Insights From Roleplays With Standardised Patients and Live Supervision for Psychotherapy and Counselling Training—A Qualitative Study

IF 1.2 Q3 PSYCHOLOGY, CLINICAL

Counselling & Psychotherapy Research Pub Date : 2025-04-07 DOI:10.1002/capr.70018

Jule Räuchle, Franziska Kühne, Antonia Zacharias, Greta Große, Florian Weck, Ulrike Maaß

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Background

Live supervision (i.e., providing corrective feedback during therapeutic sessions) as well as roleplays are effective methods used to improve therapeutic skills in counselling and psychotherapy training. Importantly, substantial learning occurs beyond objective skill improvement. For this reason, the aim of the present study was to investigate subjective learning outcomes from roleplays with standardised patients with or without additional live supervision.

Methods

Using a content-structuring qualitative approach, semi-structured interviews with 36 psychology students (91.9% female, M = 26.7 years old, 81.0% bachelor's degree) who had previously participated in a randomised-controlled study comparing two training groups (roleplay, n = 18 vs. roleplay + live supervision, n = 18) were analysed.

Results

The students in the present study reported having learned basic communication and alliance skills, as well as conceptual knowledge. Training groups did not differ substantially in their main learning outcomes, yet the live supervision group uniquely reported learnings regarding summarising, ensuring the patient's understanding, and balancing spontaneity and structuring. The students endorsed live supervision for university teaching, and almost half of them felt that the feedback had a greater impact on their learning outcomes than the roleplays themselves.

Conclusion

Overall, the study highlights that students generated extensive knowledge about basic therapeutic skills from roleplays that were still salient up to 2 weeks later. However, only live supervision helped to put the subjectively acquired knowledge into observable skill improvement, as a comparison with the results of the randomised controlled study shows. Regarding the effectiveness of roleplays alone, it is important to offer students the opportunity for self-reflection between roleplay sessions.

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来源期刊

Counselling & Psychotherapy Research PSYCHOLOGY, CLINICAL-

CiteScore

4.40

自引率

12.50%

发文量

期刊介绍： Counselling and Psychotherapy Research is an innovative international peer-reviewed journal dedicated to linking research with practice. Pluralist in orientation, the journal recognises the value of qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods strategies of inquiry and aims to promote high-quality, ethical research that informs and develops counselling and psychotherapy practice. CPR is a journal of the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy, promoting reflexive research strongly linked to practice. The journal has its own website: www.cprjournal.com. The aim of this site is to further develop links between counselling and psychotherapy research and practice by offering accessible information about both the specific contents of each issue of CPR, as well as wider developments in counselling and psychotherapy research. The aims are to ensure that research remains relevant to practice, and for practice to continue to inform research development.