Conceptualizations of Novice and Experienced Counselors

We examined the conceptualizations of 23 (11 experienced and 12 novice) counselors, with respect to general counseling process and specific client concerns by means of a two-part conceptual mapping task (CMT). Analyses of the CMT data revealed an interaction effect of counselor experience and generality of conceptual task on the extensiveness of counselor conceptualizations. Experienced counselors displayed slightly more extensive conceptualizations on the general CMT and less extensive conceptualizations on the specific CMT. This interaction effect was interpreted as evidence that experienced counselors possess extensive abstract, general knowledge of counseling that they use to conceptualize specific instances of counseling efficiently and parsimoniously. On the other hand, novice counselors, who lack such abstracted knowledge, engage in more extensive, unique conceptual work for each separate client.