Therapeutic efficacy and safety.
Choices about how much or how little we disclose about ourselves to our clients are based on four important factors.
It is important to remember that just because you feel safe telling your client something about yourself does not mean that they will feel safe hearing it.
Poorly considered disclosure of content from your private life can change the dynamics of the therapeutic relationship and cause confusion for the client as to what the roles and expectations of the relationship are. However refusal to answer reasonable questions about yourself can leave your client feeling inconsequential or dis-empowered which may impact adversely on the therapeutic relationship.
A therapist's decision to disclose personal information should take the following questions into consideration.
Safety of the clinician.
Appropriate self disclosure will vary according to the population with whom we work, the size of the community in which we work and live, and the proximity of our workplace to the community in which we live. Other factors will include family, lifestyle choices our involvement in social media, past experience and personality style.
Theoretical considerations.
The degree to which we use self disclosure in therapy is also strongly influenced by the theoretical basis of our practice. Traditional analysts have followed Freud’s instructions to remain very neutral and anonymous, with the idea that the therapist should act as a mirror or a blank screen for the client’s feelings and thoughts to be projected onto.
More recent theories hold the therapeutic relationship as the most important factor in predicting therapeutic outcome and therefore encourage well considered self disclosure for the building of the relationship.
Behavioural and cognitive therapies encourage self disclosure as a teaching tool or a way of normalising the human experience of clients. Political considerations also influence what is considered appropriate self disclosure in therapy with therapies influenced by feminist theory such as narrative therapy emphasising the importance of an egalitarian relationship between therapist and client.
How does disclosure occur?
Deliberately - Through what we choose to tell our clients, or what we put on our website or professional profile. How we dress, what we put in our therapy room, and how we choose to respond or react within sessions.
Unavoidably – Our age, gender, physical appearance, where we practice, how we wear our hair, wedding rings or a visible tattoo, pregnancy, illness, time off work.
(If you practice from home a great deal about you is disclosed by your house itself.)
Accidentally – Unplanned meetings outside the therapy room or on social media and our spontaneous verbal and non verbal reactions.
Clients’ deliberate actions – It is quick and easy for the most well meaning client to search on the internet and find all manner of information about you, the content of which you will often have very little control.
Choices about how much or how little we disclose about ourselves to our clients are based on four important factors.
- Therapeutic efficacy
- Impact on the therapeutic relationship
- Safety
- Theoretical underpinnings
It is important to remember that just because you feel safe telling your client something about yourself does not mean that they will feel safe hearing it.
Poorly considered disclosure of content from your private life can change the dynamics of the therapeutic relationship and cause confusion for the client as to what the roles and expectations of the relationship are. However refusal to answer reasonable questions about yourself can leave your client feeling inconsequential or dis-empowered which may impact adversely on the therapeutic relationship.
A therapist's decision to disclose personal information should take the following questions into consideration.
- What is the purpose of this disclosure?
- Will this information be helpful for the client’s therapeutic aims?
- How might this information affect our therapeutic relationship?
- Could it cause harm in any way?
Safety of the clinician.
Appropriate self disclosure will vary according to the population with whom we work, the size of the community in which we work and live, and the proximity of our workplace to the community in which we live. Other factors will include family, lifestyle choices our involvement in social media, past experience and personality style.
Theoretical considerations.
The degree to which we use self disclosure in therapy is also strongly influenced by the theoretical basis of our practice. Traditional analysts have followed Freud’s instructions to remain very neutral and anonymous, with the idea that the therapist should act as a mirror or a blank screen for the client’s feelings and thoughts to be projected onto.
More recent theories hold the therapeutic relationship as the most important factor in predicting therapeutic outcome and therefore encourage well considered self disclosure for the building of the relationship.
Behavioural and cognitive therapies encourage self disclosure as a teaching tool or a way of normalising the human experience of clients. Political considerations also influence what is considered appropriate self disclosure in therapy with therapies influenced by feminist theory such as narrative therapy emphasising the importance of an egalitarian relationship between therapist and client.
How does disclosure occur?
Deliberately - Through what we choose to tell our clients, or what we put on our website or professional profile. How we dress, what we put in our therapy room, and how we choose to respond or react within sessions.
Unavoidably – Our age, gender, physical appearance, where we practice, how we wear our hair, wedding rings or a visible tattoo, pregnancy, illness, time off work.
(If you practice from home a great deal about you is disclosed by your house itself.)
Accidentally – Unplanned meetings outside the therapy room or on social media and our spontaneous verbal and non verbal reactions.
Clients’ deliberate actions – It is quick and easy for the most well meaning client to search on the internet and find all manner of information about you, the content of which you will often have very little control.