The effects of client pretraining on the level of anxiety, locus of control, quality of the counselor/client relationship, attendance and attrition

Field: Psychology (Social Sciences)

One of the purposes of this study was to investigate the pretherapy effect' of pretraining on clients' anxiety levels and internalexternal locus of control. Additionally, this study investigated the effects of pretraining on the counselors' perceptions of the counselor/ client relationship after -four therapy sessions. Last, the effects of pretraining on client attendance and attrition were also studied.A sample of 64 female and 40 male university counseling center clients was used. Subjects were assigned to a counselor, then the counselor/client pair was randomly assigned to one of three treatment groups--Pretraining 1, Pretraining 2, or a no pretraining control group.Pretraining 1 was conducted via a video taped presentation which was based on the anticipatory socialization interview described by Orne and Wender (1968). The purpose of Pretraining 1 was to provide a learning experience for clients which was designed to help them develop an understanding of the nature of counseling, the role expectations of the participants, the myths about counseling, and the responsibilities during counseling.Pretraining 2 included all aspects of Pretraining 1, plus a video taped presentation of some of the counseling techniques and a simulation of a counseling session. The main purpose of Pretraining 2 was to familiarize clients with some of the counseling techniques so that they could further assist themselves during therapy. One of the purposes of the simulated counseling session was to provide clients with a model of appropriate in-therapy behavior. The control group followed the regular counseling center procedures.Pretraining was conducted during the hour before the first counseling session. Clients in all three groups were administered the Taylor Manifest Anxiety Scale and the Rotter Internal-External Locus of Control Scale prior to the first counseling session. The counselors of the client subjects completed the Barrett-Lennard Relationship Inventory after the fourth counseling session. Only 59 counselor responses were used in the final analysis. Weekly attendance records were maintained for each subject.The null hypotheses tested ware: (a) There would be no significant difference between the vector of mean scores derived from the outcome measures, the Taylor Manifest Anxiety Scale and the Rotter Internal-External Locus of Control Scale, for the three pre therapy training groups; (b) There would be no significant difference between the means of the outcome measure, the Barrett-Lennard Relationship Inventory after an adjustment for the covariate (number of counseling sessions attended), for the three pretherapy training groups; (c) There would be no significant relationship between group membership and the number of counseling sessions attended; and (d) There would be no significant relationship 'between group membership and dropout rate of counseling.Hypothesis I was tested using a one-way multivariate analysis of variance procedure. Hypothesis 2 was tested using an analysis of covariance procedure. A Chi-Square statistic was chosen to test Hypotheses 3 and 4. The .05 significance level was chosen for rejection of the null hypothesis.Overall, the results of the study indicated that there were no significant differences between the three groups on any of the variables studied. Hypothesis 1 failed to reach significance (p < .09). Hypothesis 2 was not rejected (F = .24, p < .79). Hypothesis 3 failed to reach significance (Chi Square = 4.39, p < .62). And, Hypothesis 4 -was not rejected (Chi Square = 2.80, p < .24).The conclusions of the study were that: (a) Pretraining did not affect the clients' levels of trait anxiety; (b) Pretraining did not affect the clients' locus of control scores; (c) Pretraining did not affect the counselors' perceptions of the quality of the counseling relationship after four counseling sessions; (d) Pretraining did not affect clients' attendance in counseling; and (e) Pretraining did not affect clients' attrition rates of counseling.