Developing Psychology Students’ Leadership Abilities Through Psychological Counseling

Abstract

Introduction. The today’s strategy of the education system declaratively aims to train specialists with well-developed leadership abilities. In fact, universities graduate very few such specialist, which is especially relevant for psychological education. Leadership abilities, which form the basis for many professionally important qualities of a psychologist, are minimally developed in many students; traditional university-based training of psychologists does not provide their purposeful development. This empirical study is the first to prove that group psychological counseling may increase the level of leadership abilities of psychology students within a relatively short time. Psychological counseling can be integrated into the educational process. Methods. The empirical study involved 50 full-time bachelor-level students studying at the Faculty of Psychology, Irkutsk State University. The research used the following methods: (a) the test method of multi-scale personality inventories; (b) developing, modeling, teaching, and analytical methods of psychological counseling; and (c) methods of nonparametric statistics (Fisher’s angular transformation). Results. Psychological counseling of psychology students resulted in a substantial increase in the level of leadership abilities, in the levels of communicative and organizational skills associated with leadership, and in the levels of leadership qualities (for example, extraversion, lability, and spontaneity). Discussion. Psychological counseling contributes to an increase in the level of future psychologists’ leadership skills. Leadership skills are improved both in terms of leadership qualities and communication skills associated with leadership. Conclusion. The development of leadership abilities of future psychologists by methods of psychological counseling can and should become a part of their professional training. Group counseling sessions aiming at the development of leadership skills may be implemented within specialized elective courses and disciplines that provide the development of personality and leadership (social psychology, psychological counseling, etc.).

Keywords

• leadership
• leadership skills
• leadership competence
• communication skills
• organizational skills
• psychological counseling
• group counseling
• developing methods
• psychology students
• professionally important qualities