphasize that the benefits of
personal therapy cannot be obtained through
the supervisory relationship. Although supervision is helpful in
highlighting and discussing how the counselor’s personal
beliefs are impacting his or her clinical work,
supervision is a client-focused endeavor. Supervision cannot
(and, by definition, should not) function as personal therapy. It
cannot provide the thorough attention
necessary to fully understand the counselor’s behaviors and
beliefs. Therefore, it cannot give the new counselor a true taste
of the client experience. Supervision can,
however, be facilitated by personal therapy, providing the
supervisory dyad with a more solid, broad foundation for
understanding the counselor’s experience and
countertransference.
Conclusion
I have pointed out some of the key arguments for including
personal therapy in counselor education, but these are far from

9. all-inclusive. Neural science research, for
example, suggests that it is neurologically important for
counselors to have done their own therapy work, as discussed in
the book A General Theory of Love.
Given the benefits of personal therapy, I advocate that, at a
minimum:
The next revision of the ACA Code of Ethics should explicitly
state that personal therapy is an ethical obligation.
All counseling-related graduate programs should require
personal therapy for students.
All state licensing boards should accept transcript credits
granted for personal therapy. Ideally, all licensing boards
should require that applicants have undergone
personal therapy to apply for counselor intern licensing.
Without personal therapy, I believe beginner counselors are
handicapped – counseling others without knowing the potential
impact and resource of their own psyches and
applying knowledge without having experienced its truth from
the inside out. To be effective, aware and ethical in our work
with clients, we must have undergone our own
therapeutic work.
Amanda Norcross is an ACA member and an LPC intern
working in Austin, Texas. Contact her at [email protected]
(mailto:[email protected]).
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Required counseling for mental health professional
trainees: Its perceived effect on self-awareness and other
potential benefits
KATHRYN A. ODEN
1
, JANICE MINER-HOLDEN
2
, &
RICHARD S. BALKIN
1
1

12. Texas A&M University – Commerce, and
2
University of North Texas, Texas, USA
Abstract
Background: Professional literature, mental health training
program accreditation standards, and
mental health professionals support the idea that high levels of
self-awareness are necessary for mental
health professionals to deliver effective services to a diverse
client population.
Aims: The authors examined the experience of 164 students in a
counselor preparation program that
required 10 sessions of individual counseling for perceived
effect on self-awareness and
recommendation for requirement of counseling for trainees.
Method: The researchers developed a survey including a
Counselor Self-Awareness Scale to examine
students’ perceptions regarding the value of the required
counseling experience.
Results: Students perceived a significant increase in awareness
of interactions with clients, as well as
other benefits, and 92% of participants supported required
counseling for mental health professional
trainees.
Conclusions: This study provided support for the effectiveness
of required counseling in increasing
perceived self-awareness for trainees.
Keywords: Required counseling, self-awareness, counseling
trainees, counselor preparation, Counselor
Self-Awareness Scale
Introduction

13. The assertions that higher levels of psychotherapist self-
awareness are related to enhanced
therapeutic effectiveness, and that personal counseling enhances
self-awareness, appear in
the professional mental health literature in theoretical writings,
research descriptions, and
counselor preparation program accreditation standards (Bridges,
1993; CACREP, 2001;
Downs, 2000; Freud, 1917/1966; MacDevitt, 1987; Rogers,
1957; Sue & Sue, 2003). In this
paper, we summarize these findings and present the results of a
study designed to investigate
master’s level counseling students’ perceived effects on self-
awareness as a result of
counseling that was required in their preparation program, the
students’ support for the
counseling requirement, and their recommendations for
enhancing effectiveness of the
required counseling experience. For the purposes of this study,
self-awareness was defined
as the capacity to allow one’s feelings, thoughts, and behaviors
into consciousness, especially
Correspondence: Kathryn A. Oden, PhD, Counseling
Department, Texas A&M University – Commerce, PO Box
3011,

14. Commerce, TX 75429-3011, USA. Tel: þ1-903-886-5637. E-
mail: [email protected]
This work was carried out at: 1400 W. Highland Street, Denton,
TX 76203-0829, USA.
Journal of Mental Health,
October 2009; 18(5): 441–448
ISSN 0963-8237 print/ISSN 1360-0567 online � Shadowfax
Publishing and Informa Healthcare USA, Inc.
DOI: 10.3109/09638230902968217
in the context of the counselor-client relationship (CACREP,
2001; Rogers, 1957; Sue &
Sue, 2003; Watkins, 1985).
The first modern psychotherapist, Sigmund Freud (1917/1966),
asserted the necessity for
analysts to participate in their own analysis in order to increase
their awareness of
countertransference and, thus, minimize its potentially
detrimental effect on the analytic
process. Mental health professionals since this time have
supported the idea that therapists
need to be aware of their own biases, values, stereotypical
beliefs, and assumptions in order to

15. appropriately serve culturally diverse clients (Pedersen, 1997;
Rogers, 1957; Sue & Sue, 2003).
The Council for the Accreditation of Counseling and Related
Educational Programs
(CACREP) (2001) supported the belief that self-awareness is
important for mental health
professionals in the requirement that accredited programs
provide curricular experiences for
their students that ‘‘facilitate student self-awareness so that the
counselor-client relationship is
therapeutic and the counselor maintains appropriate
professional boundaries’’ (CACREP,
2001, p. 62). The American Psychological Association (APA) in
1954 affirmed the importance
of the development of self-awareness in counselor training by
encouraging it in its original
Practices for Counselor Trainee Selection. The APA Committee
on Accreditation’s (2000)
Guidelines and Principles for Accreditation of Programs in
Professional Psychology did not address
self-awareness.
A related focus in the professional literature has been on the
relationship between
counselor participation in personal counseling and counselor

16. self-awareness. D’Andrea and
Daniels (1992) surveyed chairs and program directors of
counselor education programs and
found that only 13% of the 122 respondents supported the idea
of required personal
counseling for all students and that only 9% of the respondents’
programs actually practiced
such a requirement.
From a philosophical position, mental health professionals
clearly value personal
counseling quite highly (Bridges, 1993; Norcross & Prochaska,
1982). However, a review
of the literature revealed only two studies addressing the
question of whether counseling
enhances self-awareness. Downs (2000) interviewed 13
graduates of a counselor education
program that required 10 hours of personal counseling during
their term at the university.
The nine participants who completed the requirement reportedly
benefited in several ways
including the ability to gain insight and an awareness of
personal issues that might impact
their professional practice. The results of MacDevitt’s (1987)
survey indicated that 80% of

17. the 185 respondents, members of the Psychotherapy Division of
the APA, had participated
at some time in personal therapy and found a significant
positive correlation between the
number of hours of personal therapy and countertransference
awareness.
A large southern metropolitan university counseling program
required its students to
complete 10 individual counseling sessions with either a
licensed mental health professional
outside the counseling program or a supervised counselor
trainee within the program clinics
during the students’ first semester of program coursework. This
article will report results
from a study designed specifically to investigate these master’s
level counseling students’
perceived effects on self-awareness, their support for the
counseling requirement, and their
recommendations for enhancing effectiveness of the required
counseling experience.
Method
Participants
We used random cluster sampling to identify intact groups of

18. master’s level counseling
students enrolled in face-to-face courses in the counselor
preparation program. A total of
442 K. A. Oden et al.
164 students completed surveys, and these participants
represented 62% of program
master’s students enrolled that semester.
The student population in the program was 90% Caucasian, 6%
Asian or Pacific-Islander,
3% Hispanic, and 1% African-American. Sixty-two percent of
the students were female and
38% were male. Of the total participants, 2% were aged 18–22,
47% were aged 23–29, 30%
were aged 30–39, 17% were aged 40–49, and 4% were 50 or
above. Eighty percent fulfilled
the counseling requirement by seeing a counseling program
student and 20% by seeing a
mental health professional outside of the program. At the time
of assessment, 16% of the
164 participants reported having completed only six sessions of
counseling. Eighty-eight
percent of those who completed only six sessions completed

19. their counseling within the
program clinics. An additional 7% of the 164 participants
completed 9 sessions or less, and
the remaining 77% of total participants completed 10 or more
sessions. Prior to fulfilling the
required counseling, 37% of participants had never been in
counseling, 23% had attended
between one and five counseling sessions, and 40% had
attended six or more counseling
sessions. Fifty-one percent were pursuing the community
counseling track of study, 43% the
school counseling track, and 5% the college/university
counseling track.
Instrumentation
We developed a survey and a Counselor Self-Awareness Scale
to examine students’
perceptions regarding the value of the required counseling
experience. We directed
participants to respond only on the basis of their required
counseling experience.
Evidence of test content. To define the central construct of the
Scale that would be consistent
with both the professional literature and the purpose of this
study, we used specific

20. definitions we found in the literature review, contextual
material from that review, and
contextual material from CACREP standards addressing self-
awareness. We defined
self-awareness as the capacity to allow one’s feelings, thoughts,
and behaviors into
consciousness, especially in the context of the counselor-client
relationship.
We used this definition to develop 13 items on the Counselor
Self-Awareness Scale. On
each item, participants indicated on a 9-point Likert scale the
point that represented their
perspective in relation to the required counseling experience.
The point of 1 indicated ‘‘I
gained absolutely no awareness about this aspect of myself,’’
and the point of 9 indicated
‘‘The level of awareness I attained about this aspect of myself
makes this one of the most
meaningful experiences of my life.’’ Sample items included:
awareness of my own thoughts,
feelings, and behaviors; my personal beliefs about and attitudes
toward people who are
different than me; my own needs; and aspects of my personality
that may hinder my ability

21. to maintain professional boundaries (see Table I). We consulted
five associate and full
professor level counselor educators from a CACREP accredited
counseling program to
establish evidence of test content. The items were deemed
appropriate to measure perceived
counselor self-awareness.
Evidence of internal structure. To minimize ordering effects
(Kalton & Schuman, 1982), we
created two versions of the scale that consisted of identical
items organized in two different
random orders. After collecting data from all 164 participants,
we conducted a principal
component analysis on the 13 items. We used the principal
factor method to extract the
factors, followed by a varimax rotation. Results of the scree test
yielded two components
with eigen values greater than 1.0. We retained these
components for the rotation; they
accounted for approximately 79% of the variance.
Required counseling for trainees 443

22. We used component loadings greater than .40 on a given
component for interpretation on
the rotated component pattern matrix. Six items loaded on the
first component, which we
subsequently labeled the internal subscale, as these items
related to a student’s perception of
how counseling affected one’s awareness of one’s own internal
experience. Seven items
loaded on the second component, which we subsequently
labeled the external subscale, as
these items related to a student’s awareness of how one might
interact with clients. The two
component solution accounted for 68% and 11% of the variance,
respectively. Items and
corresponding component loadings are presented in Table I.
Reliability. We used Cronbach’s alpha to compute reliability
coefficients for the two
subscales derived from the principal component analysis.
Reliability estimates were strong
for both subscales: a¼ .96 for the internal subscale, and a¼ .94
for the external subscale.
Procedures
Participants were recruited from regularly scheduled counseling
program classes and were

23. assured of confidentiality and that their participation was
voluntary. In addition to
completing the Counselor Self-Awareness Scale, participants
checked whether they
recommended that future students pursue similar counseling in a
counseling program
clinic, in an outside setting, or in either setting. The survey
concluded with narrative
response questions to which participants could reply: (i)
whether they supported a
requirement of counseling for future students in counselor
preparation programs, and why
or why not; (ii) what they would change about the requirement;
and (iii) any additional areas
of strength or concern they wanted to provide regarding the
required counseling experience.
Results
Counselor Self-Awareness Scale
With respect to internal awareness, participants reported a mean
score of 5.64 (N¼164;
SD¼1.98). With respect to external awareness, participants
reported a mean of 4.90
Table I. Awareness items and corresponding component
loadings from the rotated component matrix.

24. Items Internal External
1. Awareness of my own thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. 0.84
0.38
2. The reasons for my behavior. 0.91 0.26
3. My personal beliefs about and attitudes toward people who
are different than me. 0.45 0.61
4. My own needs. 0.82 0.33
5. How the ways that I relate to others might impact my
effectiveness as a counselor 0.30 0.82
6. The reasons I feel the ways I do. 0.82 0.40
7. How my feelings and attitudes might affect my ability to be
objective. 0.41 0.77
8. Aspects of my personality that may hinder my ability to
maintain professional
boundaries.
0.29 0.80
9. The reasons I make the choices I make. 0.82 0.40
10. How my experiences might affect my interactions with
clients. 0.35 0.83
11. How my beliefs and attitudes might affect my relationships
with clients. 0.32 0.81

25. 12. The reasons I think the ways I do. 0.84 0.40
13. How my own needs might interfere with my ability to put
the client’s needs first. 0.55 0.90
N¼164.
444 K. A. Oden et al.
(N¼164; SD¼1.95). In order to ascertain the effect of required
counseling for master’s
counseling students on the students’ awareness of their own
internal experience and their
interactions with clients, we categorized respondents into low,
middle, and high scoring
groups. Groups were derived statistically by using the means
and standard deviations of the
subscales and identifying the scores corresponding to .44z (33%
of the distribution) to
ascertain low, middle, and high values. Thus, for the internal
awareness subscale,
participants who scored 4.77 or below were in the low group,
who scored between 4.78
and 6.50 were in the middle group, and who scored 6.51 or
above were in the high group.
For the external awareness subscale, participants who scored
4.04 or below were in the low

26. group; who scored between 4.04 and 5.76 were in the middle
group, and who scored 5.77 or
above were in the high group.
We used chi square analyses at an alpha level of .05 to identify
if significant differences
existed in the reporting of internal and external awareness as a
result of participating in
counseling. If no relationship was apparent, students would be
equally dispersed across the
low, middle, and high groups, thereby indicating that students
did not overwhelmingly
endorse low, moderate, or high levels of awareness gained from
counseling.
For the internal subscale, we found no significant relationship:
w2(2)¼2.061, p¼ .357.
This result indicates that students did not overwhelmingly
endorse gains from counseling in
their awareness of their own internal experience, with 33%
(n¼55) endorsing high gains,
38% (n¼62) endorsing moderate gains, and 29% (n¼47)
endorsing minimal gains in their
internal self-awareness. For the external subscale, we found a
significant relationship:
w2(2)¼63.085, p 5 .001. This result indicated that students did
overwhelmingly endorse
gains from counseling in their awareness of interactions with

27. clients, with 32% (n¼53)
endorsing high gains, 59% (n¼97) endorsing moderate gains,
and 9% (n¼14) endorsing
minimal gains in awareness of interactions with clients.
Support for required counseling and recommendations
Regarding participants’ support of the counseling requirement,
92% (n¼164) indicated
they did support the requirement, 6% were unsure, and 2% did
not indicate an opinion; no
one indicated they did not support the requirement. Most of
those who were unsure
indicated that if a student had participated in counseling in the
past, the requirement might
be waived for them. Even participants who reported concerns
still supported the
requirement of counseling for future counselors in training. One
student stated, ‘‘My
counselor was very distant and aloof. She hardly even smiled
and rarely showed empathy,’’
yet still asserted that he or she ‘‘absolutely’’ supported the
required counseling.
Thirty-one percent of students who completed their counseling
within program clinics
recommended that future students complete the counseling
within a program clinic, 17%

28. recommended outside, and 77% recommended either setting.
Forty-eight percent of
participants who completed the counseling outside the program
clinics recommended that
students complete the requirement outside, none recommended
inside, and 52%
recommended either setting.
Benefits of required counseling and areas for improvement
Participants’ narrative responses revealed six themes related to
benefits from their required
counseling experiences. They indicated increased understanding
of the client perspective
(56%), self-awareness (36%), understanding the process of
counseling (33%), personal
growth (18%), understanding the role of the counselor (11%),
and insight about
Required counseling for trainees 445
expectations of the preparation program (4%). One student
stated, ‘‘I feel it is important
that future counselors know what it is like to be the one being
counseled and how important
it is to know yourself, why you do what you do and how hard it

29. is to change.’’ Another
student reported, ‘‘I think the counseling helped me be more
aware of my needs. This
helped me not to use my clients to fulfill my personal needs.’’
Another responded that, ‘‘It
was probably the most influential aspect of the counseling
program for me . . . . It helped me
to conceptualize the counseling process in a way that nothing
else could.’’
Narrative responses also revealed several areas of potential
improvement. Participants’
suggestions included to require fewer sessions (16%), to better
prepare student clients for the
experience (14%), to require the experience off campus (10%),
to require more sessions
(9%), to include more feedback from counselor (7%), to provide
opportunities for
more counseling throughout the program (6%), and to require
the counseling later in the
program (3%). Suggestions that applied to the counseling
program clinic setting were to
allow for choice of counselor (9%), to allow for more flexible
times (8%), not to videotape
counseling sessions (7%), to provide more competent counselors

30. (7%), to provide an
opportunity to talk with counselor’s supervisor (6%), to have
counseling provided only by
doctoral-level counselor trainees (4%), to have only supervisors
– not other practicum
students – view sessions and tapes (4%), to provide greater
assurance of confidentiality (2%),
to provide an option to change counselors (1%), and to make
counseling rooms less sterile
(1%).
Discussion
Informed consent
Even with extensive measures to inform students about the
required counseling component,
some participants reported receiving inaccurate or insufficient
information. It would be
important to provide in writing specific information regarding
this process and to consider
creating a brief video to standardize the delivery of information
about the counseling
requirement to new students. Any program implementing this
requirement must consider
other ethical issues, including the dual relationships created

31. when the counseling is provided
in program clinics.
Number and timing of required sessions
Whereas 16% of the participants expressed concern that the
number of sessions required
was too many or that the time commitment was too large to ask
of students, 12% wanted the
requirement extended to more sessions and/or over a longer
period of time. Felker (1970)
indicated that 5 sessions of counseling for counseling trainees
might not have been enough
to bring about sufficient change in participants to impact their
counseling effectiveness.
Borsook (1981) found that fewer than 12 to 16 sessions may not
have been enough for
counseling trainees who might be low in willingness to move
past the distress involved in the
process of beginning to examine one’s values and philosophical
positions.
Wise, Lowery, and Silverglade (1989) suggested that the first
few months of a program
before students start seeing clients is a prime time to
recommend counseling. During this

32. time, students are dealing with the adjustment to graduate
school but are not in the process of
actually trying to deliver services as novice therapists.
However, the authors recommended
that students not immerse themselves in personal therapy once
they begin seeing clients,
because by then students are more focused on their own
professional competence.
446 K. A. Oden et al.
Potential benefits and costs to students
Potential Benefits. Ninety-one percent of participants in this
study reported that they
perceived that required individual counseling brought about a
moderate to high increase in
their awareness of their interactions with clients. Forty-four
percent of participants reported
that the required counseling experience helped them understand
the role of the counselor
and the process of counseling, which may enhance their ability
to be more effective (Bridges,
1993). Fifty-six percent of participants indicated that the
experience helped them to

33. understand what it is like to be in the client’s position and to
learn to convey genuineness
and empathy for clients, which may increase effectiveness
(Peebles, 1980).
Potential costs. A potential cost to requiring individual
counseling to students in counseling
programs is the empirical finding that some clients experience
negative effects from
counseling (Lambert & Cattani-Thompson, 1996). In this study,
even though 45% of
participants reported negative aspects of the experience, none
reported negative effects, and
the vast majority reporting negative aspects still considered the
experience to be beneficial
overall.
In the program in which this study was conducted, many
students commuted to school.
For these students, to avail themselves of no-cost counseling at
the program clinic might
have required an extra trip to campus involving a time
investment of as much as 3 hours per
week. Conversely, students who engaged in counseling outside
the program may not have
spent as much time but had to incur the cost – except in rare

34. cases of pro bono services.
Advantages and disadvantages to programs providing required
counseling in their own program
clinics
Advantages to providing counseling within program clinics
include a ready client pool for
practicum students. For students who are clients, there is no
cost and sessions might be
conveniently scheduled at times before and after classes.
Disadvantages to providing counseling in program clinics
include a substantial increase in
ethical concerns, in particular, dual relationship issues. Another
disadvantage is the relative
inexperience of the student counselors who provided the
counseling compared to licensed
mental health professionals who provided the counseling
outside the clinic. This
confounding variable may have accounted for two findings: that
participants who received
outside counseling tended to favor outside counseling more than
those who received inside
counseling favored inside counseling, and that participants who
received outside counseling

35. reported significantly higher increases in self-awareness. The
number of students who
received counseling outside was very small (20%), thus
rendering the latter finding a focus
for future confirmatory research. Another disadvantage is the
challenge of providing
students with choices regarding counselor gender, age, and
theoretical orientation.
Wampler and Strupp (1976) offered options to address several
of these issues; however,
most of these options might require faculty members and
programs to increase time and
funding expenditures substantially. One option involves
arranging a reciprocal arrangement
with another mental health program so that students are not seen
in their own programs but
could still receive counseling at no cost. Another possibility is
the coordination of the
provision of the counseling services with professionals in the
area who would be willing to
provide the services at no or low cost to the students. The
program could hire a part-time
therapist to provide the counseling services. Programs could
also provide loan funding for

36. students to be able to pay for counseling outside the program.
Required counseling for trainees 447
Future research
This study examined changes in level of self-awareness from
only a subjective rather than an
objective perspective. Professionals in the field of mental health
provider preparation would
benefit from studies that objectively examine changes in levels
of self-awareness as a result of
counseling and the relationship between levels of self-
awareness and counselor effectiveness.
Studies comparing the effect on self-awareness compared to
other interventions would be
beneficial. Future researchers might also address students’
reports of time and money spent
as factors in perceived benefit of a required counseling
experience.
Declaration of interest: The authors report no conflicts of
interest. The authors alone are
responsible for the content and writing of the paper.
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http://www.apa.org/ed/gp2000.html
Therapists’ experiences of personal therapy: A descriptive
phenomenological study
VICKY OTEIZA*
Burlada, Spain
Abstract
Aim: To consider therapists’ descriptive accounts of their
experiences of personal therapy. Method: The methodology
employed was qualitative, using data obtained from individual
semi-structured interviews. Ten Spanish psychotherapists
were interviewed about their experiences of personal therapy.
Findings: In a systematic thematic analysis of the interview
transcripts, six emergent themes were identified: different
approaches to personal therapy; time in therapy; approach to
choosing personal therapist; experiences of personal therapy;
contribution of personal therapy to therapists’ professional
development, and contribution of personal therapy to therapists’
affective development. These findings are consistent with

41. previous research. Conclusion: The findings indicated that
participants’ experiences of personal therapy were positive.
Alternative approaches for personal development are
considered.
Keywords: personal therapy; thematic analysis; phenomenology;
personal development
Introduction
The controversy regarding personal therapy amongst
psychotherapists has existed for many years. There is
a general acceptance of personal therapy as important
amongst therapists to increase effectiveness and
maintain well-being (McNamara, 1986; Williams,
Coyle & Lyons, 1999). However, personal therapy
for psychotherapists has generated considerably more
speculation and debate than research (Greenberg
& Staller, 1981; Macaskill, 1988; Macaskill &
Macaskill, 1992; Macran & Shapiro, 1998; Wogan
& Norcross, 1985).
The emphasis of research in this area has histori-

42. cally been quantitative as opposed to qualitative.
Few consistent phenomena can be observed from
such studies. Surveys reveal that most therapists feel
they have benefited professionally and personally
from personal therapy in aspects ranging from their
verbal behaviour to their therapeutic relationship
(Greenberg & Staller, 1981; Macaskill & Macaskill,
1992; Norcross, 1988, 1990; Wogan & Norcross,
1985; Williams, Coyle, & Lyons, 1999).
Several studies, which have placed therapists in
similar situations to real-life therapy, suggest that
therapists who have received therapy are more active
in their interactions with clients, and more aware of
counter-transference situations (Macran & Shapiro,
1998). However, evidence for a direct effect of
personal therapy on client outcome is inconclusive
(Greenberg & Staller, 1981; Macaskill, 1988;
Wheeler, 1991).

43. This research attempts to explore therapists’
experiences of personal therapy, and also therapists’
attitudes to mandatory personal therapy. Rela-
tively little is known about the effects of personal
therapy on professionals. Greenberg and Staller’s
(1981) impression was that, ‘too often, trainees
decide whether or not to seek therapy on the basis
of purely emotional and practical considerations’
(p. 1467), rather than on findings reported in
literature.
Method
Research method
The methodology employed was qualitative and
focussed on the phenomenon of personal therapy,
using data obtained from individual audio-taped
*Email: [email protected]
Counselling and Psychotherapy Research, September 2010;
10(3): 222�228
ISSN 1473-3145 print/1746-1405 online # 2010 British
Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy

44. DOI: 10.1080/14733140903337300
semi-structured interviews. The interviews used the
following semi-structured schedule:
1. According to (psychotherapy organisation), in
order to meet the requirements for personal
development and registration, therapists have to
undertake a minimum of 50 hours of mandatory
therapy. What are your views about it?
2. How much personal therapy do you think a
person should have before practising?
3. How did you go about choosing your therapist
for personal therapy?
4. Tell me about your experience of personal
therapy.
5. How does it feel like to be both a client and a
psychotherapist?
The first and last questions were deliberately open-

45. ended to encourage extended responses. The inter-
view scheduled was developed through the use of a
pilot study, which also helped to evaluate the
recruitment approach and the transcription process.
Participants
I originate from Spain and decided to interview
Spanish therapists as I intended to return there to
practise. The sample was taken from a published list
of Spanish therapists belonging to an established
psychotherapeutic organization in Spain. There were
issues concerning convenience, that is, the access of
the researcher to participants and participants’ avail-
ability. Thirty therapists, geographically closest to my
location in Spain, were identified. Ten therapists
were finally selected (purposive sample) and inter-
viewed about their experiences of personal therapy.
Of the 10 psychotherapists interviewed, three were
Psychoanalytic; one Reichian; one Systemic; one

46. Gestalt; one Existentialist; one Psychoanalytic-Exis-
tential; one Psychoanalytic-Eclectic; and one Psycho-
analytic-Psychodrama. Due to the small number of
cognitive and behaviourist therapists, an extra effort
was made to contact cognitive therapists but, as they
had not undergone personal therapy, one of the key
requirements for taking part in the research, they did
not satisfy the interview criteria. No other candidates
could be located and included in the sample.
Six out of 10 participants were women, all in their
late 40s to mid-50s. All participants stated they had
been in professional practice for over 15 years and
had experienced personal therapy. Therapy was
mandatory for all participants; half of them had
been in therapy for three to five years, and the other
half for 5�10 years. For reasons of convenience, the
location where the interviews took place was their
workplace. Length of interviews ranged between 30

47. and 40 minutes.
Data analysis
Transcripts were analysed using a systematic the-
matic approach following Colaizzi’s method (1978)
to provide a rich description of the phenomenon.
This method consists of the following steps:
. Data were reviewed to achieve emphatic im-
mersion in participants’ subjective worldviews.
Interviews were analysed in both languages;
tutorials with my research supervisor, an Eng-
lish speaker, corroborated concordance.
. Transcripts were analysed, extracting significant
statements from each one. Each statement was
pasted on to a separate document retaining the
transcript, page and line number.
. Underlying meanings of each statement were
noted and read by a second researcher, with
necessary adjustments made. A total of 72
formulated meanings from all interviews were
written.

48. . A reflective diary was maintained to help in the
fine tuning and further categorisation.
. Formulated meanings were organised into clus-
ters of themes. The 72 formulated meanings
were arranged into 16 theme clusters which
were then collapsed into six emergent themes of
the phenomenon of therapists’ experiences of
personal therapy.
Ethical issues
Ethics approval was granted by the University Ethics
Committee via written application. The Ethics
Committee additionally reviewed a copy of the
information sheet and participant consent form
informing interested therapists about the purpose
of the research, their rights as participants, and the
responsibilities of the researcher. There were no
incentives for participation; however, a commitment
was given to participants that they would receive
details of the findings once the study was completed.

49. Reflexive statement
I am a therapist who had experience of personal
therapy and the insight into procedures and
processes involved. The theoretical basis for this
Therapists’ experiences of personal therapy 223
investigation and its methodology were consistent with
my approach and values as a counsellor; that is, reality
is understood as both multiple and socially con-
structed through the interaction of individuals who
use symbols to interpret each other, and assign mean-
ing to perceptions and experience (Bowling, 2002).
Being the researcher and aware of the issues of
power and hierarchy which involved interviewing
experienced psychotherapists, I identified my own
need to create a ‘good’ impression with them. In
contrast, I perceived that, at times, participants were
keen to give what they regarded as the ‘right’

50. responses (Wiles, Charles, Crow, & Heath, 2004).
Finally, I was aware of my bias as a counsellor
regarding personal therapy.
Findings
The analysis yielded the following six main themes
and theme clusters, detailed in Table I.
Each theme will be discussed in turn, but for the
purpose of this paper, participants’ experiences
and views of the emergent theme number four,
experiences of personal therapy, will be presented in
more detail in this section.
Different approaches to personal therapy
Participants working from mainly Psychodynamic,
Jungian, Gestalt and Existential approaches argued
that exploration of the ‘internal world’ of therapists’
is essential. They also stated that personal therapy
might not be so important for other approaches such
as Cognitive-Behavioural, where there is more focus

51. on change of behaviour than on emotions or change
of personality.
Most participants maintained that personal ther-
apy should be essential for any therapist, regardless
of their approach as a therapist, in order to identify
therapists’ emotions, and to avoid confusing them
with those of clients. Some participants showed
more flexibility about the idea of personal therapy
being mandatory, recognising diversity of criteria
amongst schools, and also their ignorance about
some of them.
Once participants discussed purposes and objec-
tives in personal therapy, they established a direct
Table I. Emergent themes and theme clusters.
Emergent themes and theme clusters Participants with emergent
themes and theme clusters
1. Different approaches to personal therapy P1, P2, P4, P5, P6,
P7, P8, P10
2. Choosing a therapist P1, P2, P3, P4, P5, P6, P7, P8, P9, P10

52. 2.1. Criteria for choosing a therapist P1, P3, P8, P9, P10
2.2. Ways of choosing a therapist P2, P3, P4, P5, P6, P9, P10
2.3. Becoming more selective with time P2, P7, P9
3. Time in therapy P1, P2, P3, P4, P5, P6, P7, P8, P9, P10
3.1. Establishment of some criteria P1, P2, P3, P4, P5, P6, P8,
P9, P10
3.2. Length of personal therapy does not guarantee improved
professionalism
P3, P6, P7, P8
3.3. Therapy should have an end vs personal development as on-
going P1, P2, P3, P7, P8
4. Experiences of personal therapy P1, P2, P3, P4, P5, P6, P7,
P8, P9, P10
4.1. A difficult but helpful and enriching experience P1, P2, P4,
P5, P6, P7, P9, P10
4.2. Experiencing different types of personal therapy P2, P3,
P5, P7, P8, P9
4.3. Experiencing the world of the client P1, P2, P4, P6, P8, P9
4.4. The experience of being both client and psychotherapist P1,
P2, P5, P6, P7, P8, P9
5. Contributions of personal therapy to therapists’ professional

53. development P1, P2, P3, P4, P5, P7, P8, P9, P10
5.1. Knowing more and feeling better P1, P2, P3, P7, P8, P9,
P10
5.2. The advantage of personal therapy on subsequent practice
with
clients
P1, P2, P3, P7, P8, P9
5.3. Having a professional reference: the therapist as a model
P3, P5, P7, P9, P10
5.4. Professional recognition and support P3, P4, P5, P7
6. Contributions of personal therapy to therapists’ affective
development P1, P2, P4, P5, P6, P7, P8, P9
6.1. The qualities of the personal therapist that made the
experience of
personal therapy meaningful
P1, P4, P5, P8, P9
6.2. Emotional, experiential and professional P1, P2, P4, P6, P7,
P8
224 V. Oteiza
link between time in personal therapy and type of

54. therapy. For example, psychodynamic approaches
that support internal and structural change might
require more time, and therefore the process of
personal therapy could take longer.
Choosing a therapist
This process begins at the point where the decision
is made to begin personal therapy. Participants
focussed on professional aspects, such as experience,
confidentiality or respect, and personal connection
as the main criteria when choosing their therapists.
Even though some participants thought their deci-
sion about their therapist was not premeditated,
most of them stated it was a decision taken with
much care.
Criteria for choosing a therapist. There were four
influences in the choice of therapist:
. participants’ perceptions towards the therapist
and their feelings when working together;
. gender;

55. . the therapist’s professionalism in terms of hav-
ing experience, being respectful with the client,
keeping confidentiality and inspiring partici-
pant’s confidence; and
. aspects related to or associated with location/
place and school.
Ways of choosing a therapist. Some participants stated
that it was their own initiative or motivation to find
a therapist. Most mentioned recommendation as
their way of finding a therapist, while others noted it
was not a conscious choice or a premeditated
decision when choosing a particular therapist, but
was down to meeting the therapist who was ‘right
for them’.
Two strategies were employed by participants in
order to make the final decision; to have two or three
sessions with a therapist before deciding on their
choice, to follow one’s intuition.
Becoming more selective with time. Three participants

56. noted that after having had a first experience of
personal therapy, together with professional experi-
ence, they became more selective and better able to
choose a therapist.
Time in therapy
Establishment of time criteria. Eight out of 10 partici-
pants stated that 50 hours of personal therapy was
too few for their therapists to enter into their internal
worlds; to facilitate change 50 hours was simply
insufficient. However, in general participants felt the
length of the therapeutic process might depend on
different factors, such as the type of issues or
difficulties, personality, personal feelings in that
moment or the therapist themselves. Half of the
participants mentioned a length of about three years
of personal therapy as a reasonable time. Partici-
pants arrived at this conclusion from their experi-
ences as clients and as therapists.

57. Each participant had been in personal therapy for
a minimum of three years. Two stated that those
wishing to become therapists should spend longer in
therapy. As therapists rely on their internal world,
they require a deeper understanding of that world
and therefore longer, more in-depth work is required
in order to develop their understanding and enable
work in a more effective way.
Length of personal therapy does not guarantee improved
professionalism. Four participants emphasised the fact
that length of personal therapy does not guarantee
professional improvement. These participants argued
that longer periods of personal therapy might indicate
a greater need for help as a client, and therefore did
not necessarily mean a better professional.
Therapy should have an end vs personal development
as on-going. In general, participants thought that the
process of personal therapy should have a defined

58. end. One participant talked about the risk of
dependency or lack of confidence when personal
therapy is open ended. However, a Reichian parti-
cipant noted, for them, therapy should continue as
long as they remain in practice.
Experiences of personal therapy
A difficult but helpful and enriching experience. Partici-
pants noted several enriching aspects of their experi-
ence of personal therapy:
. to be more conscious, more aware of their own
personal issues;
. to abandon the fantasy of considering them-
selves as the ‘healthy ones’;
. to admit they are ‘merely’ human too;
. to respect an individual’s personal rhythm;
. to let themselves be guided and accompanied; and
. to expect to be challenged.
Therapists’ experiences of personal therapy 225

59. If one takes into consideration the fact that many
professionals choose health and mental health . . .
(he laughs) to maintain the fantasy that we are the
healthy ones and not the ‘crazy’ ones. We have to
be careful with this, and we hope the professional
helps us to remove that mask, that role, because it
is a defence against a pathology, a fantasy of
wanting to help our families, to bring health to
our families. (P6)
Experiencing different types of personal therapy. One-to-
one and group therapy were the most common types
of therapies described. Choosing individual or group
therapy depended on the type of professional work in
which participants were engaged:
Group therapy is more uncomfortable, it’s not
intimate. In the individual one there are only two
people, you and the therapist . . . the other
one . . . is more . . . I don’t know what word to

60. use . . . heavier, because one is exhibited not only
to one person, but to the whole group, it’s more
intense, I like it more [she laughs]. But well, there
are issues one doesn’t treat in there, it depends on
the people, I prefer group therapy, it depends
maybe on the type of person. And then, after years
of practice one can deal with more issues... it has
been a long pathway. (P2)
Experiencing the world of the client. Participants valued
their experience of being a client. One participant
regarded this as ethically important in relation to
justice and equal treatment, in that therapists should
experience the same process they offer to clients:
I defend a lot the fact that someone shouldn’t
forget that when one is helping s/he’s not in an
omnipotent position, with the white coat and
keeping their distance. I think it’s very interesting
to live the experience . . . Maybe, once the process

61. is finished, there’s the ethical part of not forgetting
about it either, to remember that one has difficul-
ties, that one is always a patient . . . I think it’s a
very interesting position of humility, honesty and
that one shouldn’t ever forget. (P4)
The experience of being both client and psychotherapist. When
entering into personal therapy, four participants
explained that they preferred not to think of them-
selves as therapists during that time. One participant
described his internal struggle in therapy as trying to
‘resist’ his therapist’s personal style:
[ . . . ] I question it but within a process of . . . it’s
a bit neurotic the whole thing, due to my way of
being in the world. I abandon myself to that, and
when I don’t, It doesn’t flow, I’m stuck . . . in the
competition, thinking . . . ‘this doesn’t suit me’,
or ‘that would suit me better’ . . . or . . . ‘it would
be better this way’ . . . or ‘what I need is’ . . . I

62. think this is a bit neurotic, because what I think
it’s not necessarily what I need, what I need is ‘let
it go, abandon yourself, let the other person
work’. (P7)
One participant believed that not practising as a
therapist during the first stage/phase of personal
therapy is important in order not to be distracted by
clients’ issues.
Contributions of personal therapy to therapists’
professional development
Knowing more and feeling better. One participant
considered a main acquisition from personal therapy
as the capacity of ‘contención’, that is, holding the
client in the therapeutic space with whatever s/he is
experiencing until the client is able to function.
Another participant mentioned the skill of ‘self-
exploration’ acquired as the result of intense perso-
nal work.

63. The advantage of personal therapy on subsequent
practice with clients. Personal therapy helped profes-
sionals to identify blind spots and deal with their
own unresolved issues. Personal therapy acted also
as a filter to establish therapists’ emotional well-
being according to participants
Having a professional reference: The therapist as a
model. Participants agreed with the idea that the
experience of personal therapy had a relevant impact
on them, especially the style, attitude and manner
the therapist demonstrated in the therapeutic con-
text.
Professional recognition and support. Two partici-
pants talked explicitly about the requirement of
receiving personal therapy in order to be approved
by their schools and start professional practice.
Participants also talked about the importance of
personal therapy as professional support primarily at

64. the beginning of their professional practice. Clinical
supervision can also be used to analyse counter-
transference. In this context the supervisor helps the
therapist to identify with the client and her/his issues
and at the same time maintain perspective.
226 V. Oteiza
Contributions of personal therapy to therapists’ affective
development
Qualities of personal therapist that made the experience
meaningful. Participants highlighted that professional
or personal similarities with their therapist was what
really helped rather than the approach used. Addi-
tionally was the impact of the quality of the
therapeutic relationship. Participants described the
therapeutic relationship using such terms as rich-
ness, connection, respect, intimate, sincere and real.
Emotional, experiential and professional. For the

65. participants, one of the most important aspects of
personal therapy was to live the experience of the client.
However, they agreed that to give themselves over
to the emotional and experiential side was not at all
easy.
Discussion
The sample of therapists was small and not necessarily
representative of therapists generally. However, the
findings paralleled those of previous research under-
taken (e.g. Cushway, 1996; Fleischer & Wissler, 1985;
Grimmer & Tribe, 2001; Macran, Stiles, & Smith,
1999; Orlinsky, Botermans, & Ronnestad, 2001;
Thériault & Gazzola, 2006; Webb & Wheeler, 1998;
Williams, Coyle, & Lyons, 1999).
The findings indicated that participants’ experi-
ences of personal therapy had a positive impact on
them to the point that all participants would recom-
mend it. They focused on its relevance for personal

66. and professional development, from learning about
one’s emotional blind spots and hypersensitivities, to
extending one’s awareness of the personal impact
one tends to have on other people, as well as
increasing the ability to recognise, accept, and work
to correct one’s inevitable human weaknesses and
limitations.
It has been suggested that supervision or alternative
personal development strategies might perhaps
achieve the same ‘outcome’. For example, recent
studies have considered alternatives such as Personal
Development Group (Orlinsky, Botermans, &
Ronnestad, 2001; Payne, 2004) as an encounter
with a wide range of personal and professional
learning possibilities. However, the participants in
this study felt strongly that personal therapy repre-
sented a unique contribution to professional and
affective development, experiencing the world of

67. the client or helping the professional to function
effectively.
Limitations of the study
The sample was a group of therapists who were
interested in talking about their experiences of perso-
nal therapy. It may be that therapists with relatively
positive experiences of therapy were most likely to
accept taking part in this study. Also, participants were
not asked directly about whether they felt their
therapy had had any hindering or negative effects;
but it is interesting to note approximately 20% of
unsatisfactory or harmful therapeutic experiences
were reported on average by respondents from differ-
ent studies (Macaskill, 1988; Pope & Tabachnick,
1994). This explicit question could be included in
subsequent studies to allow wider exploration of the
experience of personal therapy. As, therapy was
mandatory for all participants of this study, the views

68. of therapists for whom therapy was not mandatory
might have provided a different range of responses.
Conclusion
This paper offers an insight into therapists’ experi-
ences of personal therapy. Participants agreed suffi-
cient time must be allocated for therapy, especially
for those who want to become therapists, to allow
deep exploration and change. Most agreed personal
therapy should be time limited, contrary to personal
development which they considered should be on-
going while practising. The themes and theme
clusters were not completely separate or indepen-
dent. This reflected the integrated, interconnected
way in which participants organized their thoughts,
feelings and experiences.
Acknowledgements
This article is based on a research dissertation as
part of the MSc in Integrative Counselling &

69. Psychotherapy at Birmingham City University.
With thanks to Lilieth Grant, my tutor and super-
visor, for her contributions to the development of
this research. Also, the participants who agreed to
give their time as respondents and to Jennifer Mahon
for the language support.
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Biography
Vicky Oteiza completed her MSc in Integrative
Counselling and Psychotherapy at Birmingham City
University, England. At present she works as a
consultant in professional development for staff in
organisations, and in private practice as a counsellor
in Spain.
228 V. Oteiza
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74. Page 1 of 2
Ethics in Psychology
© 2013 Argosy University
Course Case Study
Joe, a thirty-five-year-old, male mental health counselor,
received a client referral, thirty-five-year-old Jill,
from a community counseling clinic. He began providing
counseling services to her. Jill's complaint was that
she was unsatisfied with her current job as a bank teller and was
experiencing mild anxiety and depression.
Joe had been providing services to Jill for three weeks when she
disclosed that she was confused about
her sexuality because she experienced sexual attraction toward
some women. Joe immediately responded
to Jill with wide eyes and a shocked look. He told Jill that he
was a traditional Catholic, who felt that this
type of feeling was immoral and wrong. He informed her that
she should avoid thinking about this and pray
for forgiveness. He also told her that he felt uncomfortable
talking about the issue any further. Jill continued
to talk to Joe about dealing with her family issues.

75. Joe had recently read about a new technique and immediately
became excited about trying it. He explained
to her that he had read an article in a magazine about a new
technique called rebirthing. The new technique
was being used in Europe to help people change their views
about their relationships with their family. Joe
said, "It is supposed to be really effective in almost wiping out
your memory of your family; it is like
hypnosis." "I would really like to try it on you today, what do
you think?" Jill declined his offer and continued
to talk about her family. Joe thought to himself that even though
Jill said no, he was still going to try to
hypnotize her as they talked because he thought she could
benefit from the technique.
Jill disclosed that she was raised in a traditional Asian
American home with many cultural influences and
culture-specific rules and behavior. Jill was struggling with
balancing her individualism and her cultural
heritage. Joe explained to her that because he was living and
working in a rural community, mostly
consisting of people of East European descent, he could not
relate to Jill’s culture and the issues with which

76. she was struggling. He apologized and explained that he was not
required to study these cultural issues
because of his geographical location.
Jill moved on to talk about her depression. She began talking
about feeling lonely and how it contributed to
her depression. During a counseling session several months
later, she revealed that she was attracted to
Joe and would like a closer, intimate relationship with him. Joe,
aware that he was also attracted to Jill,
talked about his feelings toward her but explained that engaging
in a relationship outside the established
counseling relationship was unethical. He informed her that
because of the mutual feelings of attraction, the
counseling relationship would be ineffective and that he would
refer her to another counselor for continued
services. Jill agreed, and they terminated the counseling
relationship. Later, she contacted him to continue
counseling and to discuss the referral. Joe agreed to meet her
that evening at a restaurant and bring her
the referral information. That night they began an intimate
sexual relationship.
Joe never got around to providing the referral for Jill even
though he was aware of her ongoing state of

77. depression and anxiety. Joe stopped seeing Jill after a month of
intimate sexual encounters. Joe enjoyed
the relationship but felt guilty due to the unethical nature of the
relationship. Because of his continued
concern about Jill's depression, Joe considered going to his
current clinical supervisor to discuss the case
but decided against it. This was because he and his supervisor
were good friends and he suspected his
supervisor would be hurt by knowing the real reason he had
been cancelling get-togethers.
Joe decided to call Jill's boss at the bank to check on her and
see how she was doing. He called her boss
and explained that he had been counseling her for anxiety and
depression and wanted to check if she was
Page 2 of 2
Ethics in Psychology
© 2013 Argosy University
2
Course Case Study

78. feeling fine. Her boss informed Joe that Jill had quit her job and
was in the county hospital undergoing
treatment for severe depression. Joe quickly hung up and
decided not to call or visit the bank again. After
thinking it over, Joe decided that general counseling might not
be for him. He decided to begin marriage
and family therapy. He ordered some business cards and
advertised in the yellow pages. He thought, “After
all, I am a mental health counselor, and it can’t be hard to
counsel a couple. You don't need anything
special. I already have one degree, and that's enough!”
Role of the family 1
CULTURAL COMPETANCE 4
Cultural Competance
NAME
University

79. PSY430-A01 Ethics in Psychology
Professor
DATE6
Assignment 2: Case Study: Cultural Competence
For this assignment, you will refer to the section "Course Case
Study." Reread the case study, looking specifically at issues
related to cultural competence. Examine the ACA's and APA's
ethical guidelines related to the issue of cultural competence
and respond to the following:
Describe the ethical issues related to cultural competence.
Examine the influence of your own personal values as related to
the diversity issues presented in this case. Reflect on how you
felt as you read the case study, how your values came into play,
and how you would handle your values in a situation such as
this.
Make recommendations based on your readings and the APA or
ACA ethics codes.
Be sure to apply specific ethical principles.
Save the paper as
AU_PSY430_M2_A2_LastName_FirstInitial.doc and submit it
to the M2 Assignment 2 Dropbox by Wednesday, April 13,
2016. Your response should be at least 2 pages long.
Assignment 2 Grading Criteria
Maximum Points
Described the ethical issues related to cultural competence.
20
Explained how one's own personal values relate to diversity in
the case study.
20

80. Made recommendations based on readings and the ethics codes.
20
Applied specific ethical principles.
20
Wrote in a clear, concise, and organized manner; demonstrated
ethical scholarship in accurate representation and attribution of
sources; and displayed accurate spelling, grammar, and
punctuation.
20
Total:
100
References:
Argosy Online (2016). Argosy University Module 2. Retrieved
from: http://myclassroomonline.com
Corey, Gerald, Corey, M. S., Callanan, P. (2011). Issues and
Ethics in the Helping Professions. [VitalSource Bookshelf
Online]. Retrieved from
https://digitalbookshelf.argosy.edu/#/books/1111738890/
Oden, K. A., Miner-Holden, J., & Balkin, R. S. (2009).
Required counseling for mental health professional trainees: Its
perceived effect on self-awareness and other potential benefits.
Journal of Mental Health, 18(5), 441. Retrieved from
https://login.libproxy.edmc.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest
.com/docview/215279369?accountid=34899

81. Oteiza, V. (2010). Therapists' experiences of personal therapy:
A descriptive phenomenological study. Counselling and
Psychotherapy Research, 10(3), 222. Retrieved from
https://login.libproxy.edmc.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest
.com/docview/858452006?accountid=34899
Pedersen, P. B. (2007). Ethics, competence, and professional
issues in cross-cultural counseling. In P. B. Pedersen, J. G.
Draguns, W. J. Lonner, & J. E. Trimble (Eds.), Counseling
across cultures (pp. 5–20). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Retrieved
from http://www.sagepub.com/upm-data/15654_Chapter_1.pdf