Format: Please submit as a word document (not PDF) using appropriate scholarly presentation and APA referencing/citation. Length: 2,000 words Curriculum Mode: Reflection This assessment task (A2) provides students with an opportunity to deepen their understanding of ethical considerations in the therapy and/or research context by reflecting on an ’ethical dilemma’. Details: For this assessment, choose one of the problem scenario in vUWS. These raise fairly complex (but not impossible) ’ethical dilemmas’ for you as a counselling, psychotherapy or art therapy practitioner or practitioner-researcher to to consider and work through. Outline the problem scenario in no more than 200 words (included in your word count). Then, clearly, concisely and specifically address this scenario in the remaining 1,800 words using the questions (in vUWS) as a focus to guide your reflections on the ethical dilemma arising from the problem scenario you have chosen.
Scenarios to choose from
Problem Scenario
CHOOSE ONE for A2
1). You are working as a novice counsellor at a private agency in Sydney and you see individual adult clients. The therapeutic approaches adopted by this organisation are cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) and mindfulness. You have had training in both of these approaches and feel comfortable in using the approaches. In your second week of work for this agency, you meet with Tom, a 32-year-old male client who presents with social concerns. He explains that he has no friends and finds it difficult to relate to others of his own age. He goes on to share being confused by people in general. After discussing his previous social experiences, the client identifies creating a circle of friends as his main goal; and his second goal is of finding a romantic partner. The client also shared that he feels more romantically suited to someone around 16-17 years old. He explains finding people that age more attractive to him and thinks they would have more in common than someone his own age. He admits to lying about his age to younger females to help him make social connections.
2) You have been invited to be part of a research project in a school with a group of nurses as they want support with mental health measures as part of the project. The students are the subjects in the research project and they range in age from 7-12. The focus of the research is on behavioural issues at home and in the classroom using yoga as an intervention. Due to the children’s ages their parents will sign the informed consent and need to agree to this research project. You will help design the research project and follow-up with the children and their families in regard to behavioural outcomes. The research will have some related costs and there are limited funds to run the research. A local yoga company has heard about the research project and have offered to teach yoga for the research at the school for no cost. The yoga company wants the names of the students in the research groups to be able to offer discounts on yoga products (e.g. yoga mats, yoga clothing) and discounts for classes at their studios for parents of the children as a further incentive to secure the offer.
3) You are working as an art therapist in a large hospital setting with children and youth in the psychiatric unit. You know that your role is important in the well-being of the youth and children in the hospital. However, you can find yourself at odds with the medical team given their hierarchical approaches to working with hospital patients. Your supervisor is one of the head doctors and he was shown a piece of art by one of your shared clients from an individual session with you. The doctor then suggests that some of your art therapy clients exhibit their art in an upcoming public art exhibit for a hospital fundraiser. This would be a great opportunity to promote the value of art therapy in a hospital setting.
4). You are working as a counsellor in a community mental health setting and you see children, youth and adult clients. A mother attends the first session with her 16-year-old daughter, Sienna. The mum reports that the daughter has been acting differently; mum says she has been isolating herself in her room, being irritable and very negative, which is out of character. The mum believes her daughter has been bullied at school and wants you to help her daughter develop ways of managing being bullied. The mum has asked that you report to her weekly after each session. In the second session when the mum is not with Sienna she discloses that she has been self-harming by cutting her arms with a sharp blade due to some bullying but does not want you to tell her mum. She also told you that she has been using marijuana to help her cope and has recently begun selling marijuana. Sienna does not really want to come to counselling but is doing so to appease her mum.