This article reviews the major concerns of group counseling and differentiates among group guidance, group counseling, and group therapy. It also evaluates the research status of group counseling. Finally, the author presents implications for the future of this approach.

The discharged veteran is accorded, in most cases, the right to further his education for one to four years, if he so desires, with government assistance. Proper vocational and educational counseling of soldiers returning to civilian life is highly important. One type of soldier who especially needs expert guidance if he desires vocational or other training is the soldier who was classified as an illiterate when he was inducted into the Army. If this man is to be tested as part of the guidance procedure, account must be taken of his reading handicap.The universally employed group test may have adequate validity for those who are normally literate, but for those whose literacy is marginal the group test score is not always dependable as a criterion of aptitude. All soldiers, for instance, take the Army General Classification Test. In one study of soldiers processed at this Center for Army illiterates, there was an average increase of approximately twenty points in standard score on the AGCT from their first testing, prior to entry into the Center, until they were tested as graduates some weeks later. It is reasonable to assume that if these men had had somewhat more training in this or a similar center, where twelve weeks was the maximum time they could stay, they would show an even higher average increase in AGCT score.In order to obviate some of the gross effects of illiteracy, as reflected in an aptitude score on a group test, the Personnel Consultants' Section in the Ninth Service Command Special Training Center used the Wechsler Mental Ability Scale, Form B, an individually administered test, as the criterion of verbal aptitude. This test was supplanted by the Army Individual Test in late 1944. Not all the subtests of the Wechsler were given; in fact, if the trainee was English speaking, he was given only four of the verbal subtests, Information, Arithmetic, Comprehension and Similarities. In this shortened form the scale proved to possess adequate validity in a battery of tests for initially selecting those men who * The opinions expressed in this article are the authors' and do not necessarily reflect the official attitude of the Army of the United States.

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