Emotion Regulation for Counselors

Emotion Regulation for Counselors, a paper we wrote with Dr. Jacqueline M. Swank, tells about the importance of emotion regulation for people in the counseling field. Not for their clients, but for those who help. As we know, taking care of ourselves is our ethical responsibility. Emotion regulation is one of the ways to take care of ourselves when we feel overwhelmed with intensive emotions both in session with clients, and in between sessions, when we still have to wait before seeing our supervisors.

If you are interested in reading this paper, you can leave a request at my ResearchGate page!

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/324253030_Emotion_Regulation_for_Counselors

Photo by Mayur Gala on Unsplash

Alec Courtelis International Student Award

My amazing advisor, Dr. Jacqueline Swank. We finally have pictures together. I am thinking about mentoring a lot and I am blessed to have Dr. Swank, who truly enjoys mentoring students, who is my role model not only professionally, but also personally. She is one of the most generous people I have ever met. Always there to support her mentees and colleagues! At the same time fun to be around, excellent balance of challenge and support, superb researcher and practitioner, this is our Dr. Swank!

FCA Member of the Year 2017 Award

I want to say again what I have just said at the Awards ceremony. Florida Counseling Association is my home. I met myself here. My real self that I had no idea existed. I discovered a leader inside of me, a part of me that wants to help, promote, support! Generous me. Happy me. 
I am endlessly grateful to Tara Jungersen, who was the first person who gave me an opportunity to work as a leader and introduced me to Carly Parot, who I was working with as a region representative and then I met Anne Flenner and Kristie Knight, who believed in me as a leader, who have so much love and passion for the association and profession that you also get it! 
I love you so much! 
And because of all that I was able to launch a movement towards better ethical counseling practice in Russia, which went on so fast and now many people do not know how it all started! And all other good things I started to inspire people for – it all happened because I met these amazing women who had taught me leadership, advocacy and empowered me tremendously.

I am proud to be a member of Florida Counseling Association!

 

Mechanisms of Change in the Mentoring Academy

Mentoring is crucial for the creation of scientific knowledge, however, the research on mentor-specific education and development is scarce. For the last three years I have been doing research within Mentoring Academy at the University of Florida as a research assistant at the Clinical Translational Science Insitute (CTSI) 

The first paper within this project titled “Exploring mentoring in the context of team science” has been accepted for publication in the NCPEA Publications journal Mentoring and Tutoring and is currently in press.

The second paper on mentors development is titled “Assessing mentor academy program effectiveness using mixed methods” and is currently under review.

The third paper titled “From contemplation to action: mechanisms of change in the mentoring academy” is currently ready for submission.

In this article we view mentor’s development as a journey through stages of change, proposed by Prochaska and DiClemente in their Transtheoretical Change Model (TTM; Prochaska, Norcross, & DiClemente, 2013).

These stages are noteworthy for the Mentor Academy programs developers as educators can provide relevant activities to address mentors’ knowledge gaps when they are aware of the stage of change that mentor is in.

 

 

Family Counseling for Victims and Survivors of Domestic Violence in Russia

The chapter on working with the victims of domestic violence in Russia in Marriage and Family therapy for the Handbook Intercultural Perspectives in Family Counseling (in progress) presents an overview of dominant cultural norms, which endorse domestic violence and sexual assault in modern Russia, addressing social inequalities and providing a rationale for specific treatment plans for family counseling within domestic violence. Ethical and clinical issues in family counseling with couples where violence is present are addressed. Clinical assessment and screening, guidelines for conjoint treatment, therapeutic tools and treatment plans within Russian culture are provided.

Domestic violence and discrimination against women are the most pressing problems confronting Russia today (Horne, 1999; Hawkins, & Knox, 2014). Domestic violence is considered a private matter in Russian society, which is seen as a “dirty laundry not to be washed in public”. Additionally, battered women are concerned that should they leave their abuser, they will be unable to support themselves and their children as the traditional cultural norms of Russian gender culture dictate a dependent status for women (Horne, 1999). Moreover, Russian proverb “he beats you, which means he loves you” shows that violent actions of male traditionally are perceived as signs of care.

Additionally, sexual violence against women in Russia is widespread, and for many years this topic remained taboo. However, recently researchers and family counselors acknowledged the necessity of examining the effects sex, age, and level of traditional values on Russian adults’ perceptions of a sexual assault scenario. Overall, Russian adults endorse more traditional roles for women than what research indicates for adults in the U.S., with men holding more traditional beliefs than women. When a man was given more authority and power, he was seen as more justified and was more likely to be exonerated when he committed a violent act against a woman (Diakonova-Curtis, & Porter, n.d.).

Family therapy intensively develops in Russian society, however, “there is no standardized psychosocial (psychological) assistance for the family” and this type of care almost doesn’t exist in rural areas and small towns, (Bebtschuk, Smirnova, & Khayretdinov, 2012), where the level of domestic violence is high (Volkova, Lipai, & Wendt, 2015). Needless to say, there is a lack of special education on working with the issues of domestic violence and sexual abuse in marriage and family therapy.

References

Bebtschuk, M., Smirnova, D., & Khayretdinov, O. (2012). Family and family therapy in Russia. International Review of Psychiatry, 24(2), 121–127. doi:10.3109/09540261.2012.656305

Diakonova-Curtis, D., & Porter, N. (n.d.). Factors affecting the perceptions of sexual assault of women in Russia. PsycEXTRA Dataset. doi:10.1037/e625292013-001

Hawkins, C. A., & Knox, K. S. (2014). Gender violence and discrimination in Russia: Learning from an American–Russian partnership. International Social Work57(5), 511-522. doi:10.1177/0020872814536416

Volkova, O., Lipai, T., & Wendt, S. (2015). Domestic violence in rural arears of Russia and Australia. International Letters of Social and Humanistic Sciences, 55, 101–110. doi:10.18052/www.scipress.com/ilshs.55.101