Abstract
Within the counseling/psychotherapy field, the extent to which empathy is a communication skill, an inner experience of the counselor, or the client’s perception is controversial (Gladstein, 1983). The empathy training literature has, however, taken the position that empathy is a behavioral communication skill, emphasizing skill acquisition and performance. Behavioral training technology has been developed to equip trainees with a repertoire of counseling skills. The inner experience of the trainee has been neglected, however, by the empathy training literature (Hackney, 1978; Mahon & Altman, 1977). Partly, this neglect is due to the lack of an adequate conceptualization of empathy that links the complex nature of empathy with the available training technology. A view of empathy is needed that takes into account the counselor’s inner experience, but is still pragmatic enough to relate to the available training technology.
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© 1987 Springer-Verlag New York Inc.
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Brennan, J. (1987). Effects of Four Training Programs on Three Kinds of Empathy. In: Empathy and Counseling. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-9658-5_9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-9658-5_9
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-1-4615-9660-8
Online ISBN: 978-1-4615-9658-5
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