Sexual behavior problems of adolescents

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Table of Contents

Research Topic
The Ethical Aspects of the study
Strengths, Limitations, and Suggestions
Design
Participants
Data Quality & Collection
Data Analysis
Summary of Research Critique
Reference List

Research Topic

The critique article for this paper is the article titled “An exploration of counselor experiences of adolescents with sexual behavior problems”, by Chassman et al (2010, p.269). The study explores the effect of working with adolescents sexual behavior problems (SBPs) and it involves 18 American and Australian counselors.

The study focuses mainly on the counselors past personal circumstances with regard to sexual abuse, their emotional and sexual responses towards the subjects and their perceptions regarding sex information. A related study by Margret Pack explores the social, organizational, and theoretical factors that have a traumatic effect on counselors of sex abuse.

The study identifies theoretical approaches as effective ways of connecting with self, clients, and other counselors. In contrast, Chassman et al. (2010, p. 269) identifies self-care and self-monitoring as possible ways of managing counselor’s feelings and perceptions. The feelings referred to in this context include anger, guilt, sadism, confusion, apprehensions and sadism. Such factors influence the counselor from objectively examining the difficulties facing their clients.

Chassman’s study establishes important findings with profound implications for sex abuse counseling. In sex offender treatment, eliminating burnout and trauma is essential as it allows the counselor to address the problems of the client objectively and effectively (Pearlman, & Mclan, 1995, p. 353). In this regard, the Chassman et al. study establishes ways of dealing with feelings of the counselor towards their clients.

Firstly, the study establishes that, most commonly, counselors exhibit natural sexual responses to adolescent clients. Confusion, guilt, and anxiety are also common feelings shown by counselors towards their clients. Secondly, the study establishes that the counselors can overcome these feelings if they have adequate and early training in their careers. The study however observes that group or personal therapy can resolve arousal of such feelings.

In counseling practice, establishing connections at different levels particularly with the self and the clients is essential in handling sex abuse cases. In addition to counselor feelings towards a client, psychological stress and burnout affect the treatment of sex offenders.

Thus, it is important that sex therapists control their perceptions and feelings and learn to cope with practice-related stress for effective stress treatment (Ennis, & Horne, 2003, p.149). The approaches of critical reflection and strength-based reflection help counselors to establish and maintain these connections (Pack, 2004, p. 677).

In contrast, Ennis and Horne contend that social support mechanisms such as family and peer support can serve to mitigate therapist risks of psychological distress and PTSD symptoms. Reducing psychological distress translates into improved relations with self and clients. In line with Chassman et al. study, Ennis and Horne study establishes that social support lowers psychological distress and PTSD symptoms, which is essential in self care of a sex offender therapist.

The Ethical Aspects of the study

The Chassman et al. study essentially involved a qualitative approach in which it interviewed 18 members of the counseling community. To obtain accurate and reliable data, it applied open-ended procedures where the subjects described their experience of dealing with SBPs.

Since, in the initial phase of this research, the methodology was not structured, the researcher obtained a comprehensive and reliable data. Additionally, the study effectively reveals common misconceptions such as counselor’s history of sexual abuse may affect treatment of SBPs and that counselor’s sexual response to minors is dangerous in sex treatment.

The study, using qualitative techniques, sheds light into credible concerns of counselors in three ways. Firstly, it recognizes that sexual response towards young adults that discuss sexual problems is a natural occurrence.

Secondly, it assumes that the emotions of guilt, worry, and confusion are quite widespread and training and education of counselors can overcome such emotions early in their careers. Thirdly, the qualitative design has focused on the fact that solution to such emotions is only through supervisory relationships such as personal therapies and adoption to an open team atmosphere.

The study uses several steps to protect the personal information of the informant. Firstly, the researcher gave each informant a pseudonym to protect the personal information provided.

The use of open-ended procedures ensured a spontaneous response from the informant regarding the counselor’s feelings towards adolescent clients with SBPs. To obtain more information, the researcher used questions that were more specific in later interviews. However, despite these ethical safeguards, any ethics committee did not approve the study.

To ensure that the informants consent to participate in the study, the study used snowball-sampling procedure, where the initial study subjects identified potential informants. This ensured that all informants were aware of the scope of the study prior to agreeing to participate.

In the study, 18 experienced professionals willingly agreed to participate in the study. The study recruited participants from the US and Australia representing rural and urban settings. They all had previous experience in treating adolescents with SBPs. Given the nature of the research design, i.e. a qualitative approach, no debriefing was necessary.

The research meant to promote the integrity and credibility of the informant’s responses and facilitate a comprehensive study from the responses given. Additionally, the grounded qualitative approach used aimed at generating concepts based on the empirical data. This means that the description and hypotheses of the study were lacking at the beginning of the study.

Strengths, Limitations, and Suggestions

The main aim of the study was to explore the challenges that counselors treating adolescents with SBPs face. This has potential implications for the counseling community and practice. Firstly, the study’s findings shed light into the feelings and perceptions exhibited by professional counselors when handling sex abuse cases.

In contrast, other studies mostly focus on stress-related experiences of the counselors for sex treatment. The study establishes that counselor’s sexual feeling in response to adolescent client’s sexual experiences is a common and natural phenomenon. It identifies anxiety, guilt, and confusion as other common feelings exhibited by counselors during counseling sessions.

Secondly, based on the informant’s responses, the study identifies education and early training in a counselor’s career as possible ways of mitigating these feelings. Additionally, the study identifies personal therapy and working in a team environment as other ways of reducing sexual responses towards adolescent clients. Thirdly, the use of grounded qualitative approach was essential in discovering the informant’s concerns. The use of grounded theory was essential in developing the concepts and findings of this study.

Although the study excelled in identifying the concepts and challenges facing counselors working with adolescents with SBPs, it, nonetheless, had some limitations. Firstly, the study heavily relied on research articles from external sources in coming up with its themes and concepts. The research itself was, however, limited as it involved only 18 subjects. The researchers acknowledge this limitation, which means that the study was limited in scope and thus the results not necessarily sufficient to support the findings.

Secondly, the methods of comparing the data to identify the themes and concepts involved triangulation analysis of data. This has the potential of causing investigator bias and raising conflicts due to established theoretical frameworks. Thirdly, the study only explored the counselor’s feelings and not the psychological stress and PTSD, which have potential impacts on counselor’s work.

The study was not substantive enough as the subjects comprised of counselors treating adolescents with SBPs. Professionals working with highly sexualized groups such as prostitutes.

Additionally, research did not cover the impacts of the treatment experience on the counselor, which limited the scope of the study. The study did not sufficiently adhere to ethical principles of qualitative research. In qualitative research, the researchers should inform the participants of the purpose, the risks, and benefits of the study prior to their participation (Batchelor & Brigg, 1994, p. 949).

However, the ground theory approach used in the study is essential in developing new concepts and theoretical constructs. The subjects from different treatment settings, varying level of experiences, different cultures and from both gender got involved in this study hence the study was comprehensive.

After data analysis, the study identified four themes; the counselor’s historical experiences regarding sex abuse, sexual responses, and feelings to adolescent clients, self-monitoring and self-care. These interpretations were consistent with the results and formed the basis of the findings. The researchers identified the four themes based on the qualitative data of counselors’ responses to their clients. The research only used 18 subjects, which cannot provide sufficient data for the interpretations of the findings arrived at.

However, the researchers single out self-monitoring and self-care as ways of mitigating counselor’s sexual responses or feelings towards clients. This has potential implications to the nursing community. The researchers acknowledge the limited scope of the study but recommend further research to explore the impacts of sexual treatment on counselors working with minors and highly sexualized groups.

Design

In this study, the qualitative approach used was appropriate for establishing the counselor’s main concerns regarding sex treatment. In particular, the grounded theory was essential in developing the themes that have potential implications to the nursing community. Additionally, open-ended procedures used ensured collection of the comprehensive data essential in formulating the theme.

Since the research aimed at establishing new concepts that are independent of existing theoretical frameworks, a qualitative research design was most suited. The research design involved snowball sampling in recruiting the 18 study subjects. The study derived the subjects from diverse social and cultural backgrounds.

The study used interview to collect data and triangulation analysis to compare the data. However, the entire process of replication of the procedure and criteria of identifying variations are not clear for other researchers to replicate. Additionally, the 18 participants involved in this study could not support a comprehensive study. Triangulation was efficient in establishing data variations followed by exploration of the new category.

Participants

In the study, the research used the snowball-sampling procedure in recruiting the 18 professional counselors from Australia and United States. The study took into account various characteristics of the participants used in this study. Some participants were from two states from Australia and three states from the United States all with varied level of experience in counseling. The sampling plan included many aspects to ensure variability of data collected.

The participants were representative of diverse cultures, practice, treatment settings and consisted of both gender. However, the sampling plan could improve by increasing the sample size studied and expanded to cover several countries. This was an apparent sample bias, which the study did not address. Another possible bias was the use of counselors working with minors while professionals working with highly sexualized groups; these facts did not feature in the study.

Most studies have established that stress and trauma are common challenges that face sex offender counselors. However, few studies have explored the counselors’ sexual responses and feelings towards their clients. In this regard, the study conducted on counselors working with adolescents with SBPs, was appropriate, and significantly addressed their concerns and the possible mitigation measures.

Data Quality & Collection

Since the study used a qualitative research design, there were no dependent and independent variables. The research used Interviews involving open-ended questions in data collection.

In the early stages of interviewing, counselor informants without any coercion disclosed information regarding their experiences with minor clients. The questions in later interviews were more specific and well structured to generate specific responses from the informants. To ensure reliable data, the researchers used several methods to ascertain trustworthiness of the responses.

This involved rigorous interviewing and regular contact with the informant. The study used new informants to confirm the results obtained from the interviews. Additionally, it used comparative analysis and reference to relevant literature to verify the thematic information obtained. The researchers support the method of persistent contact with the informants as effective means in generating reliable data based on similar studies.

In this study, the first interview involved open-ended procedures. However, subsequent interviews were more specific and structured to obtain particular information regarding the counselor’s responses or feelings to minor clients. In this way, the informants may have influenced the informant’s responses, which affect the quality of data collected.

Data Analysis

The researchers used axial and open coding in analyzing the data comparatively. The study assigned open codes to raw data derived from the informants. The research summarized the comparable groups into specific groups.

As a result, it established the relationships between the categories using selective coding and integrated into the final analysis to give the four themes. These include the professional’s feelings regarding their client’s sex information, his/her sexual responses to their client’s sexual information, and his /her history with regard to abuse, self-care, and self-monitoring measures.

Summary of Research Critique

Sex therapists often face challenges when working with their clients. Some challenges such as psychological stress negatively affect their work. In this regard, Chassman et al. study involved an exploratory investigation of the feelings and sexual responses, which counselors may exhibit that affect their work.

It also explores support mechanisms of mitigating these risks, which have implications to the counseling community. Among the major strengths of the study is the use of varied categories of subjects, use of open-ended interview questions and the use of grounded qualitative theory to collect, analyze and interpret data. However, the use of only 18 participants from the US and Australia limited the scope of the research.

Reference List

Batchelor, J., & Briggs, C. (1994). Subject, project or self? Thoughts on ethical Dilemmas for social and medical researchers. Social Science & Medicine, 39(7), 949-52.

Chassman, L., Kottler, J., & Madison, J. (2010). An exploration of counselor Experiences of adolescents with sexual behavior problems. Journal of Counseling & Development, 88 (3), 269-276.

Ennis, L., & Horne, S. (2003). Predicting Psychological distress in sex offender Therapists. Sex Abuse, 15(2), 149-56.

Pack, M. (2004). Sexual Abuse Counselors’ Responses to Stress and Trauma: A Social Work Perspective. Journal of Counseling, 25(2), 672-677.

Pearlman, L., & Mclan, P. (1995).Vicarious traumatisation: An empirical study of the Effects of trauma work on trauma therapists. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 26 (6), 353-59.

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