Problem. The importance of nonverbal communication in the therapeutic communicative interaction between counselor and client is undeniable. Yet, clinical training programs have traditionally been remiss in systematically teaching this vital area of therapeutic interaction. The problem, therefore, was to begin the process of constructing and evaluating a systematic nonverbal skill training program for counselors by administering and assessing a nonverbal skill training program for beginning counselors. / The study hypothesized that beginning counselors receiving the nonverbal skill training program would demonstrate, in a simulated counseling session, significantly more open body postures, more attending body positions, less eye contact breaks, and less self-manipulative hand gestures than would beginning counselors not receiving the nonverbal training program. The study also hypothesized that beginning counselors receiving the training program would discriminate, in a videotaped posttest designed by this experimenter, congruent from incongruent verbal/nonverbal client messages significantly more accurately than beginning counselors not receiving the training program. / Procedures. To test the hypotheses of the study, a control group posttest-only was employed. The subjects were the beginning master's level counselor trainees (N = 27) enrolled in the two sections of first quarter prepracticum. Section 01 (N = 17) comprised the experimental treatment group and section 02 (N = 10) comprised the control group. / Results. Mann-Whitney U tests showed that the experimental treatment group exhibited significantly more (p < .05) open body postures and significantly fewer (p < .001) self-manipulative hand gestures than the control group. Although the experimental group exhibited fewer (p < .10) eye contact breaks than the control group, this difference did not meet (alpha) = .05. No differences were found between the two groups with respect to body position. The experimental treatment group distinguished congruent from incongruent verbal/nonverbal client messages significantly (p < .025) more accurately than did the control group. / Conclusions. It was concluded that the training program is capable of teaching beginning counselors two basic nonverbal counseling skills. These two skills are: (1)the ability to demonstrate specific nonverbal behaviors that can convey the facilitative conditions of counseling, and (2)the ability to discriminate incongruent verbal/nonverbal client messages. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 42-03, Section: A, page: 1008. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1981.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_74421 |
| Contributors | GROTGEN, JOHN FREDERICK, JR., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 277 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
Page generated in 0.0026 seconds