Cognitive Techniques as a Means of Facilitating Supervisee Development

1
Cognitive Techniques as a Means of Facilitating
Supervisee Development
2
The Use of Counseling Models in Supervision

• Supervision
• Focus on skills and education?
• Focus on the person of the supervisee?
• Potential hazards of counseling models in
  supervision
• Potential benefits
• Demarcating the line between the practices of
  supervision and personal counseling

3
Supervisee Development and Cognitive Experiences

• Supervisee development
• Characterized by psychological distress including
• Anxiety
• Confusion
• Fluctuating motivation
• These occur during a time when the supervisee is
  developing certain realities about professional
  practices, their clients, and themselves as
  counselors
• Potential Impact of unaddressed psychological
  distress
• Distorted thinking leading to negative impacts on
  professional development

4
The Cognitive Model Illustrated
Core belief
Intermediate belief
Automatic Thought
Situation
Reactions- Emotion, Physical, Behavioral
5
Intermediate Beliefs Working with adaptive
rules, attitudes, and assumptions
Core Belief
Im not good enough
Intermediate belief (rule, attitude, assumption)
(Positive) I need to work very hard (Negative)
Anything less that total success means I am a
failure
Negative adaptive response
Positive adaptive strategy
Work hard at assignments, over-prepare. Leads to
helpful performance anxiety
Become hypercritical, mistakes speak to personal
worth leads to discouragement
6
Common Cognitive Interventions

• Socratic Questioning
• Challenging the rationality and usefulness of
  cognitive distortion
• Generate alternatives
• Using the probable opposite
• Designed to assist in focusing and bringing forth
  thoughts for consideration
• Direct Elicitation
• Designed to explicitly bring forth distortions
  for consideration
• Downward Arrow Technique
• Designed to bring forth distorted intermediate
  beliefs for consideration

7
Phases of Cognitive Intervention In Supervision

• Socialization Phase
• Seek permission
• Explain fundamentals of the cognitive model
• Focus Phase
• Choose specific incident to examine
• Focus on specific cognitive experiences
• Use Socratic questioning to uncover automatic
  thoughts and intermediate beliefs
• Use themes in automatic thoughts, direct inquiry,
  and downward arrow technique to identify
  intermediate beliefs

8
Phases of Application cont.

• Modification Phase
• Use Socratic questioning to explore rationality,
  usefulness, and or accuracy of automatic thoughts
  and intermediate beliefs
• Use Socratic questioning to generate alternatives
  to cognitive distortions
• Solicit commitment from supervisee to utilize new
  knowledge

9
The use of the cognitive model in supervision
10
References

• Beck, J. S. (1995). Cognitive therapy basics and
  beyond. New York Guilford Press.
• Bernard, J. M. (1992). The challenges of
  psycho-therapy based supervision Making the
  pieces fit. Counselor Education and Supervision,
  31, 232-237.
• Bernard J. M. Goodyear, R. K. (2002).
  Fundamentals of clinical supervision. Boston, MA
  Allyn and Bacon.
• Borders, L. D., Fong, M. L. (1994). Cognitions
  of supervisors-in-training An exploratory study.
  Counselor Education and Supervision, 33, 280-293.
  
• Bradely, L. J., Gould, L. J. (2001).
  Psychotherapy-based models of counselor
  supervision. In L. J. Bradely N. Ladany (Eds.),
  Counselor supervision Principles, process and
  practice (3rd ed., pp. 147-180). Philadelphia,
  PA Brunner Routledge.
• Burns, D. D. (1980). Feeling good The new mood
  therapy. New York Signet.
• Dodge, J. (1982). Reducing supervisee anxiety A
  cognitive-behavioral approach. Counselor
• Education and Supervision, 22, 55-60.
• Dinmeyer, D. Jr., Carlson, J. (2006).
  Consultation (3rd ed.). New York, NY Routledge.
• Ellis, A. Grieger, R. (1986). Handbook of
  rationale emotive therapy. New York Springer.
• Fitch, T. J., Marshall, J. L. (2002). Using
  cognitive interventions with counseling practicum
  students during group supervision. Counselor
  Education and Supervision, 41, 335-342.
• Kindsvatter, A., Granello, D. H., Onedera, J.
  D. (in press). Cognitive techniques as a means to
  facilitate supervisee development. Counselor
  Education and Supervision.
• Osborn, C. J., Davis, T. E. (1996). The
  supervision contract Making it perfectly clear.
  The Clinical Supervisor, 14(2) 121-134.
• Overholser, J. C. (1991). The Socratic method as
  a technique in psychotherapy supervision.
  Professional Psychology Research and Practice,
  22, 68-74.
• Overholser, J. C. (1993a). Elements of the
  Socratic method I. Systematic questioning.
  Psychotherapy, 30, 67-74.
• Overholser, J. C. (1993b). Elements of the
  Socratic method II. Inductive reasoning.
  Psychotherapy, 30, 75-85.
• Pearson, Q. M. (2006). Psychotherapy-driven
  supervision Integrating counseling theories into
  role-based supervision. Journal of Metal Health
  Counseling, 28(3), 241-252.