The Relationship Among Wellness, Psychological Distress, and Social Desirability of Entering Master's-Level Counselor Trainees

Counseling students' experiences and interpretations of purpose development

The aim of this study was to explore the lived experiences of counseling students regarding their development of sense of purpose in life and further seek their recommendations for fostering sense of purpose within educational settings. In this study, we have used pragmatism as our research paradigm and Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) as our data analysis approach to gain deeper insights into the phenomenon of purpose development and further use the findings of this study to suggest specific purpose-strengthening educational approaches. Based on the interpretative phenomenological analysis, we identified five themes that revealed purpose development as a non-linear process that involves exploring, engaging with, reflecting upon, articulating, and actualizing one's purpose, and is influenced by both internal and external factors. In light of these findings, we discussed implications for counselor education programs that aspire to cultivate counseling students' sense of purpose in life as an important dimension for their personal wellness, which research has shown could further promote their professional development and career success.

Solution-Focused Wellness: A Randomized Controlled Trial of College Students

Heightened stress levels and compromised well-being are common among college students. Current trends on college campuses include an increase in the number of students experiencing mental health issues and an increase in students seeking help, illustrating a need for evidence-based brief interventions that improve student wellness. This research study used a randomized controlled study design to examine the effects of a short-term (seven-week), solution-focused wellness intervention on perceived stress and wellness of college students. Repeated measures analysis of variance results demonstrated that the effect of group membership across time was significant for both perceived wellness and stress (p < .01). Effect sizes using partial eta2 statistics were large for both outcome variables. Findings indicate that a brief solution-focused wellness intervention can significantly improve perceptions of wellness and reduce stress among college students and is more effective than treatment as usual. Intervention replicability allows for dissemination across varied academic groups and locations, and potential generalization across populations.

Wellness, Exposure to Trauma, and Vicarious Traumatization: A Pilot Study

Due to the increasing number of clients seeking counseling who have experienced trauma, counselors are at a greater risk for developing vicarious traumatization and becoming impaired. Wellness has been described as helpful in managing the effects of working with clients who have experienced trauma and in mitigating impairment. The current pilot study examined how exposure to client trauma experiences impacted counselors' (N = 68) wellness and how exposure to client trauma along with wellness influenced vicarious traumatization. Participants had an average of 12.9 years of experience and a caseload on which most clients reported a trauma history. The expectation that greater exposure to client trauma would influence wellness was not met. However, results indicated that counselors with higher levels of wellness along with exposure to client trauma exhibited significantly lower levels of vicarious traumatization. The pilot study builds awareness of vicarious traumatization and highlights the importance of wellness.

Emotional Intelligence and the Counselor: Examining the Relationship of Trait Emotional Intelligence to Counselor Burnout

Given the intimate and emotional nature of counseling, counselors are often highly susceptible to counselor burnout. Scholars have reported on how important it is for counselors to find strategies that mitigate stressful scenarios and prevent burnout. Emotional intelligence could be a preventative factor. This article describes a correlational investigation that examined the relationship of practicing mental health and marriage and family counselors' (N = 539) emotional intelligence to their degree of burnout. The results from this study indicate that participants' level of emotional intelligence negatively predicted their level of burnout (r = −.62, p &lt; .001; 38% of the variance explained). This article provides a description of our findings, suggestions for future research, and implications for counselors.

Rethinking Social Desirability Scales: From Impression Management to Interpersonally Oriented Self-Control

Social desirability (specifically, impression management) scales are widely used by researchers and practitioners to screen individuals who bias self-reports in a self-favoring manner. These scales also serve to identify individuals at risk for psychological and health problems. The present review explores the evidence with regard to the ability of these scales to achieve these objectives. In the first part of the review, I present six criteria to evaluate impression management scales and conclude that they are unsatisfactory as measures of response style. Next, I explore what individual differences in impression management scores actually do measure. I compare two approaches: a defensiveness approach, which argues that these scales measure defensiveness that stems from vulnerable self-esteem, and an adjustment approach, which suggests that impression management is associated with personal well-being and interpersonal adjustment. Data from a wide variety of fields including social behavior, affect and well-being, health, and job performance tend to favor the adjustment approach. Finally, I argue that scales measuring impression management should be redefined as measures of interpersonally oriented self-control that identify individuals who demonstrate high levels of self-control, especially in social contexts.