Psychological Communication Skills 1: Basic Skills

URL study guide

https://studiegids.vu.nl/en/courses/2024-2025/P_BPSG1BA

Course Objective

1. The student can identify and recognize the ten listening and regulating skills in a problem-clarifying interview. 2. The student can identify and recognize Leary’s Rose in a problem-clarifying interview. 3. The student can apply the ten listening and regulating skills in a problem-clarifying interview. 4. The student can adopt a position from Leary’s Rose in a problem-clarifying interview and argue why this position was chosen. 5. The student can critically reflect on their own application of the ten basic listening and regulating skills, including observation, impact on the conversation partner, and formulating alternatives. 6. The student can reflect on their own actions in a problem-clarifying interview based on Leary’s Rose, including observation, impact on the conversation partner, and formulating alternatives. 7. The student can set personal learning goals related to the 10 basic listening and regulating skills and Leary’s Rose, and critically reflect on their own learning process.

Course Content

In every profession it is important to communicate well, but for a psychologist this is a core skill. Practitioners, coaches and researchers must all be able to collect information by means of a conversation. How do you ensure that you get the best picture of what the other person has to say and how do you prevent viewing the information too much from your own frame of reference? The answer to these questions lies in applying good communication skills. This course will train you in doing that. Five essential listening skills, five regulatory skills and Leary's Rose are discussed. You learn to recognize these skills, to apply them and to reflect on their effect. This course is given in the form of a training. That means that there will be a lot of practice in conducting various interviews. This course has a fairly clinical focus. For example, you will practice with conducting a problem clarification interview. However, good basic communication skills are not only important in clinical practice, but also in all other directions within psychology.

Teaching Methods

Tutor groups Contact hours: 84 tutor group

Method of Assessment

- Interview assignment and reflection report.
- Attendance requirement.
- Active participation and good preparation is a prerequisite for passing the course. The final grade is based for 90% on the reflection report and 10% on process (participation, attendance and attitude, deadlines, preparation). In case of failure, the reflection report can be rewritten. The maximum possible grade in such a case is a 6. You can also choose to both re-do the interview as well as the reflective report. Then, you can obtain a completely new grade. In this course, a passing final assignment can only be retaken if an entirely new interview is conducted. The original grade will stand, even if the grade on the retake is lower than the first attempt. Completion of the research participation is a condition for receiving the study credits for this course.

Literature

In this course we will use a reader. The reader will become available onCanvas prior to the course.

Custom Course Registration

Students must sign in for the course and the practical sessions via VUnet.

Additional Information

Work groups in English or Dutch, depending on chosen study track. Professional ethics of a psychologist, especially confidentiality and respect, are of paramount importance. This means that during this course, you will keep any information shared by fellow students to yourself. Professional ethics will be addressed during the course.