Ummikhaira Sofea Binti Ja’afar | 22030396 | KMC6043 | Assignment 1: Book Review

Chapter 17: Interventions for Thinking (2) 290 - 309

This chapter discussed interventions for thinking with 5 learning outcomes and provides a
guidance for the counsellor trainee / practitioner to understand that interventions for thinking
include creating explanations, creating expectations, creating realistic goals, creating realistic
decisions, and managing problems and altering problematic skills. This would help the
counsellor trainee / practitioner to assist their clients to have better views on their lives in the
counselling sessions.

1. Interventions for Creating Explanation.

In this section, the author discussed on creating explanation that – everyone makes decisions,
and those decisions always have costs and its repercussions. Within the constraints of reality,
we can learn to develop our skills such that our decisions benefit us rather than harm us. In
counselling sessions, the counsellor frequently works with the clients indirectly rather than
directly to help them understand their full level of existential responsibility. It is important to
remind clients that their choices have directly influenced their lives. They might need
assistance in discovering that they have control over not only their actions but also their
thoughts and feelings.
Clients should become more conscious of how their language choices may also limit or
create more options. While conducting the counselling session, using active language to
describe feelings is helpful. Clients who use active language are more likely to recognise that
they are in control of their emotions and to accept the responsibility for controlling them.
Additionally, it's crucial to help clients recognise the effects of the defences they employ, such
as "security operations" or "defensive processes." Due to the fact that these defences help
clients coping with their anxiety and may shield extremely sensitive regions, it takes skill and
caution to work with clients to investigate and reduce their use of defences.
Frequently, the clients' description of the cause makes the half-truths into entire truths.
Using the STC framework, clients should fully understand the connections between thoughts,
feelings, physical responses, communications, and actions. The STC framework offers the
starting point for comprehending the connection between what happens to a person and how
they behave. It aids clients in recognising both explanatory errors and their detrimental effects.
Clients should describe causes in more realistic terms. Counsellor can help clients to have
realistic explanation by:
• Examine the evidence for the explanations and check how it fits the facts

Nelson-Jones, R. (2005). Practical counselling and helping skills (5th ed.). Sage Publications Ltd.
Ummikhaira Sofea Binti Ja’afar | 22030396 | KMC6043 | Assignment 1: Book Review

• Dispute explanations and restate them into more realistic ones

• Conduct behavioural experiments, changing their actions in line with altered
explanations
• Provide new information that challenges existing explanations.

This section brilliantly discussed before the counsellor guides the clients to restructure their
thoughts they have to know and understand on how to create explanation for the issues the
clients present in the counselling session. The examples provided in this section help the
counsellor to recognize the best strategy for the explanatory errors from the clients.

2. Interventions for Creating Expectations

This section discussed on how to create expectations in the way the client is aware of the
consequences. Clients have to be aware first, the styles of creating expectations of risk and
reward.

The author explained in this section how a client can create their own pessimism by being
persistent with their own incorrect explanations based on what they have experienced. Linking
the explanation and expectations can help the clients aware of how they think for certain
situation.

The author explained the two-column

technique that can be useful for clients to
recognize the risks and rewards in specific
situations

Nelson-Jones, R. (2005). Practical counselling and helping skills (5th ed.). Sage Publications Ltd.
Ummikhaira Sofea Binti Ja’afar | 22030396 | KMC6043 | Assignment 1: Book Review

The author provides some interventions and examples to help the counsellor trainee to guide
the clients creating better expectations in this section.

3. Interventions for Realistic Goals

This section discussed about creating realistic goals as a part of intervention for thinking. This
section helps the counsellor trainee to identify the best ways to guide the client setting realistic
goals. Setting goals are important to let the clients get a better picture of what they are working
towards and what is expected of them. The author provides good explanations how the
counsellor trainee can guide the client to create a realistic goal and avoid the goal-setting errors.
The goal-setting errors involve goals that unrealistically high or low and setting the goals based
on how others think they should be rather than on their own valuing process. The author
presented how to state realistic goals and the criteria for effective goals clearly in this section
that can serve as a guidance for both counsellor trainee and client to evaluate the client’s goals.
The criteria for effective goals are:

Once goals are stated, counsellor trainees may

need to work together with the clients to
identify ways to achieve those goals. Setting
the sub-goals can provide incentives for
actions and when attained, produce
confidence to persist.

Nelson-Jones, R. (2005). Practical counselling and helping skills (5th ed.). Sage Publications Ltd.
Ummikhaira Sofea Binti Ja’afar | 22030396 | KMC6043 | Assignment 1: Book Review

4. Interventions for Realistic Decisions

The basic goal of all counselling interventions is to guide clients toward better decisions. To
help clients make better decisions and, more importantly, to improve their own decision-
making abilities, the counsellor trainees can benefit from this section discussed by the author.
Realistic decision-making was covered in this part, along with decision-making styles.

Clients have different decision-making styles that may be helpful or harmful. They may
make different decisions in different ways, and their styles may alter when making decisions
in conjunction with other people. The author stated eight styles of decision-making which are:

The author discussed styles of joint decision-making because many clients are in situations
where they have differences and potential conflicts of interest with others. The styles of joint
decision-making are:

Nelson-Jones, R. (2005). Practical counselling and helping skills (5th ed.). Sage Publications Ltd.
Ummikhaira Sofea Binti Ja’afar | 22030396 | KMC6043 | Assignment 1: Book Review

• Competitive – “I win – You Lose”

• Collusive – “You win – I lose”
• Cooperation – “Win – Win”
The author discussed how to develop realistic decision-making. Some clients require assistance
in learning to make decisions systematically. The author provided the seven-step framework
for realistic decision-making within the context of two stages: i. Confronting and making
decision; ii. Implementing and evaluating the decision. This framework is practical for the
trainees to assist the clients’ making decisions in the intervention for thinking.

Stage 1: Confronting and

making decision

Stage 2: Implementing and

evaluating the decision

5. Managing Problem and Altering Problematic Skills

This section's emphasis is on teaching clients how to control their ideas, feelings, behaviours,
and circumstances. The model presented in this section, which can be simplified to CASIE,
can be used to manage potential future issues and problematic skills that can be applied
for client to self-help.

Nelson-Jones, R. (2005). Practical counselling and helping skills (5th ed.). Sage Publications Ltd.