Spirituality has been increasing recognized as an important aspect of client diversity in counseling and psychotherapy. However, little attention has been given to spirituality in counseling supervision in the literature. The purpose of this study is to investigate the perceived effectiveness of a Christian-based spiritually integrated counseling supervision group. An experienced Christian counseling psychologist served as the supervisor and fifteen Christian counselors participated as supervisees. Three-hour group supervision sessions were held one or two times per month for six months. During each group session, one or two supervisees presented their cases, followed by group discussions. Individual semi-structured interviews and focus groups were conducted after the group supervision sessions to investigate supervisees’ perceptions of the effectiveness of the group supervision. Individual interviews and focus groups were recorded, transcribed verbatim, and analyzed using thematic analysis. Eleven themes emerged from the data. Supervisees reported (1) enhanced spiritual perspectives and spiritual intervention competence, (2) enhanced counseling perspectives and counseling intervention competence, (3) clearer viewpoints for integrating spirituality into counseling, (4) enhanced sensitivities to clients’ specific spiritual issues, (5) stronger awareness of the relationship between their own spirituality and counseling work, (6) feelings of competence and effectiveness as spiritually integrated counselors, (7) concerns about the role of spiritually integrated counselors, (8) using spiritually integrated counseling in certain situations and contexts, (9) affirmation of the effectiveness of spiritual interventions, (10) experiencing challenges and confusion as a spiritually integrated counselor, and (11) perceptions of the charactevist: cs of the supervision group. The authors discuss the findings of this study, and offer suggestions for research and practice.
|