The Pros And Cons Of Clinical Interviewing

A core component in the field of clinical psychology is interviewing. Clinical interviews, also known as conversations with purpose, are dialogues between psychologist and patient that are designed to help psychologist diagnose and plan treatment. It is essential that psychologist build their competency in their clinical interviewing skills. The foundation of refining these skills established though social interactions starts here in graduate school. In this paper, I’ll go over my previous experiences in interviewing, strengths and weaknesses, what I have learned thus far, and the areas that need further growth and development. My first introduction to interviewing was in graduate school at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Attending

During interviews, I tend to be good at building initial rapport, attending behaviors, question selection, and some nondirective listening responses. When I sit down to interview someone, I always remember that they are a person. Talking about simple things are also important before getting into the details of the interview. Holding a light conversation comes very natural to me. I also know that rapport building is a critical aspect of building a trusting relationship. I also operate under a client lead model, so I follow the pace of the client when interviewing. That includes starting when they are ready and taking breaks from the interview to discuss other matters. Previously I struggled with maintaining eye contact, but through practice interviewing I learned when it is appropriate to make eye contact. I usually keep a good posture during interviews. Depending on who I am talking to, my voice can come off seductive. This is not purposely done. Besides that, I keep a good rate and volume of speech. Active listening and verbal tracking is also strengths. I show that I am listening to what a client is saying through summarizing, restating and paraphrasing what they say from time to time to make sure I am understanding the message they are relaying. Furthermore, I do a good job of asking open-ended questions and

I struggle or am too not familiar with knowing the right use of therapeutic questions, some directive listening and action responses and ending an interview. The text for the class did a good job providing definitions and examples of therapeutic questions but when I attempted to use them in practice it did not feel natural, but forced. I sounded scripted and they didn’t go with the flow of conversation. I believe this is because I didn’t truly understand the best time to work in questions like indirect to swing and projective. I’d like to see these examples shown in class. I am also not too comfortable with some forms of directive listening responses like reframe and confrontation. I struggle in my personal life with confrontation so to do it tactfully in a professional setting is a challenge. I think confrontation is no scary to me because I tend so get emotional or defensive when I am confronted. I imagine receiving the same emotions if I had to confront a client, which can rupture rapport. Although, I know that confrontation is sometimes necessary, I’d like to avoid it as much as possible. There are some directive and action responses that I have trouble producing, one being advice and the other being self-disclosure. In general, I am very skeptical about giving advice for two reasons. The first being that I have always operated under a client centered approach where