primary school-based counselling: is it associated with reductions in psychological distress? mick...
TRANSCRIPT
Primary school-based counselling:
Is it associated with reductions in psychological
distress?
Mick CooperProfessor of Counselling
How do we know if primary school-based counselling is
associated with reductions in psychological distress?
Can ask children/parents /teachers to rate child’s levels of psychological
distress, and see if it drops during counselling
Time 4 Me Evaluation• Primary outcome measure:
Child Outcome Rating Scale (CORS-child)
• Children (7-11 years old) asked to rate levels of psychological wellbeing at every counselling session
• Average scores at first and last session compared
• Data available from 288 children (100% response)
Is it just the children who think they have improved?
Parents/carers, and teachers, also completed the CORS measures at the start and
end of counselling
Strengths and Difficulties
Questionnaire• Additional parent/carer- and
teacher-rated measure of psychological difficulties
• Used throughout CAMHS• Excellent levels of reliability and
validity
Differences across clients
• Young people with a disability (e.g., Autistic Spectrum Disorder, behaviourally-based difficulty, communication impairment, learning disability) improved more than those without
Time 4 Me Evaluation Summary
School-based counselling associated with significant improvements on all outcome measures, generally indicating large reductions in psychological distress from start to end of counselling
Context
• Significant improvement is consistent with evaluations of other primary school-based counselling services: e.g., Place2Be
Limitations
• No control group (i.e., a comparable group of children who do not receive counselling), so improvements might be due to non-counselling factors
• But studies suggest that ‘spontaneous remission’ from mental health problems in children is at a much lower level than found in this study
End of counselling
Start of counselling
Child-CORS averages
Clinical cut-off point
Control group change
Conclusion
• Primary school-based counselling, as delivered by Time 4 Me, associated with large improvements in mental health and emotional well-being in children
• Likely to support learning and educational achievement
Young service userEvaluation of school-based counselling in Wales
“It’s easier to educate happier people”