BASIC PRINCIPLES OF

GUIDANCE AND
COUNSELLING
Prepared by:
DR RAFIDAH AGA MOHD JALADIN
Senior Lecturer/Counselling PsychologistDepartment of Educational Psychology &
Counselling
Faculty of Education, University of Malaya
50603 Kuala Lumpur, MALAYSIA
Tel: +603 7967 5035/5058 Email: rafidah_aga@um.edu.my
PERKAMA International Lifetime Member (ASH00159)
Registered Counsellor with Lembaga Kaunselor (KB00196, PA00300)
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 Different Types of Helping Providers

• The people who provide guidance

and counseling services also come
in different types and with
different credentials, licenses,
certifications, educational
experiences, philosophies, ways
of understanding development &
pathology, etc…

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Different Types of Helping Providers
• Psychiatrists
• These providers • Psychologists
include:
• Social workers
• Counsellors

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• Paraprofessionals
• Non-professionals
Guidance & Counseling…
• As people learn about the art & science of the mental health field,
there are terms and definitions that will be helpful. They include:

• Guidance
• Counselling

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• Psychotherapy
What Is Guidance?
• “Guidance is a process of helping people make important
choices that affect their lives, such as choosing a preferred
lifestyle” (Gladding, 2000, pg. 4).

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• Guidance can be seen is such activities as helping a student make
decisions about what courses to take or which vocation to
pursue. It is a relationship between two unequal persons.
What Is Guidance?
• Types of guidance services include:
• Responsive Services (e.g., crisis situation)
• Individual Planning (e.g., educational & career)
• Guidance Curriculum (Large group guidance with a set

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curriculum, usually classroom oriented)
• System Support (Supporting and helping the system run
smoothly—gathering information, providing programming,
assessment, evaluation)
• (Myrick, 1997; Gysbers & Herderson, 1999)
What Is Counseling?
• According to the Counsellors’ Act 1998 (Act 580),
counselling is:
“a systematic process of helping relationship

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based on psychological principles performed by
a registered counsellor in accordance with the
counselling code of ethics to achieve a voluntary
favourable holistic change, development and
adjustment of the client such that the change,
development and adjustment will continue
throughout the lifespan of the client.”
What is Counselling?
• To summarise, counselling is guiding and more..
• Counselling is a relatively short-term relationship,
characterised by an interpersonal relationship
between the counsellor and the counsellee. It is

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theory-based, handled professionally by trained
people, guided by ethical and legal standards that
focus on helping or giving care to people who need
to resolve developmental and situational problems.
• Counselling focuses on making important changes in
one’s thinking, feeling and behaving. It is a more
than guiding because it aggressively promotes
making changes in the counsellee’s life-style.
What Is Psychotherapy?
• Traditionally focuses on serious problems associated with
intrapsychic, internal, and personal issues and conflicts. It
deals with the “recovery of adequacy” (Casey, 1996, p. 175).
• The focus of psychotherapy tends towards:

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• Past more then present
• Insight more than change
• Detachment of the therapist
• Therapist as the expert
What Is Psychotherapy?
• The distinction between “psychotherapy” and
“counseling” has been blurring more and more
recently as more and more “counsellors” move into
the world of clinical mental health and are

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recognized for what they have been doing for
decades. The major traditional differences between
counseling and psychotherapy revolve around:
• Length of time in therapy—psychotherapy tends to last
longer—20-40 sessions, counseling tends to be short-
term—6-8 sessions).

• Counseling tends to happen in outpatient settings.

Psychotherapy tends to take place in both outpatient and
inpatient settings.
 What Is Counseling?
• The definition was written to
try and meet the needs of the
several different types and
styles of counseling practiced
by the members of the ACA.
The elements of the definition
are important to understand.

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What Is Counseling?
• Counseling is a profession.
• requires appropriate training at graduate level, professional
associations, licensure & certification, ethical standards, etc.

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• Counseling deals with wellness, personal growth, career,
empowerment and educational concerns.
• Includes intra- and interpersonal concerns related to school or
college adjustment, mental health, aging, marriage or family
issues, employment, and rehabilitation.
What Is Counseling?
• Counseling is conducted with persons who are considered to
be functioning well and those who are considered “normal”.
• Clients have adjustment, developmental, or situational concerns;
and their problems require short-term intervention.

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What Is Counseling?
• Counseling is theory based.
• The professional counselor works from a theory of counseling
that guides his/her work. It is applied to individuals, groups,
families, and other systems.

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• Counseling is a process that may be developmental or
intervening.
• Counseling is a process in which clients learn how to make
decisions and formulate new ways of behaving, feeling, and
thinking, related to self-determined goals (rather than the goals
of the counselor).
What Is Counseling?
• Counseling includes • School Counseling
various subspecialties. • Community Counseling
• The profession of • Mental Health Counseling
counseling has several • Marriage & Family

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different types of Counseling
practitioners with • Group Counseling
specialized training.
• College Counseling
• They included:
• Rehabilitation Counseling
• Substance Abuse
Counseling
• Gerontological Counseling
• Offender Counseling
 Approaches of Guidance&Counselling

• There are four main approaches of G&C:

• Crisis intervention
• Rehabilitative or corrective

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• Preventive
• Developmental
• Each approach carries different themes that help to identify
what sort of services to be provided and how to allocate time
for it.
• Sometimes one G&C program can have a combination of two
main approaches.
 Functions of Guidance & Counselling

Giving Advice
Instilling Confidence
Two way Communication
Expressing Feelings
Thought Clarification
Orientation

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 Counselling Environment

Counseling is normally done

in a conducive and
harmonious environment
with an open mind towards
understanding counsellee’s
emotional problem .

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Becoming a Counsellor
• How to get started?
What skills should you develop?

• List what you think are the qualities of an effective counselor.

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 The Wrong Reasons to Become a Counselor
• Emotional distress—having
unresolved personal traumas.
• Many people enter • Vicarious Coping—living your lives
the counseling through others.

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profession for reasons • Loneliness and isolation—seeking
that do not make for a friendship through clients.
good counselor. Some • Desire for Power—seeking to
of those reasons control others.
include:
• Need for Love—Seeking love to fill
narcissistic needs.
• Vicarious Rebellion—acting out your
needs through others.
Characteristics of a Counsellor
• Stability of character • Sensitive to oneself
• Harmony with self and the effect you
and others have on others

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• Constancy and • Knowing your own
purposefulness wounds and working
• Flexible to resolve them
• Seeking goodwill for • Energetic
others • Intelligent
Qualities of an Effective Counselor
• Unconditional positive regard (and respect)
• Emphatic understanding
• Warmth and caring

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• Openness/congruence
• Concreteness and specificity
• Communication competence
• Other qualities?
 Becoming a Skilled Professional
• List what you think are the necessary skills to become an effective:
• (a) counselor.
• (b) educator
• Do you detect any similarities or differences?

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 The Helping Process
MODEL CARKHUFF
• ATTENDING • INVOLVEMENT in
to involve processing
• RESPONDING – to • EXPLORING human
facilitate exploring experiences

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• PERSONALIZING • UNDERSTANDING human
understanding goals
• INITIATING action • ACTING upon programs
• FACILITATING FEEDBACK • FEEDBACKING
information
THANK YOU…
Dr Rafidah Aga Mohd Jaladin
Dept of Educational
Psychology & Counselling
Faculty of Education
University of Malaya

rafidah_aga@um.edu.my

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Questions

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