This session will provide an overview of a Delphi research study conducted to explore essential topics needed for training school counseling site supervisors. The presenters will explain the current literature regarding school counseling supervisor training, provide an overview of Delphi methodology, and present the essential topics that reached consensus for school counseling site supervisor training. Attendees will be invited to share feedback on the results to inform future training.
Counseling researchers often examine correlated predictors such as depression, anxiety, PTSD, and substance misuse when studying clinical outcomes. Hierarchical regression may obscure relative importance when constructs overlap. This session introduces dominance analysis, a method that clarifies predictor importance across regression models. Participants will learn how dominance analysis improves interpretation of counseling assessment data and informs research and clinical decision-making.
Spirituality is a critical yet under-assessed dimension of client identity, and counselor education lacks consistent approaches for preparing counselors-in-training (CITs) to assess it with cultural responsiveness. This session examines limitations in current assessment practices, identifies training gaps, and offers a structured, ethically grounded approach for integrating spiritually responsive assessment into counselor education and clinical practice.
Suicide remains a significant concern for middle and high school youth, placing school‑based counselors in critical frontline roles. However, training in evidence‑based suicide prevention is inconsistent, and systematic outcome tracking is rare. This methods‑focused session presents implementation‑science–informed strategies for monitoring intervention effectiveness, fidelity, and follow‑up using a scalable digital outcome‑tracking tool.
Psychopathology arises from neurocognitive processes, yet most instruments used in counseling focus only on symptoms. This presentation demonstrates tasks (e.g., Stroop, Wisconsin Card Sort, n-back, RTID) to measure mechanisms like working memory, executive function, and emotional states. With access to pre-conscious states, lessened self-report biases, and sensitivity to earlier change, participants will learn how to enhance assessment batteries and the empirical rationale for doing so.
Despite demands for specialized skills in community crisis settings, counselor training remains inconsistent. This education session presents a stakeholder-informed concept mapping methodology to systematically identify and assess essential crisis competencies. Attendees will explore this research design, learn to develop a focus prompt, and examine how to translate stakeholder data into measurable outcomes for counselor education curricula and clinical supervision.
This session examines researcher bias within Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) and its implications for rigor in counselor education research. Participants will explore how subjectivity functions within hermeneutic inquiry, identify analytic risks such as the “black box” effect, and apply reflexive strategies to enhance transparency, credibility, and methodological coherence in IPA studies.
Predicting safety issues with new clients can feel like fortune telling and often causes clinician anxiety. Hopelessness has long been identified as one of the most prominent warning signs for suicidal thoughts and behaviors, but articulating these feelings can look different to each individual client. The presentation will review approaches to assessing and treating suicidal thoughts and behaviors, and present new findings to inform updated assessment prompts for identifying suicide risk.
This session introduces Positive Childhood Experiences (PCEs), emphasizing their framework, measurement, and significance for counseling research. Attendees will learn why PCEs are needed alongside the field’s strong focus on ACEs in research and practice. Presenters will review key frameworks, measurement approaches and limitations, and the value PCEs add to counseling research, along with recent findings and future directions.
This session presents findings from a quasi-experimental study examining an AI-based simulation and feedback intervention's effectiveness on CITs' broaching attitudes/behaviors and counseling self-efficacy. Results revealed significant broaching improvement (p = .019, d = 0.83) and medium-to-large self-efficacy effects between control and experimental groups. Attendees will explore how AI-supported practice can supplement traditional andragogy to enhance CITs' counseling skills.
While research on intercultural couples has primarily focused on their unique relational challenges, cultural humility emerges as a valuable resource toward relational flourishing. Drawing on two quantitative studies, this session presents theoretically-informed pathways linking cultural humility to relational satisfaction via cultural sharing and self-expansion. Attendees will leave with strategies for supporting intercultural couples in counseling and clinical training contexts.
This presentation delivers practical applications of geographic information systems (GIS) in counseling research and assessment. Using a spatial analysis of Medicare-approved mental health counselors and social determinants of mental health, the presentation shows how GIS can enhance counseling research. Attendees will gain an applied overview of data and technical requirements, as well as strategies for mapping and analyzing geographic patterns to inform research and assessment practices.
