The Role of Values and Ethics on Counseling

ROLE OF ETHICS AND VALUES IN COUNSELING
Role of Ethics and Values on Counseling
Name of Student
Name of University
Author Note

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Assignment 1
Personal values and beliefs are important for every individual. Everyone has certain values that
they imbibe from an early age either from their families or from their teachers. Beliefs are
thoughts or possibilities that one can base their thinking on such as certainties or probabilities or
matters dealing with faith. A belief usually originates from different sources like a person’s own
experience, the cultural or societal norms that they have grown up with like religion or caste or
from the opinions of others. Values are generally long lasting beliefs and are things that the
person has believes to be the right way to act. A belief usually develops into value when a
person’s commitment to the belief increases.
When a person chooses to work in a profession which involves continuous interaction
with a client, the individual should make sure that they do not impose their values and beliefs on
the clients (Steg et al., 2014). The values and the beliefs that the person holds could be of prime
importance to the people who believe in them, but that does not imply that everyone else around
them will also have to believe in the same things as them. In professions like social work,
counseling, psychology, the counselors and social workers have to be extra careful to not impose
their values on them. If a patient or a client believes in abortion and the counselor does not. Both
of them values and beliefs are valid, what each of them believes is unique to them and without
judging which one of them is wrong or which is right, the counselor should remember that the
client has come in for help and is at a vulnerable position, the counselor might not like the things
that the client believes in but it is not for him/her to prioritize their feelings. He/she should only
talk about the clients feeling and emphasize on that (Personal beliefs, 2019). The client is the one
who is at a vulnerable position in their life so judging them or imposing any kind of values in

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them would be an unethical thing to do. One of the most important rules of counseling is that the
counselor has to be unbiased. Any kind of biasness will harm the process of counseling and the
counselor will be violating the code of ethics.
Generally during a counseling session, the counselor and the client, only speak about the
difficulties of the clients and the factors that are posing a problem for the client (“Putting
clients”, 2019). The whole experience of counseling is focused to make the life of the client
better; it is not about the values and beliefs of the counselor. If in case the counselor disagrees
with a certain value of the client he/she should keep it themselves. For example, in case of the
issue of abortion, if a certain client is pro-abortion and the counselor is not, the counselor should
keep his beliefs to themselves. Such a difference of opinion will alter the process of counseling
altogether. The client might talk about his/her decision and why he/she supports it and the
counselor might retaliate, this would immediately affect the counseling process. There would be
an argument and it might change the atmosphere and process of counseling. The client who is
already agitated will become even more agitated and this will adversely harm the mental health
of the client. The client goes to a counselor for help and if the counselor starts talking about his
or her personal opinion it will completely ruin the process and will not give the desired outcome.
Counselors should be aware of the knowledge and skills they possess and the
responsibility that comes along with the job. They should also be careful of the fact that any
personal matters or issues should not affect the service that the counselor is providing. Every
counselor has certain mechanisms that they have developed for analyzing their actions, beliefs
and thoughts. Reflective counseling practice is being mindful of the actions that the counselor is
taking (Elliott, 2013). Reflective counselors are quite aware of their own actions and limitations
(Malikiosi-Loizos, 2013). They conduct their counseling session with proper knowledge and are

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clear about the intention. There are processes that contribute to reflective practices of counseling,
these include: evaluating one’s own performance, developing some self-awareness, monitoring
potential so that burnout can be avoided and finally making sure that the person is investing in
self-care (Pieterse, Lee, Ritmeester, & Collins, 2013). Reflective practice of counseling enables
the professional to form a concrete idea of their strengths and weaknesses and the things that
they should avoid during to talking to client. As a practitioner the counselor while taking to a
client who has a different view of the world than them, they should make sure to draw the line
where they think that the client’s beliefs will come in conflict with theirs. Self-reflection will the
counselor learn about the areas on which talking is a little difficult. Methods of self-reflections
could be maintaining a neutral position and asking for help when one needs it.
The strategy of maintaining a neutral position is a very useful counseling strategy (Bond,
2015). It is important to make the client feel like that the counselor is sharing the same values as
the client, it makes them feel accepted. The counselor might not share their value but they should
make the client feel like they do. The counselor has to maintain a neutral attitude whatever the
counselor feels, they should not openly express it. Although it might not seem realistic, the
neutral attitude can help with keeping the values of the individual in check. This means that the
counselor just has to listen to the client without judgment and acknowledge everything that the
client says. The second self-reflective strategy is to seek help whenever needed. The counselor
might need help once in a while, even the most professional ones need clinical supervision
(Kocet, & Herlihy, 2014). Whenever the counselor has to deal with difficult clients, the
counselor might feel like that they need to talk to someone professional. Supervision helps
develop awareness especially when the counselor fails to understand where the problem lies.

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This essay concludes that the beliefs and the values that the counselors have should not
come in the way of patient care. Self-reflective strategies help in keeping the personal values in
check and stop them to interfering with the work that they do as counselors. The few ways to
practice the self-reflective method is marinating an unbiased position and seeking help whenever
required. Every counselor needs to maintain a neutral position and make that the client feels
needed and finally every professional should seek help when needed.

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Reference
Bond, T. (2015). Standards and ethics for counselling in action. Sage.
ct.counseling.org. (2019). Putting clients ahead of personal values - Counseling Today.
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Elliott, G. (2013). When Values and Ethics Conflict:TheCounselor’sRoleand
Responsibility.Files.eric.ed.gov.
Kocet, M. M., & Herlihy, B. J. (2014). Addressing value
‐based conflicts within the counseling
relationship: A decision
‐making model. Journal of Counseling & Development, 92(2),
180-186.
Malikiosi-Loizos, M. (2013). Personal therapy for future therapists: Reflections on a still
debated issue.
Pieterse, A. L., Lee, M., Ritmeester, A., & Collins, N. M. (2013). Towards a model of self-
awareness development for counselling and psychotherapy training. Counselling
Psychology Quarterly, 26(2), 190-207.
Steg, L., Bolderdijk, J. W., Keizer, K., & Perlaviciute, G. (2014). An integrated framework for
encouraging pro-environmental behaviour: The role of values, situational factors and
goals. Journal of Environmental psychology, 38, 104-115.
www.iaa.govt.nz. (2019). Personal beliefs, values, attitudes and behaviour - Immigration
Advisers Authority Your tagline here. Immigration Advisers Authority.