When… 1) clients begin talking about others rather than themselves, 2) the therapeutic
process becomes repetitive or intellectualized, or 3) clients become compliant or lose
their initiative:
a. The client’s conflict is being reenacted.
b. The client is engaging in a transference test.
c. Countertransference reactions are being evoked in the therapist.
d. Change is beginning to occur.
Being direct in therapy can arouse feelings in therapists about issues of ________ and
________.
a. self-involvement / self-disclosure
b. depression / safety
c. therapist hostility / client vulnerability
d. Both a and c are correct
The interpersonal process approach can be applied by therapists who choose to work
within:
a. the same theoretical orientation.
b. different theoretical orientations.
c. family theories only.
d. person centered theories only.
Therapists want to respond to ambivalence about making first appointments by:
a. Addressing it directly.
b. Discouraging the client from acting on the ambivalence.
c. Accepting the uncertain commitment.
d. Both a and b are correct.
When therapists step out of their “roles” and become more present with clients, the
potential for greater emotional contact is possible as well as:
a. Stopping the therapeutic process.
b. Arousing countertransference issues.
c. Easily finding optimum interpersonal connectedness.
d. Having little difficulty differentiating personal issues of the therapist from the client.
The process dimension in therapeutic relationships can best be utilized with:
a. A psychoanalytic-object relationship orientation.
b. A interpersonal-dynamic orientation.
c. Longer term therapy modalities.
d. Any theoretical orientation.
Clients often interpret their own resistance as being ______ and want to _______ the
topic.
a. normal/avoid
b. shameful/avoid
c. bad/approach
d. irrelevant/change
When children are allowed to play one parent against the other, they:
a. Learn that rules do not apply to them.
b. Learn that rules always apply to them.
c. Are rarely viewed as manipulative by others.
d. Tend to become extremely high achievers.
A client’s inability to act or change, results from:
a. The push-pull nature of conflict.
b. The inability to follow good advice.
c. A personality disorder.
d. The lack of motivation.
The therapeutic term for multigenerational reenactment is:
a. projective indentification.
b. identification with the aggressor.
c. family projection process.
d. All of the above are true.
One of the best ways to evaluate the success of an initial interview is for therapists to
ask themselves:
a. “Was I able to create a corrective emotional experience for my client?”
b. “Do I feel like I made contact with this person and have a genuine feeling for who he
or she is?”
c. “Was I able to listen to my client without responding emotionally to his/her
experience?”
d. Both a & c are correct.
When client conflicts are replayed in the therapeutic relationship, and are consequently
made overt, beginning therapists commonly feel ________.
a. Inadequate
b. enlivened
c. powerful
d. prepared
Three suggestions for new therapists to resolve their initial performance
anxiety include:
a. questioning the unrealistic performance expectations they often place on themselves.
b. de-centering and focus more on the client and what the client is really saying.
c. requesting active support from their supervisors and instructors.
d. all of the above are correct.
When clients begin therapy by externalizing their problems, the therapist must first:
a. Direct clients toward an internal focus.
b. Acknowledge the complaints as valid concerns.
c. Give clients several solution options.
d. Find the repetitive relational conflict involved in their interactions.
To identify recurrent themes from a client, the therapist needs to find a/an ________
a. presenting symptom.
b. predominant affect.
c. integrating focus.
d. precipitating factors.
After inviting clients to express their concerns about the therapist or therapy, the
therapist must:
a. Accept the validity of the client’s perception.
b. Interpret the theme underlying the concerns.
c. Reassure the client by resolving the anxiety.
d. Disclose his/her own concerns.
When therapists evoke in their clients unacceptable feelings about themselves, they are:
a. able to avoid their own disavowed feelings.
b. do not have to remember feeling badly about themselves.
c. avoiding shame about themselves.
b. All of the above are correct.
The locus of change in the therapeutic setting must remain ___________
a. entirely with the therapist.
b. entirely with the client.
c. entirely with the supervisor.
d. a shared control or collaborative alliance between therapist and client.
Recognizing the ______ structure of conflicts will enable therapists to respond to the
______ that has immobilized the client and prevented change from occurring.
a. one-sided/pattern
b. hidden/problem
c. patterned/individual
d. two-sided/ambivalence
Supporting the client’s own autonomy and initiative is found in a/an ________ rather
than a/an ________
a. independence-fostering / dependence-fostering approach.
b. dependence-fostering / independence-fostering approach.
c. neutral, dispassionate relationship / active, close relationship.
d. teacher-student role / helper-helpee dynamic.
A common reason therapists resist focusing the client inward is:
a. Some clients will become angry as they are encouraged to explore conflicts.
b. They want to maintain client approval.
c. That they confuse being direct with being critical, blaming, or non-supportive.
d. All of the above.
To identify patterns and themes that cause problems in clients’ lives, the therapist:
a. tracks their depression to their childhood.
b. tracks their anxiety.
c. asks the client what they think their patterns and themes are.
d. Both a & b are correct.
A primary treatment goal for therapists with almost all clients is:
a. to “hook” a client into feeling comfortable about therapy by reassuring him/her that
everything will be okay.
b. to help clients discriminate when certain defensive coping strategies are needed and
when they are outdated.
c. to help clients see that all old coping strategies are outdated and new ones need to be
developed.
d. Both a & c are correct.
__________ is one of the most common consequences of systematic invalidation.
a. Apathy
b. Schizophrenia
c. Disempowerment
d. There are no consequences.
A common way in which clients’ conflicts are reenacted in the therapeutic process is:
a. When therapists view their clients’ problems and lives as being too similar to their
own.
b. When therapists maintain their own objectivity and separateness while at the same
time being available and responsive.
c. When therapists self-discloses their own experiences and feelings.
d. There is no common way in which clients’ conflicts are reenacted.
Clients’ conflicts are two-sided, and therapists will be effective when:
a. They respond to the most intense emotion.
b. They respond to both sides, but emphasize the side that is causing the most problems.
c. They respond to the feelings that accompany both sides.
d. They respond to the initial feeling.
In order to formulate an interpersonal conceptualization, which of the following
questions are least important for the therapist to answer?
a. What do clients elicit from others?
b. What is the client’s previous psychiatric diagnosis and/or medical history?
c. How will the client test the therapist?
d. What is the principle relational pattern that the client is reenacting in the therapeutic
relationship?
When therapists become inappropriately over-identified with certain clients, they
________.
a. are enmeshed with their clients
b. are disengaged from their clients
c. are detached from their clients
d. have destroyed any hope of regaining appropriate balance in the therapeutic
relationship
Empathic understanding is:
a. a technique used by therapists to convey to a client he/she has had the same
counseling issues and experiences as the client and can relate.
b. a respectful attitude and non-judgmental stance.
c. a key concept for change in the interpersonal approach.
d. Both b & c are correct.
Because the interpersonal process has such a strong impact on clients, beginning
therapists should use supervision to learn to do the following:
a. Disengage their feelings in the therapeutic relationship.
b. Resolve problems in the same way as their supervisor.
c. Manage their anxiety over having personal power.
d. Maintain responsibility for client change.
Attachment theorists believe that “joining” a client where they are:
a. is a type of effective sensitive attunement.
b. is more important to the client than giving an intelligent solution to their problem.
c. translates into resistance of advice giving by the therapist.
d. All of the above are correct.
The principal goal of interpersonally oriented therapy is:
a. The client experiences a different and more satisfying kind of relationship with the
therapist, than he/she has had in the past.
b. The client’s individuation from his/her family.
c. The client’s resolution of conflict by eliciting the same response from the therapist as
experienced in the past.
d. The client’s cathartic release.
“Other focused” clients:
a. tend to feel anxious, depressed and helpless.
b. can resolve their problems by changing their way of responding in conflicted
relationships.
c. can resolve their problems by assertion training.
d. Both a & b are correct.
The most important source of information about clients and what their interpersonal
style tends to elicit from others is:
a. a therapist’s awareness of their own feelings that are elicited by clients.
b. a client’s developmental history.
c. a client’s cultural context.
d. All of the above are correct.