Perceptions of Counselor Education Students Regarding their Reactions to Client Suicide

The purpose of this study was to measure the differences in perceptions regarding the vignette of a client suicide between master's level counseling students in their first year of coursework and students getting ready to graduate. The participants (N=75) were asked to read a vignette depicting a client suicide and complete the Jones Clinician Suicide Survivor Survey--Adapted. No significant differences were found between the two groups. Based on the results of the analyses, students who are getting ready to graduate show no differences in how they perceive they would react to a client suicide than do students in their first year of coursework. There were no interaction effects with gender or experience of suicide by a family member, friend, acquaintance, or client. Participation in a counselor education training program did not appear to have affected students' perceptions of how they think they would react to a client suicide. This indicates that students getting ready to graduate have the same perceptions regarding how they would react to a client suicide and how a client suicide might affect them personally or professionally as do students just beginning the counseling program. Based on the results, this study appears consistent with findings in the literature and suggests that mental health professionals are unaware of the extent of the personal and professional reactions they may experience after having a client complete suicide and that training programs are not addressing the topic adequately. A discussion linking the current study to extant research, implications for practice, and suggestions for future research is provided.

Name thesis:degree_name

PhD

Level thesis:degree_level

Immediate Access

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Counselor Education and Supervision (ExCES)

Year dc:date.available

2010

Author dc:creator

• Anderson, Renée

Contributors dc:contributor

• Joseph Maola
• William Casile
• Richard Hoffman

• Counselor education
• Suicide
• Supervision
• Training programs

Language dc:language

English

Repository record dc:identifier

https://dsc.duq.edu/etd/258

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dsc.duq.edu:etd-1262