You must compare the first client in the first paper to the second client used for this paper. The client profile for this paper is as follows:
Client Information and Client History
Client Name: Anita K (client name changed to maintain client confidentiality).
Client’s age: 21 years old.
Race or ethnicity: Black/ African American.
Cultural background: The client has connections to both Nigeria and the United States, a multicultural background likely influenced by Nigerian and North American cultures.
Gender Identity: Female.
Educational background: Third-year university student studying Psychology, currently working as a Sales Associate.
Family history and current living situation: Client currently lives with both parents and her younger brother.
Family history: Born in Houston, Texas, faced immigration and financial issues. The client has a complicated dynamic with her parents, particularly describing a loving relationship with the father but critical behaviors from a mother with narcissistic tendencies. When the client was younger the client was left in Nigeria to attend boarding school having never been to Nigeria. This has caused the client to have abandonment issues and mistrust with her parents.
Previous mental health or medical diagnosis by a mental health or medical professional: No formal diagnosis.
Legal Issues: None
Previous counseling experience: No previous counseling experience mentioned.
Socioeconomic status: Lower-middle class, indicated by the financial issues mentioned in a few sessions and current living situation.
Any other information that may be pertinent: at the age of 10, when she was sent to live with an estranged family in Nigeria for two years while her parents returned to the United States. This separation caused deep feelings of abandonment and led to a fundamental mistrust of others. During this period, the client also endured various forms of abuse. Upon returning to the United States, she experienced resentment towards her younger brother, who was born during her absence, impacting their relationship since then.
Client’s Presenting Issues and Concerns
The client is navigating her first serious relationship, which has brought to light negative aspects of her personality and exacerbated attachment style issues rooted in childhood trauma. She struggles with verbal communication during conflicts, often resorting to texting, which creates tension with her partner. Her avoidance attachment style complicates direct conflict resolution. Additionally, the client is grappling with emotional turmoil stemming from her upbringing, marked by verbal and physical abuse, and pressures related to appearance and societal expectations. These challenges manifest in struggles with self-esteem, anxiety, and self-image. The client’s family dynamics are complex; she has a loving but critical mother with narcissistic tendencies, while maintaining a good relationship with her father. There is also lingering resentment towards her younger brother, influencing their family dynamics. Overall, the client’s current issues with attachment style reflect disrupted relationships with her parents, significantly impacting her interpersonal dynamics and emotional well-being. In comparison with the previous subject of Venny who also had issues with regards to his attachment style which was avoidant as well. These two in comparison highlight the impact of disrupted relationship between parent and client and the attachment style it creates.
ASSIGNMENT INSTRUCTIONS:
Introduction
Write a brief introductory paragraph that prepares the reader by identifying the purpose of the paper and providing the organization of the paper (i.e., the topical headings identify the topics that will be discussed throughout the paper). This section should be no longer than one paragraph in length.
Client Information and Client History
Select a different client with whom you have been providing counselling during Practicum and have been using the same major counselling theory to provide a foundation for counselling that was identified and discussed in your PSYC 7113 Case Conceptualization & Literature Review assignment.
Describe the client’s history. Protect the confidentiality of the client by changing any client identifiers to maintain client confidentiality. Do not copy and paste information contained in the client’s case file at the practicum site. The description of the client’s information and history should be no longer than two paragraphs in length. In your own words, include the following areas of information:
Client’s age.
Race or ethnicity.
Cultural background.
Gender identity.
Educational background.
Family history and current living situation.
Previous mental health or medical diagnosis by a mental health or medical professional.
Identify any currently prescribed medications and their dosage.
Identify any previous formal assessments, including the date administered.
Socioeconomic status.
Client’s Presenting Issues and Concerns
Briefly describe the client’s presenting issues and concerns that the client has stated has brought him/her/they/them to counselling at this time. All symptoms are to be clearly identified and organized. Describe your understanding of the main issues and concerns using clear and concise terminology. The client’s presenting concerns and issues may be similar or different from the client that was conceptualized in your Case Conceptualization and Literature Review assignment completed during 7113 trimester. This section should be no more than one paragraph containing no more than 4 sentences.
Theoretical Foundation
Provide an understanding of a variety of approaches and theories related to the client and clinical issues. Identify and describe one selected counselling theory (such as Psychodynamic, Cognitive-Behavioral Theory, Humanistic, etc.) that provides the theoretical foundation for the treatment plan for counselling the client. Summarize the rationale for the selected counselling theory, incorporating the theory’s philosophy and constructs that will provide the foundation in the construction of the treatment plan for the client (to be addressed later in the paper).
Depending on the theoretical orientation, include varied ways to understand the health and well-being of the client, including but not limited to such factors as: medical/health matters or diagnosis, critical events, relationships, work/school, spirituality, psychometric testing, meaningful activities, and capacity in daily living.
Consider incorporating some of the following points that facilitated your decision-making process to select the counselling theory for your client:
What population/problem was the theory created to address? What are the underlying philosophies?
What propositions/ideas are at the foundation of the theory?
How does the theory describe a person’s distress?
How does the theory describe how a person moves from psychopathology to health?
What does the counsellor hope to accomplish with their work using this theoretical approach?
How does the counsellor facilitate the client’s movement toward psychological health?
Given the theory you have described, how do you, as the counsellor understand the client’s distress?
Topical Literature Review
Engage in a literature review that supports and provides a rationale for selecting one counselling theoretical orientation. The literature review must be specific to the client’s presenting concerns, culture, and fit for the client. For example, what does the literature state about the most effective types of counselling approaches used with clients who are similar in background and present issues similar to your selected client? Prediction of client change will be considered through the lens of research evidence specific to the client.
Support the discussion with empirical or professional literature.
Assessment
Identify and describe the processes used to complete a comprehensive assessment of the client. Discuss how the assessments were selected (rationale) and how the client’s cultural background was considered in the selection of assessment instruments. If formal testing was conducted, provide the name(s) of any formal tests that were administered with dates, results, recommendations, and relevance of those assessment tools. If informal tools were used to gather client information, clearly identify the informal tools (e.g., review of records, interviews, observations, etc.). Support the discussion with empirical or professional literature. This section should no more than one paragraph in length.
Treatment Plan
In this section, students will present and describe the formulation of this client’s treatment plan to address the client’s presenting issues and concerns? Include a brief description of how the treatment goals were discussed with the client.
Identify and describe the structure of the client’s treatment plan. Explain how the components of the treatment plan align with the theoretical foundation (i.e., the same major counselling theory).
Identify 1-2 long term goals for this client. What makes these goals feasible and sufficient to address the client’s presenting issues and concerns, from the framework of the one selected counselling theory? Support the discussion with empirical or professional literature.
This section should be no more than 3 paragraphs in length.
Interventions
Identify 1 intervention for each long-term goal (no more than 2 long term goals) identified in the previous section, and how the interventions align with the selected counselling theory and the long-term treatment goals. How are these interventions appropriate and specific to the client, at this time? Provide empirical or professional literature support for the selection of the interventions. Support the discussion with empirical or professional literature. This section should be no more than 2 paragraphs in length.
Ethical Considerations
Identify potential ethical issues that may arise in your work with the client at your practicum site. Include in this section how personal beliefs may contribute to an ethical issue, e.g., abortion. Describe the ethical implications of these issues. Identify and apply ethical perspectives/concepts and to address them, making connections with professional codes of ethics with literature support. Refer to the specific regulations and ethical standards in your discussion. Support the discussion with empirical or professional literature. This section should be no more than 1-2 paragraphs in length.
Cultural Sensitivity and Implications
Describe the complexity of the client’s culture in relation to its history, values, communication styles, community interaction, and beliefs and practices. Provide evidence of adjustment in your own attitudes and beliefs because of working within and learning from the diversity of communities and cultures. Assess the impact of assumptions, judgments, and/or biases related to other cultures. Describe how you incorporate diverse and multiple perspectives when working with others. Support the discussion with empirical or professional literature.
Provide an analysis of any cultural implications (positive and negative) of using the same counselling theory for both clients. Describe any differences in the life experiences of the client that may have influenced the theory’s effectiveness in addressing the client’s presenting concerns. Support the discussion with empirical or professional literature.
Comparative Analysis of Theory
In this section, engage in a comparison analysis of the use of the same major counselling theory selected for the client discussed in your 7113 Case Conceptualization & Literature Review assignment and for the client described in this 7203 Capstone Paper. In your analysis, address the following topics:
Analyze the therapeutic relationship between you and each client. Did use of the same counselling theory impact the therapeutic relationship? If yes, provide a description of the relationship factors that enhanced the therapeutic alliance, with at least one example. If the therapeutic relationship experienced a rupture, provide a description of the relationship factors that had a negative impact, with at least one example. Support the discussion with empirical or professional literature.
Provide an analysis of the effectiveness of the one major counselling theory’s assumptions, principles, or foundational beliefs in application to each client’s presenting concerns. Was the theory effective in addressing each client’s concerns? If yes, provide a description with at least one example. If not, discuss potential reasons for the differences in effectiveness. Support the discussion with empirical or professional literature.
Provide an analysis of the effectiveness of the one major counselling theory’s goals and interventions in addressing each client’s presenting concerns. Was the theory effective for both clients? If so, provide examples of how the theory was effective for both clients, i.e., client made progress and/or achieved counselling goals. If not effective, describe and provide examples of the theory’s limitations for the client to achieve progress and/or achieve counselling goals. Support the discussion with empirical or professional literature.
Self-Reflection
Here is an overview of how this case and its process affected you as the practitioner—identification of strengths, challenges, and plans on how to address your observations.
Assignment Requirements:
Type and Type Font: Times New Roman, 12 pt. font size.
Length of Paper: 15-20 double-spaced typed pages, not including the title and references page. Do not exceed the maximum page count.
APA formatting: No table of contents; no abstract. Format the paper in the most current APA style, APA 7th edition. Please use headings throughout your paper that are consistent with the assignment’s grading rubric (that way you ensure adequately addressing all required areas).
