Effect of Rational Emotive Behavioural Therapy (REBT) on Reduction of Restive Behaviour among Enrolled in Counselling, Psychology and Sociology Education (CPSE)

The study investigated the effect of rational emotive behavioural therapy (REBT) on reduction of restive behaviour among undergraduate students. The need for the study came as a result of the increasing rate of restive behaviour of undergraduate students to which the researchers sought to find solutions. Pre-test-post-test randomized control trial experimental design was adopted by the researchers for the study. Sixty-four (54) counselling, psychology, and sociology education undergraduate students who were drawn through proportionate stratified random sampling technique constituted the sample for the study. The students were randomly assigned to experimental (29) and control (25) groups. Restive Assessment Scale for Students (RASS) and Reducing Restive Behaviour Scale (RRBS) were used for data collection. RASS and RRBS were properly validated by experts in test development and the internal consistency reliability indices of the items were estimated as 0.79 and 0.81 respectively using the Cronbach Alpha method. Before the commencement of the testing and treatment package, the researchers assured the participants of confidentiality of interactions and personal information as they work together in self-disclosure. Thereafter, a pre-treatment assessment (pre-test) was conducted using the RASS and RRBS in order to collect baseline data (Time 1). After that, the experimental group was exposed to 90 minutes of the REBT programme twice a week for a period of 6-weeks. The treatment took place between September and November 2019. Post-test (Time 2) assessment was conducted 1 week after the last treatment session. Besides, a follow-up assessment was conducted after two months of the treatment (Time 3). Data collected were analyzed using repeated-measures analysis of variance. The findings of the study revealed that the efficacy of rational emotive behavioural therapy on the reduction of restive behaviour among counselling, psychology, and sociology education undergraduate students was significant at post-test and follow-up measures. One of the implications of the findings is that if undergraduate students are not properly counselled, their restive behaviour will continue to increase. Based on the findings, it was recommended among others that Federal Government or relevant education authorities should provide enough guidance counsellors in the various institutions of higher learning who will assist in the counselling of the students on the dangers of restive behaviour using REBT.

Proactive Alliance: Combining policing and counselling psychology

The philosophy of community-oriented policing (COP) has been widely adopted by police departments around the world and has important benefits, such as improving community members’ satisfaction with police and their perceptions of police legitimacy. However, implementing COP is challenging. Police departments report difficulties obtaining the support of officers on the ground and knowing how best to engage communities—which often contain multiple, overlapping, and sometimes competing groups within the same geographic area—in effective problem-solving and crime prevention. This article describes Proactive Alliance, an innovative training program that draws from criminological theory andevidence-based principles in counselling psychology to teach police officers specific, immediately applicable techniques to establish rapport and long-term working relationships with community stakeholders. The training addresses two key challenges of COP: building meaningful collaboration across diverse communities and empowering frontline officers to become change agents in pursuit of the “co-production” of public safety. It builds on the original theory of broken windows policing, which emphasized the importance of harnessing police officers’ personalities to facilitate successful community engagement and crime prevention, and provides practical tools based on those used by mental health professionals to enable officers to engage in active listening, to connect, and to problem-solve with the community while protecting their own well-being. We conclude by describing the potential of Proactive Alliance to strengthen COP and evidence-based policing more broadly.

Metaphysics of Counselling History on Colonized Land

We offer a conceptual analysis of how Canadian counsellor education and counselling psychology can respond to colonial history through the teaching of its own history. Drawing on literature in counselling, education, and decolonial Indigenous scholarship, we work toward a positive and practical way to teach history that addresses power, colonization, and Indigenous intellectual traditions. Those in the fields of Canadian counselling, counsellor education, and counselling psychology are invited to expand their focus on epistemology into an appreciation of being. This focus on being leads to a broadened horizon of counselling as healing education, and a shift towards a place-centred pedagogy of history. It yields a radically different and markedly more humble and pluralistic pedagogy of the history of our field—one that is grounded within the reality of the land.

Book Review of Embracing Cultural Responsivity and Social Justice: Re-shaping Professional Identity in Counselling Psychology

Sandra Collins’s e-book Embracing Cultural Responsivity and Social Justice: Re-Shaping Professional Identity in Counselling Psychology integrates a well-grounded conceptual model for attending to culture and social justice in counselling with applied examples that bridge theory and practice. The book is interconnected between domains, competencies, learning outcomes, and key concepts in the culturally responsive and socially just (CRSJ) counselling model, which enhances meaningfulness, relevancy, and ease of application for readers. The interactive features of the e-book design include (a) audio and video components that bring the contents to life, (b) internal links that support easy navigation between various sections of the book, and (c) links between the concepts in each chapter and detailed glossary definitions that ground the ideas in the professional literature. This e-book is unique in its multimodality and is user friendly with language that is both professional and personal.

Caste and Counselling Psychology in India: Dalit Perspectives in Theory and Practice

This paper is written from the perspective of a Dalit counselling psychologist and aims to provide an understanding of the exclusion of Dalit perspective in the theoretical as well as therapeutic domains of psychology as a discipline. It aims to elaborate on the impact of caste on the internalised-self of psychologist as well as their client and how it influences the whole process of learning as well as practice. It identifies the gaps in this field and suggests a revision and reformulation of its course and training programmes so that the closed doors can be opened for all. Further it addresses the various dyads of relationships in therapeutic alliance that can be possibly influenced by caste-based oppression in social life. The paper is highly concerned with the unaffordable and inaccessible nature of clinical settings and the persistent ignorance of the mental health concerns of Dalits. In this paper significant issues like the sense of disconnect, lack of dialogical spaces, and dehumanised processes have been explored in detail. Expressing the hope that there will be a possibility of revisiting and reformulation of theoretical orientations and philosophical frameworks, the paper calls for adequate attention towards the Dalit perspective in counselling psychology to envision egalitarianism in reality.

Influence of Psychosocial Guidance and Counselling Services on Secondary School Students’ Academic Performance: A Case of Tanga City, Tanzania

This study examined the influence of psychosocial guidance and counselling services (GCS) on secondary school students’ academic performance in Tanga City. The study employed a mixed method approach that utilized a correlation and a case study design. The study’s sample size was 423 respondents, including 330 students, 26 heads of schools, 33 guidance counsellors, 33 academic teachers and one City Educational Officer. The study used questionnaires with close and open - ended questions and semi structured interview guides for data collection. Data was analyzed thematically and through the descriptive statistics as well through the hypothesis testing. The study concludes that the academic performance of the students is good; psychosocial GCS have assisted them in providing helpful instruction on psychological and social issues which otherwise would interfere with their academic performance. Furthermore, there is a significant positive relationship between students’ access to psychosocial GCS and their academic performance. The study recommends the establishment of a strong school GCS policy which will oversee the effective implementation of the psychosocial GCS in the schools. It also recommends the employment of supervisory personnel trained in guidance and counselling psychology, who would oversee the assessment of the problems and needs of students. Finally, the study recommends the training of the guidance and counsellor teachers in the field of school guidance and counselling psychology in order to equip them with professionalism for rendering quality services.

On Becoming a Counselling Psychologist: Making Sense of Presence

This reflective essay offers a personal account of my experience during my counselling psychology training. Research highlights that the person of the therapist contributes to clients’ improvement beyond the intervention, advocating the importance of personal development beyond a competency-based model. Consonantly, counselling psychology appreciates how practitioners bring their “self” to the therapeutic relationship, thus valuing their training, wider knowledge, and lived experiences. Accordingly, I will explore significant events that illuminate the personal dimension of my professional practice while also considering the wider empirical knowledge. Furthermore, as the beginning of my training has focused on the person-centered/experiential approach, I will conceptualize my experience within the framework posited by Rogers. Specifically, I will begin by reflecting on the theme of power to expose how personal issues might affect my development as a trainee. Second, I will illustrate how engaging with feedback has brought to awareness aspects of my “self” that relate to the theme of acceptance. Third, I will consider personal strengths that have the potential to enrich my practice and are encapsulated by the theme of lightness. Last, I will suggest the theme of presence as my attempt to make sense of challenges and limitations that I have faced during my training. By presenting these themes, I endeavor to offer a picture of how I have grown into a new place in my development as trainee counselling psychologist.