In the past decade, there has been an increased awareness of the deleterious effects for professionals working in the field of trauma. Claims have been made that professionals working with traumatized clients are vulnerable and at risk of developing trauma symptoms similar to those experienced by their clients. Terms used to describe this phenomenon are “vicarious traumatization” and “secondary traumatic stress.” The results of survey data collected from 280 Canadian mental health professions on work setting and client type variables, personal histories of trauma, current levels of traumatic stress symptoms, and self-report ratings on experiencing secondary traumatic stress are reported. Implications for mental health professionals working in the field of trauma are addressed.

This study examined the effects of instructions and modeling in the reflection-of-feeling training of individuals low in interpersonal-communication skills. Participants with low scores on Carkhuffs Communication Index (25 males and 25 females) were randomly assigned by sex to one of the five training groups so that there were 5 males and 5 females in each group. After viewing videotaped training material, each participant conducted a 15-minute interview with a volunteer "client" and completed the Communication Index a second time. Interviews were scored for frequency of reflection-of-feeling responses and level of empathic communication displayed. Analysis of the reflection-of-feeling data indicated that instructions and instructions-plus-modeling were facilitative procedures. Ratings of written and verbal empathy demonstrated the effectiveness of the two combined conditions: instructions-plus-modeling and modeling-plus-instructions. Calculation of correlations among scores on criterion measures revealed a positive correlation between reflection-of-feeling scores and ratings of empathic communication.

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This study tested a specific training model in ethical decision making. Fifty-nine undergraduate students in counseling, social work, and child and youth care participated and were randomly assigned to 3 groups. A treatment group received a 3-hr ethical decision-making workshop and responded to a case vignette containing ethical dilemmas. Two control groups responded to the vignette without prior workshops: 1 group was aided by brief instructions and workshop handouts; another group, by brief instructions only. Written responses were scored for decision-making quality on the Tymchuk Rating Scale. The treatment group scored significantly higher than did either control group on decision-making quality; there was no significant difference between the scores of the control groups.

Micro‐counseling techniques were used to train 10 beginning graduate students in communicating test results. Training emphasized listening and responding to cues given by the client, brief and concise statements about test‐related information, and relating the information to the client's experiences and needs. Training aids included programmed materials, brief videotapes of positive and negative models, role‐playing, and videotape feedback of the role‐playing and test interpretation sessions. Judges' ratings of trainees in the experimental group were significantly higher than their ratings for the 10 trainees in the control group. Client ratings of counselor effectiveness did not differ significantly for the two groups. Changes in clients' pre‐ and post‐test attitude scores and knowledge scores were statistically significant. An enthusiastic response to the micro‐counseling approach was evident from both inexperienced and experienced graduate students.