Tele-Counseling Experiences of Counselors during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

This research aimed at understanding counselors’ tele-counseling experience during the COVID-19 pandemic from April to August 2020. This was a qualitative study. A total of 15 participants were selected from counselors in northern, central, and southern Taiwan. Through semi-structured in-depth interviews transcribed verbatim, the data was coded and analyzed based on constructive grounded theory. Three themes emerged and the results are as follows. 1)The process of tele-counseling during the pandemic: preparation for counseling location, informed consent, crisis evaluation and screening before tele-counseling; intervention adjustment of the difference between tele-counseling and the face-to-face counseling, such as the adjustment of counseling skills, applying strategies for enhancing the effect, more emphasis on observation ability, more precise time structure, amplified silence feelings, and fine-tuning of relationship interaction mode. 2) The characteristics of tele-counseling during the pandemic: counseling content was related to the new lifestyle of the pandemic; the pandemic caused the adjustment and diversification of the case volume and source; the pandemic prompted the formation of a mashup of online and offline counseling methods; the pandemic promoted the interactive selection and development of various communication platforms; the counseling effect was constrained by network stability and equipment; there was more emphasis on space privacy and information transmission security; there were doubts and pressure on crisis handling and reporting responsibilities. 3) Attitude and expectation on tele-counseling development: the counselors’ attitude towards tele-counseling was to construct a personal position between positive and hesitant; counselors were expected to establish a professional organization to revise regulations and cultivate talents; counselors were expected to build a technology cross-domain research and development (R&D) and database resource platform; counselors were prepared to meet the challenges of cases from overseas Chinese and foreign countries. Overall, the contribution of this study was to expose the process and characteristics of tele-counseling during the pandemic and to present the current attitudes and expectations of counselors on tele-counseling. In the trend of the developing online counseling into legitimate tele-counseling, this study highlighted the value and importance of tele-counseling, and provided prospective reflections on the development of tele-counseling.

Keywords

• counseling service
• covid-19
• tele-counseling