Chapter 1: Professional Orientation and Ethical Practice (Law and Ethics) Flashcards
PROFESSIONAL ORIENTATION AND ETHICS
The term scope of practice implies that you only practice if you are
adequately trained in a given area or with a given population. Hence,
if you have no training running a Gestalt group, then don’t run one.
If you know nothing about clients with eating disorders—don’t treat
them.
A counselor’s duty to warn Initially based on a California supreme court case, Tarasoff, this principle now states that if a client is
going to harm him- or herself, somebody else, or both, you will break
confi dentiality and contact the appropriate people (e.g., the police,
the target person) to ward off this tragedy.
Dual relationship (could also be called multiple relationships
on your exam) This concept implies that you are a person’s helper
but you also have another signifi cant relationship with that person (maybe you are dating them or perhaps they are a relative or business
partner.) Such relationships get in the way of objectivity and should
be avoided whenever possible unless the relationship is benefi cial to
the client.
Privileged communication set by state, law privileged communication asserts that you cannot reveal what a client said in a session in court unless the client allows you to do so. There are exceptions
to this such as child abuse, suicide, homicide, and supervisory sessions
or if a lawsuit is fi led against you. You should never release information about the client outside of court (unless it is the exceptions just
mentioned) unless the client signs a release of information consent
form. Remember to disguise the identity of your clients when doing
research, training, or in a work for publication.
Always check the NBCC and ACA websites for the latest
information on Internet Counseling and ethics before you take
your comprehensive exam. These ethics are changing extremely
rapidly.
