COUNSELING SKILLS MASTERY AND SEX-ROLE ORIENTATION (THERAPY, FACILITATIVE CONDITIONS)
Abstract
The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between counselors' sex-role orientations and their use and mastery of Stage I and Stage II counseling skills. Hypotheses were derived from literature and research involving counseling skills training as well as that of sex-role. Bem Sex-Role Inventory (1981 Short form) was employed to assess sex-role orientation. Egan's (1982) Skilled Helper model and Carkhuff's (1969) Scales for the Assessment of Interpersonal Functioning were employed to analyze use and mastery of Stage I and Stage II counseling skills. Forty-four graduate students from three urban universities comprised the sample and consisted of 12 masculine-oriented, 11 feminine-oriented and 21 androgynous-oriented counselors. All subjects had been exposed to equivalent training in skill usage. It was hypothesized that sex-role orientation would have an effect on use and mastery of Stage I and Stage II skills. Means, standard deviations, chi squares, and analyses of variance were employed to analyze the data. Results indicated that although there appeared to be a relationship between sex-role orientation and counselors' actual responses, this finding resulted from a disproportionate use of Stage I versus Stage II skills as well as disproportionate membership in the sex-role categories. Additional analyses revealed that the findings were not significant. Conceptual and methodological issues were discussed to integrate present findings with previous findings in counseling skills training and sex-role literature. Conclusions drawn from past research, and present findings included the questionableness of the use of the dispositional construct sex-role orientation on verbal counseling behavior, and the independence of stage specific counseling skills. Recommendations for future research included different forms of skill assessment as well as additional measures of counselors' theoretical orientations.
Subject Area
Academic guidance counseling
Recommended Citation
PATTERSON, MARGARET DUFFY, "COUNSELING SKILLS MASTERY AND SEX-ROLE ORIENTATION (THERAPY, FACILITATIVE CONDITIONS)" (1985). ETD Collection for Fordham University. AAI8508125.
https://research.library.fordham.edu/dissertations/AAI8508125
