Development and use of the helping skills measure to assess client perceptions of the effects of training and of helping skills in sessions.

The Helping Skills Measure (HSM) was constructed to assess client perceptions of the helping skills used by beginning helpers in sessions. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses indicated 3 scales (Exploration, Insight, Action) that were internally consistent and moderately to highly intercorrelated. Scores on all 3 HSM scales increased after training in helping skills. Client perceptions of helping skills contributed significantly to the prediction of client evaluation of session quality beyond the contribution of client perceptions of the therapeutic relationship. Hence, the HSM can be used to evaluate client perceptions of helper skills and the effects of helping skills training. Although helping skills are often taught to both undergraduate and graduate students, the research on the effectiveness of these programs has focused primarily on graduate students (see Baker, Daniels, & Greeley, 1990). Furthermore, research on helping skills at all levels has dramatically decreased in recent years. Clearly, if we are to continue to teach these courses, we need more research demonstrating that students, especially undergraduate students, can learn and implement helping skills. One probable reason for the decline of research on helping skills training is the difficulty in determining what criteria to use to assess whether trainees have learned the skills. Early researchers (e.g., Anthony & Hill, 1976; Gormally, Hill, Gulanik, & McGovern, 1975; Schroeder, Hill, Gormally, & Anthony, 1973) asked trainees to write responses to scripted client vignettes and then examined changes in ratings of the quality of their responses. Reviewers of this literature (e.g., Gormally & Hill, 1974), however, criticized the use of ratings of written responses because these are easily influenced by demand characteristics (e.g., students may be able to learn to respond well in writing but that does not mean that they can perform these skills in sessions with clients).