This education-related study explored the effect of hope theory being integrated into the teaching of group counseling courses on leadership abilities in group counseling and learning motivation for students at the bachelor’s level. The study involved 64 participants who were junior college students from two classes in the Department of Guidance and Counseling at an institution in Taiwan. Three elements of hope theory, namely goals, pathway thinking, and agency thinking, were integrated into the teaching process and the teacher’s instructional attitude, and the content of the group counseling curriculum was structured to impart group leadership skills to students. Furthermore, a curriculum design and arrangements that promote students’ involvement in learning were applied to help them learn effectively. Before and after the students undertook the group counseling course, the Group Counseling Leadership Scale and the Chinese Domain-Specific Life Goal Scale–Academic were utilized as measurement tools to discern the effects of the group counseling course. After course grades were assigned, the students were invited to complete the open questionnaire and participate in focus group interviews. The data from the questionnaire and interview served as the basis for the qualitative analysis in this study.

Through phenomenological content analysis, the data were clustered into three themes: the positive effects of the integration of hope theory into teaching strategies on learners, the key elements that impacted learners’ sense of hope in academic learning, and the benefits of hope theory being integrated into the group counseling curriculum for effective learning of group leadership. In the first theme, the positive effects of the integration of hope theory into teaching strategies on learners were grouped into two subthemes. The first subtheme was regarding the teaching strategy that involved providing clear learning goals in assignments such as group planning and presentations. This can encourage learners to adopt various learning strategies, such as reading, researching, consulting senior graders, reviewing prior learning materials, and discussing with peers. To prepare group presentations, the students thus become self-motivated to understand group counseling theories and acquire pre-group preparatory skills in depth. Peer work itself also promoted learners’ active involvement and reciprocal learning in the process. For the second subtheme, in the teaching strategies of the hope theory integrated into the curriculum, especially with weekly hope-theory-based worksheets, learners could set goals, plan their learning, and seek methods to help them implement the learning and achieve their goals. The respondents of the interview and questionnaire stated that both the learning direction and guidance in the weekly worksheet provided reference and learning opportunities on the basis of which learners could set concrete goals. This is especially beneficial for learners who want to learn but have difficulties finding an orientation. However, learners have vacillating evaluation of their goals and confidence to achieve them. A few learners may value the implementation of practical actions and the simultaneous output of the results. They then engage in a certain degree of self-judgement by, for example, being judgmental for not working sufficiently hard in their evaluation, which may influence their agency thinking. Overall, the respondents stated that they were guided to establish effective learning habits and that they would like to continue those habits.

In the second theme, the learners’ sense of hope in academic learning was influenced by various personal factors such as personal goals, past learning experience, and habits. Notably, both the teaching strategies and instructional attitudes of the teacher with hope theory integrated into the curriculum had positive influences on learning experience, learning motivation, and confidence in learning. The data in the second theme were grouped into two subthemes. In the first subtheme, under the studentcentered teaching principle, the teacher constantly seeks methods to motivate and encourage students to learn effectively. For example, the introduction of vacillating to hope theory and the weekly hope-theory-based worksheet was arranged to guide and encourage learners to apply concepts of hope theory in their learning throughout the course. The respondents shared positive feedback on having confidence in learning especially after actually accomplishing their goals. The second subtheme entailed the instructor giving positive and constructive feedback to the students. The respondents stated that the teacher recognized and highlighted the learners’ strengths; they further strengthened the learners’ theoretical foundation and its application through nonjudgmental feedback about learners’ presentations. The instructor’s constructive feedback inspired positive feelings and experience among the learners, who were more willing to accept feedback provided in a positive spirit. As such, the instructor could motivate students to expand pathway thinking and enhance their agency thinking.

The third theme concerned the benefits of hope theory being integrated into the group counseling curriculum for effective learning in group leadership. To integrate the hope theory into the curriculum, the teacher created the content for group counseling on the basis of the group leadership capabilities that the learners should possess, including psychological and behavioral characteristics of group leaders, professional ethical behaviors of group counseling, pre-group preparatory skills for group conduct, and leadership skills. The responses from the learners indicated that a well-planned curriculum requires substantial effort by the learners. The teacher also requires considerable learning input from students. However, when learners understand that both the plans and requirements set by the teacher are reasonable, their levels of agency in learning increase and their academic performance also improves. In addition, learners are motivated and encouraged by the teacher’s genuine constructive feedback. The teacher’s diligent attitude and teaching by example and precept evidently play the role of demonstration, thereby piquing the interest of the learners and motivating them to learn. The statistical results indicated that after the hope theory was integrated into the group counseling curriculum, the overall group leadership abilities improved, especially in terms of the psychological and behavioral characteristics of group leaders, theoretical foundation, pre-group preparatory skills, leadership skills in group process, and professional ethical behaviors of group counseling; among these, the improvement in theoretical foundation was most significant. The average score of hope in academics increased after the courses were completed but was not significantly different from that before the courses. However, higher hope of students was positively correlated with superior leadership in group counseling. The qualitative analysis in this study revealed the meanings, effects, and feasibility of group counseling teaching being integrated with hope theory.

The present study on the effect of integrating hope theory into the teaching of group counseling courses suggests that a follow-up curriculum could adopt the method of cooperative learning based on the learning methods of mutual assistance, support, discussion, and motivation among peers to achieve learning goals, thereby enhancing the sense of hope in academic learning, the motivation for active learning, and the effects of learning.

Because this study did not involve a control group, the causal relationship between learning effectiveness and the integration of the hope theory into the teaching strategy could not be determined. The results can be used only for reference for the improvement of teaching design and implementation methods. Therefore, future studies should adopt experimental methods or adopt research designs similar to countermeasures to obtain more results on the cause and effect of learning effectiveness.

Given the possible delay effect of the research on the sense of hope, future studies can increase the number of questions in the tracking questionnaire to explore whether learning is more effectively internalized after a period of digestion after the course, which may thereby increase the hope score.