Skills and Techniques in

Counseling
Dr. Carmella E. Ading
Encouraging

Paraphrasing

Summarizing
How can these three skills help you and
you clients?
+Major Functions
+Clients need to know that the interviewer has heard what they
have been saying, seen their point of view, and felt their world
as they experience it.
+Basic to helping client feel understood.
+Once clients’ stories have been truly heard, the clients can be
much more open to and ready for change.
 +Secondary Function
Knowledge and skill in these dimensions result in
the following :

+Clarifying for the client what he or she has said

+Clarifying for the interviewer what the client has said.
By feeding back what you have heard, you can check
on the accuracy of your listening.
+Helping clients to talk in more detail about issues of
concern to them.
+Helping an overly talkative client stop repeating the
same facts or story, thus speeding up and clarifying
the interview process.
INTRODUCTION
+Listening is not a passive process.
+Active listening involved fully participation by
helping the client clarify, enlarge, and enrich the
story.
+Need to be able to hear small changes in
thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.
+Walk in other person’s shoe.
+Encouraging, paraphrasing and summarizing are
basic to empathic understanding
+Telling the client that they have been heard.
+Do not mix your own ideas with what the client
has been saying.
+Say back to the clients what you have heard,
using their key words.
+Helping clients by distilling, shortening and
clarifying what has been said.
+Nonjudgmental attitude – listen to the clients
without evaluating them what they say as “good”
or “bad”
ENCOURAGING
 Encouragers are the simplest, and yet perhaps the most
important interventions can use to facilitate the continued
communication and disclosure of a client (continue talking).

 Merely encourages the client to elaborate and explore what is

already being talked out.
 There are four primary categories of encourages ;

1. Nonverbal signs – leaning forward, head nods, open gesture, or

raising an eyebrow.
2. Simple repetition of a word or phrase the client utters
often communicates to the client to keep talking –
Repetition of word(key word encourage) and phrase
encouraging (restatement)
-Key word encourage contain one, two or three words
while restatements are longer.

Examples ;
Client : “I’m hurting so much for my mom”
Interviewer : “You’re hurting” (Repetition of word)
Client : “I’m not sure where to start this week. So much
has happened that my head is spinning. I can’t tell
you how much I’ve been looking forward this session-I
really need it today! But now that I’m here I don’t even
know where to start…..”

Interviewer : “So much happened that it’s hard to start

today” (restatement/phrase encouraging)
Exercise :
Client : “I really have a hard time with this
relationship. It seems to be overwhelming at
times, because I need not want to grant me. I’m
not sure what I would like to do but I know I need
to change something.”
Interviewer :………………(key word
encouragers)
…………………(restatement)
+Encouragers must be used wisely.
+Used incorrectly, they may inadvertently serve to reinforce
verbalizations that are off the point, rambling or otherwise
irrelevant or non-therapeutic.
3. Semiverbal encouragers
- which are often combined with
nonverbal encouragers, consist of
expressions such as “uh-huh”, “oh”, “aha”.

4. A simple phrase that requires more

information.
- Example : “and then…..?”, “Like what?”,
or “Tell me more”.
Sample transcripts for encouragers
Client : “Sometimes I think that I’m going crazy. It’s
like this thing comes over me-a black cloud or
something. And then I’m not myself anymore….
Interviewer: “Not yourself anymore?” (Restatement
encourager)
Client : “Yeah. I get so mad I could jump out of my
skin, like I want to scream and rant and rave……”
Interviewer : (leans forward, nodding her head)
(nonverbal encourager)
Client : Well, you know, just jump up and down,
throw something and just plain throw a tantrum
like a little kid. I used to do that, you know, when I
was little. My parents still talk about it-I was a
little monster….”
Interviewer :”Really….?” (keyword encourager)

Client : Yeah, I’d hit my brother, I’d throw myself on

the ground in the grocery store-just would embarrass
my poor parents to death. It really seems unreal,
doesn’t it?”
Interviewer :”Hmm...unreal?” (semiverbal with key
word encourager)
Client : “Yeah….like another me takes over”
Interviewer : (lean forward –nonverbal encourager)
“Help me understand that “another you”.”
PARAPHRASING
+ Feedback to the client the essence of what just been said by
shortening and clarifying client comments.
+It is not parroting; it is using some of your own words plus the
important word of the client.
+Challenging the client to hear and understand the clinician’s
language
 Kleinke (1994) describes paraphrasing as follows:

A paraphrase is a rephrasing of the client’s statement in

a way that communicates to the client the therapist’s
understanding of what the client has said. The
paraphrase is used to focus the communication on
issues that appear to be most relevant and
appropriate. When paraphrasing, therapist don’t
simply parrot or repeat the client’s exact words. By
making an active attempt to rephrase the client’s
statement in their own words, therapists are able to
maintain the flow and focus of the conversation.(p.61)
+The goal of paraphrasing is the facilitation of
client exploration and the clarification of issues.
+Observation skills are important in accurate
paraphrasing.
+Hear the client’s important words and use them
in your paraphrase.
+Use your own words but the main ideas and
concepts should reflect the client’s view of world,
not yours
+ An accurate paraphrase consists of 4
dimensions:
1. A sentence stem sometimes using the client’s
name.
- Example ; “Jane, I hear you are saying….”, “What I’m
hearing is….”,” I sense you tried to…”
- Stem is not always necessary and if overused, can make
your comments seem like parroting.
2. The key word used by the client to describe the
situation or person.
- Include main ideas that come from clients and their exact
words
3. The essence of what the client has said in
summarized form.
- transforming the client’s sometimes confused
statements into succinct, meaningful and clarifying
statements.
- Keeping true to the client’s idea but not repeating
them exactly.
4. A check-out for accuracy
- a brief question at the end of the paraphrase.
- asking the client for feedback on whether the paraphrase was
relatively correct and useful.
- Example : “Am I hearing you correctly?” , “Is that close?”.
Client : “Yeah…know, my father isn’t such a bad
guy. He tries hard, but his life is tough.
Sometimes when he comes home from work he’s
drunk. Then no one knows what to do. Should we
be quiet? Should we be happy and greet him?
We never know what to do”

Interviewer : “What I hear you saying is when your

father comes home drunk, you don’t know what
he’ll be like, so you don’t know how to act.”
Client : “ When I’m angry with my friend, I just
change the subject or walk away.”

Interviewer : “You don’t tell your friend when you

are mad at her”
Sample transcripts;
Client : “What happened then was even more
embarrassing. I turned away and she started to scream at
the top of her lungs in the middle of the street! Can you
believe it?! She just stood there with everybody around
and cussed at me.. How could I ever loved someone like
that who has no social skills? Am I really that dependent
that I would just go out with anyone who says, “hey,
you’re cute?” I am really shaken up by this….What does it
all mean and what do I do now?”
Interviewer : “ What is sounds like to me that you are really
wondering about being emotionally needy right now.
(rephrasing “dependent” into “emotionally needy”)
Differences between Key-word encouragers,
Restatement encouragers and Paraphrasing

James : “I’m really concerned about my wife. She has this feeling
that she has to get out of the house, see the world, and get a
job. I’m the breadwinner and I think I have a good income. The
children view Yolanda as a perfect mother, and I do too. But last
night, we really saw the problem differently and had a terrible
argument.”
Key word encouragers : “Breadwinner”?,
“Terrible argument?”, “Perfect mother?”.
Restatement encouragers : “You’re really
concerned about your wife.” , “You see yourself
as the breadwinner.” “You had a terrible
argument.”
Paraphrasing : “James, you’re concerned about
your picture-perfect wife who wants to work even
though you have a good income, and you’ve had
a terrible argument. Is that how you see it?”.
SUMMARIZING
+Summarization is used whenever the interviewer
wants to feedback or more than on idea, content,
affect, or hidden message at a time.
+Summarization can consist of a combination of
restatements, paraphrases, and reflection.
+Longer time and more information are involved in
summarization.
+Interviewer attends to verbal and nonverbal
comments from the client, and then selectively
attends the key concepts and dimensions,
restating them for the client as accurately as
possible.
+A check-out at the end of summarization is
important.
+Summarizations may be used to begin or end an
interview, for transition to a new topic, or to
provide clarity in lengthy and complex client
stories.
Examples
To begin session : “Let see, last time we talked
about your feelings toward your mother-in-law
and we discussed the argument you had with her
around the time the new baby arrived. You saw
yourself as guilty and anxious. Since then you
haven’t gotten along too well. We also discussed
a plan of action for the week. How did that go?”
Midway in the interview : “So far, I’ve seen that the plan didn’t
work well. You felt guilty again when you saw the idea as
manipulative. Yet one idea did work. You were able to talk with
her about her garden, and it was the first time you had been
able to talk about anything without an argument. You visualize
the possibility of following up on the plan next week. Is that
about it?”
At the end of the session : “In this interview we’ve
reviewed your feelings toward your mother-in-law
in more detail. Some of the following things seem
to stand out : First, our plan didn’t work
completely, but you were able to talk about one
thing without yelling. As we talked, we identified
some behaviors on your part that could be
change. They include better eye contact, relaxing
more, and changing the topic when you start to
see yourself getting angry. I also liked your idea
at the end of talking with her about these issues.
Does that sum it up?”
CONCLUSION
+How Encouraging, Paraphrasing and
Summarizing skills help interviewer and clients;
+Major Functions : Clients need to know that the
interviewer has heard, seen and felt their world as
they experience it.
+Introduction
+Accurate listening through the skills of encouraging,
paraphrasing and summarizing
CONCLUSION
+Encouraging
+Encourage clients to continue talking
+Paraphrasing
+Feedback to the client by using your own words +
client.
+Summarizing
+Are similar to paraphrases except more information
and longer time needed.
 Sensitive expression, entailing
carefully chosen words spoken from
the heart, has power to move
people to tears or laughter – to
inspire action that can change the
world in ways larger or small.

Dan Millman, 1993, p.50

THANK YOU