A Study of the Korean Counselors’ Perception on Gerontological Counseling

Although the number of older adults in need of psychological help is increasing due to the increase in their population in Korea, there is a shortage of counselors qualified to provide the appropriate services for them. In order to activate gerontological counseling, there is a great need to explore the counselors’ perception of counseling for the older adults. Accordingly, 75 counselors with at least two years of counseling experience after graduating from a master’s program were asked through an open-ended questionnaire about their perceptions of the characteristics, counseling process, and counseling outcomes for the older clients. The counselors responded to the questionnaire online and the response data were analyzed using Consensual Qualitative Research Analysis. There were a total of 647 statements collected, they were classified into 61 subcategories, and the subcategories were integrated into 4 themes and 17 categories. The first theme was named ‘the characteristics of the older clients,’ and the counselors generally perceived them negatively such as stubborn people. The second theme was named ‘their need for counseling,’ and the counselors thought that the older clients would consider the counselor as a sympathizer to their problem but not a counseling expert. The third theme was named ‘the gerontological counseling process’, and the counselors recognized that the personality traits of older adults such as resistance to change and the age difference with the clients would make the counseling process difficult. The fourth theme was named ‘the gerontological counseling outcome,’ and the counselors recognized that the mental health problems of the older clients would be resolved to some extent even if the counseling outcomes for them were not great. The findings of this study confirmed that general counselors have negative stereotypes about older clients or aging. The authors raised the need for training to correct this negative perception of counselors and strengthen counseling competencies for the older adults in a super-aged society where gerontological counseling becomes more and more important in the last part of this paper.