Choice Theory/Reality Therapy William Glasser

slide1. Choice Theory/Reality Therapy<br>
slide2. William Glasser (1925-2013) WILLIAM GLASSER (1925—2013) was educated at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. Initially a chemical engineer, he turned to psychology, and then to psychiatry, attending medical school with the intention of becoming a psychiatrist.
Very early Glasser rejected the Freudian model, partly due to his observation of psychoanalytically trained therapists who did not seem to be implementing Freudian principles. Rather, they tended to hold people responsible for their behavior.
Early in his career, Glasser was a psychiatrist at the Ventura School, a prison and school for girls operated by the California Youth Authority. He became convinced that his psychoanalytic training was of limited utility in counseling these young people. From these observations, Glasser thought it best to talk to the sane part of clients, not their disturbed side.<br>
slide3. Origins of Choice Theory (Glasser) Glasser became convinced that it was of paramount importance that clients accept personal responsibility for their behavior. Glasser learned about control theory from William Powers, and he believed this theory had great potential. He spent the next 10 years expanding, revising, and clarifying what he was initially taught.
Glasser changed the name to choice theory to reflect all that he had developed. The essence of reality therapy, now taught all over the world, is that we are all responsible for what we choose to do. We are internally motivated by current needs and wants, and we control our present behavioral choices.
William Glasser Institute (wglasser.com)<br>
slide4. Robert E. Wubbolding Wubbolding is the director of the Center for Reality Therapy in Cincinnati (realitytherapywub.com) and faculty associate at Johns Hopkins University. He is also professor emeritus of Xavier University, where he taught counselor education for 32 years.
After completing his doctorate, Wubbolding attended training sessions representing a wide range of counseling approaches, yet he found reality therapy to be best suited to his interests. He attended many intensive training workshops conducted by William Glasser in Los Angeles, and previously served as director of training for the William Glasser Institute.
Wubbolding extended the theory and practice of reality therapy with his conceptualization of the Wants-Direction-Evaluation-Plan (WDEP) system.<br>
slide5. Reality Therapy: Selected Books Mental Health or Mental Illness? Psychiatry for Practical Action, Reality Therapy,
The Effect of School Failure on the Life of a Child, The Identity Society,
Schools Without Failure, Positive Addiction,
Stations of the Mind, Take Effective Control of Your Life,
Control Theory, Control Theory in the Classroom,
Control Theory in the Practice of Reality Therapy: Case Studies, The Quality School,
The Quality School Teacher, Reclaiming Literature,
The Control Theory Manager, Staying Together,
Choice Theory, Choice Theory in the Classroom Revised,
Choice: The Flip Side of Control, The Quality School Teacher: A Companion Volume to The Quality School, 1998
Teoria de La Eleccion, Reality Therapy in Action,
Counseling with Choice Theory, Fibromyalgia: Hope from a Completely New Perspective,

Unhappy Teenagers: A Way for Parents and Teachers to Reach Them,
For Parents and Teenagers: Dissolving the Barrier Between You and Your Teen,
WARNING: Psychiatry Can Be Hazardous to Your Mental Health,<br>
slide6. Introduction Reality therapists believe the underlying problem for most clients is the same: they are either involved in a present unsatisfying relationship or lack what could even be called a relationship.
Many client problems are caused by their inability to connect, to get close to others, or to have a satisfying or successful relationship with at least one significant person in their life.
The therapist guides clients toward a satisfying relationship and teaches them more effective ways of behaving. The more clients are able to connect with people, the greater chance they have to experience happiness.<br>
slide7. Introduction Few clients understand that their problem, which is unhappiness, results from the way they are choosing to behave.
What they do know is that they feel a great deal of pain or that they are unhappy because they have been sent for counseling by someone with authority who is not satisfied with their behavior—typically a court official, a school administrator, an employer, a spouse, or a parent.
Reality therapists recognize that clients choose their behaviors as a way to deal with the frustrations caused by unsatisfying relationships.<br>
slide8. Choice Theory – Need for a new therapy Need to change our “7 Deadly Habits of External Control”
– Criticizing – Blaming – Complaining Nagging – Threatening – Punishing – Bribing or rewarding to control
• To the “7 Caring Habits of Choice Theory)”
– Respecting – Supporting – Encouraging Listening – Accepting – Trusting – Negotiating differences to a Win/Win situation<br>
slide9. External Control System It is difficult to retrain our thinking and communication because we are so engrained in the external control system
• Three Beliefs of External Control Psychology:
– 1) My behavior is caused by something that occurs outside of myself (e.g., “I answer the phone because it rings”) – 2) I can make you do what I want you to do or we can control each other by what we say or do – 3) I know what’s right for you & if you don’t do it, I should & must control you because it is the right thing to do
**Strongly Agree, Agree, Unsure, Disagree, Strongly Disagree Where are you on this continuum of beliefs for #1, 2, & 3<br>
slide10. Diagnosis Glasser stated that clients should not be labeled with a diagnosis, unless absolutely necessary for insurance purposes
Labeling ineffective behaviors as mental illness is inaccurate. Glasser limits the term mental illness to conditions such as Alzheimer’s disease, epilepsy, head trauma, and brain infections—conditions associated with tangible brain damage.
Because these people are suffering from a brain abnormality, Glasser’s view is that they should be treated primarily by neurologists. Wubbolding tempers these principles, advising counselors to follow standard practice and the standard of care regarding diagnosis and use of psychiatric medications.<br>
slide11. Reality Therapy & Choice Theory Reality therapy is based on choice theory as it is explained in several of Glasser’s books.
Choice theory is the theoretical basis for reality therapy; it explains why and how we function.
Reality therapy provides a delivery system for helping individuals take more effective control of their lives.
If choice theory is the highway, reality therapy is the vehicle delivering the product<br>
slide12. Five Needs of Choice Theory We are born with five genetically encoded needs that drive us all our lives:
1. survival, or self-preservation;
2. love and belonging;
3. power, or inner control;
4. freedom, or independence; and
5. fun, or enjoyment.
**Each of us has all five needs, but they vary in strength. For example, we all have a need for love and belonging, but some of us need more love than others.<br>
slide13. Need for Love Choice theory is based on the premise that because we are by nature social creatures we need to both receive and give love.
Glasser (2001, 2005) believes the need to love and to belong is the primary need because we need people to satisfy the other needs.
It is also the most difficult need to satisfy because we must have a cooperative person to help us meet it.<br>
slide14. Our Quality World Choice theory teaches that we do not satisfy our needs directly. Beginning shortly after birth and continuing all our lives, we keep close track of anything we do that feels very good.
We store information inside our minds and build a file of wants, called our quality world, which is at the core of our life. It is our personal world we would like to live in if we could. It is completely based on our wants and needs, but unlike the needs, which are general, it is very specific.
The quality world consists of specific images of people, activities, events, beliefs, possessions, and situations that fulfill our needs<br>
slide15. Picture Album In our quality world we develop an inner picture album of specific wants as well as precise ways to satisfy these wants.
We are attempting to behave in a way that gives us the most effective control over our lives.
Some pictures may be blurred, and the therapist’s role is to help the client clarify them. Pictures exist in priority for most people, yet clients may have difficulty identifying their priorities.
Part of the process of reality therapy is assisting clients in prioritizing their wants and uncovering what is most important to them<br>
slide16. People in Our Quality World People we are closest to, and most enjoy being with, are the most important component of our quality world, and we most want to connect with these people.
Those who enter therapy may have no one in their quality world or, more often, may have someone in their quality world whom they are unable to relate to in a satisfying way.
For therapy to have a chance of success, a therapist must be the kind of person that clients would consider putting in their quality world. Getting into the clients’ quality world is the art of therapy. It is from this relationship with the therapist that clients begin to learn how to get close to the people they need.<br>
slide17. Total Behavior Choice theory explains that all we ever do from birth to death is behave, and, with some exceptions, everything we do is chosen or at least generated from within ourselves.
Every total behavior is our best attempt to get what we want to satisfy our needs. Total behavior teaches that all behavior is made up of four inseparable but distinct components—acting, thinking, feeling, and physiology—that necessarily accompany all of our actions, thoughts, and feelings.<br>
slide18. Role of Behavior Choice theory emphasizes thinking and acting, which makes this a general form of cognitive behavior therapy.
The primary emphasis is on what the client is doing and how the doing component influences the other aspects of total behavior.
Behavior is purposeful because it is designed to close the gap between what we want and what we perceive we are getting.
Our behaviors come from the inside, and thus we choose our destiny.<br>
slide19. Lack of Personal Responsibility From Glasser’s perspective, to speak of being depressed, having a headache, being angry, or being anxious implies passivity and lack of personal responsibility, and it is inaccurate.
It is more accurate to think of these as parts of total behaviors and to use the verb forms depressing, headaching, angering, and anxietying to describe them.
It is more accurate to think of people depressing or angering themselves rather than having the behaviors thrust upon them from the outside world.<br>
slide20. In the Beginning When a reality therapist starts teaching choice theory, the client will often protest and say, “I’m suffering, don’t tell me I’m choosing to suffer like this.”
As painful as depressing is, the therapist explains that people do not choose pain and suffering directly; rather, it is an unchosen part of their total behavior.
The behavior of the person is the best effort, ineffective as it is, to satisfy needs.<br>
slide21. What Do Reality Therapists Focus On – Choice and Responsibility Reality therapists see clients as being responsible for their own choices as they have more control of their behavior than they often believe.
This does not mean people should be blamed or punished, unless they break the law, but it does mean the therapist never loses sight of the fact that clients are responsible for what they do.
Choice theory changes the focus of responsibility to choice and choosing. Reality therapists deal with people “as if” they have choices. Therapists focus on those areas where clients have choice, for doing so gets them closer to the people they need, such as work, as a meaningful activity and way to gain the respect of other people<br>
slide22. Rejecting Transference Reality therapists strive to be themselves in their professional work. By being themselves, therapists can use the relationship to teach clients how to relate to others in their lives.
Glasser contends that transference is a way that both therapist and client avoid being who they are and owning what they are doing right now. It is unrealistic for therapists to go along with the idea that they are anyone but themselves.
Assume the client claims, “I see you as my father or mother and this is why I’m behaving the way I am.” In such a situation a reality therapist is likely to say clearly and firmly, “I am not your mother, father, or anyone but myself.”<br>
slide23. Keeping Therapy in the Present Some clients come to counseling convinced that they must revisit the past if they are to be helped. Many therapeutic models teach that to function well in the present people must understand and revisit their past.
Glasser disagrees with this assumption and contends that whatever mistakes were made in the past are not pertinent now. While the past may have contributed to a current problem, the past is never the problem.
To function effectively, people need to live and plan in the present and take steps to create a better future. We can only satisfy our needs in the present.<br>
slide24. Keeping Therapy in the Present The reality therapist does not totally reject the past. If the client wants to talk about past successes or good relationships in the past, the therapist will listen because these may be repeated in the present.
Reality therapists will devote only enough time to past failures to assure clients that they are not rejecting them.
As soon as possible, therapists tell clients, “What has happened is over; it can’t be changed. The more time we spend looking back, the more we avoid looking forward.”
Although the past has propelled us to the present, it does not have to determine our future.<br>
slide25. Avoid Focusing on the Symptoms In traditional therapy a great deal of time is spent focusing on symptoms by asking clients how they feel and why they are obsessing. Focusing on the past “protects” clients from facing the reality of unsatisfying present relationships, and focusing on symptoms does the same thing.
Whether people are depressing or paining, they tend to think that what they are experiencing is happening to them.
The reality therapist spends as little time as they can on the symptoms because they will last only as long as they are needed to deal with an unsatisfying relationship or the frustration of basic needs.<br>
slide26. Challenge Traditional Views of Mental Illness Choice theory rejects the traditional notion that people with problematic physical and psychological symptoms are mentally ill.
Glasser has warned people to be cautious of psychiatry, which can be hazardous to both one’s physical and mental health. He criticizes the traditional psychiatric establishment for relying heavily on the DSM-5 (American Psychiatric Association, 2013) for both diagnosis and treatment.
Glasser (2003) challenges the traditionally accepted views of mental illness and treatment by the use of medication, especially the widespread use of psychiatric drugs that often results in negative side effects both physically and psychologically.<br>
slide27. Therapeutic Goals A primary goal of contemporary reality therapy is to help clients get connected or reconnected with the people they have chosen to put in their quality world.
In addition to fulfilling this need for love and belonging, a basic goal of reality therapy is to help clients learn better ways of fulfilling all of their needs, including achievement, power or inner control, freedom or independence, and fun.
The basic human needs serve to focus treatment planning and setting both short- and long-term goals. Reality therapists assist clients in making more effective and responsible choices related to their wants and needs.<br>
slide28. Therapist Function and Role Therapy is often considered as a mentoring process in which the therapist is the teacher and the client is the student.
Reality therapists teach clients how to engage in self-evaluation, which is done by raising the question, “Is what you are choosing to do getting you what you want and need?”
Here are some other questions that therapists tend to ask clients: How would you most like to change your life?, What do you want in your life that you are not getting?, What would you have in your life if you were to change?, What do you have to do now to make the changes happen?<br>
slide29. Therapist Function and Role The role of the reality therapist is not to make the evaluation for clients but to challenge clients to examine what they are doing.
It is the job of therapists to convey the idea that no matter how bad things are there is hope. If therapists are able to instill this sense of hope, clients feel that they are no longer alone and that change is possible.
The therapist functions as an advocate, someone who is on the client’s side. Together they creatively address a range of concerns and options.<br>
slide30. Client’s Experience in Therapy Reality therapists will gently, but firmly challenge clients. They often ask clients questions such as these: “Is what you are choosing to do bringing you closer to the people you want to be closer to right now?” “Is what you are doing getting you closer to a new person if you are presently disconnected from everyone?”
These questions are part of the self-evaluation process, which is the cornerstone of reality therapy.
Clients should be able to say to themselves, “I can begin to use what we talked about today in my life. I am able to bring my present experiences to therapy as my problems are in the present, and my therapist will not let me escape from that fact.”<br>
slide31. Techniques and Procedures: The Practice of Reality Therapy The practice of reality therapy can best be conceptualized as the cycle of counseling (Wubbolding, 2015a), which consists of two major components:

(1) creating the counseling environment and
(2) implementing specific procedures that lead to changes in behavior.

The art of counseling is to weave these components together in ways that lead clients to evaluate their lives and decide to move in more effective directions.<br>
slide32. The Practice of Reality Therapy How do these components blend in the counseling process? The cycle of counseling begins with creating a working relationship with clients and proceeds through an exploration of clients’ wants, needs, and perceptions.
Clients explore their total behavior and make their own evaluation of how effective they are in getting what they want. If clients decide to try new behavior, they make plans that will lead to change, and they commit themselves to those plans.
The cycle of counseling includes following up on how well clients are doing and offering further consultation as needed.<br>
slide33. The Counseling Environment The practice of reality therapy rests on the assumption that a supportive and challenging environment allows clients to begin making life changes. The therapeutic relationship is the foundation for effective practice
Counselors who hope to create a therapeutic alliance strive to avoid arguing, attacking, accusing, demeaning, blaming, bossing, criticizing, finding fault, coercing, encouraging excuses, holding grudges, instilling fear, or giving up easily
It is from this mildly confrontive, yet always caring, environment that clients learn to create the satisfying environment that leads to successful relationships. In this coercion-free atmosphere, clients feel free to be creative and to begin to try new behaviors.<br>
slide34. Procedures That Lead to Change Reality therapists operate on the assumption that we are motivated to change:
(1) when we are convinced that our present behavior is not meeting our needs and
(2) when we believe we can choose other behaviors that will get us closer to what we want.
Reality therapists begin by asking clients what they want from therapy. Therapists take the mystery and uncertainty out of the therapeutic process. They also inquire about the choices clients are making in their relationships.<br>
slide35. Beginning Reality Therapy In the first session, a skilled therapist looks for and defines the wants of the client.
The therapist also looks for a key unsatisfying present relationship—usually with a spouse, a child, a parent, or an employer. The therapist might ask, “Whose behavior can you control?”
This question may need to be asked several times during the next few sessions to deal with the client’s resistance to looking at his or her own behavior.
The emphasis is on encouraging the client to focus on what he or she can control. When clients begin to realize that they can control only their own behavior, therapy is under way.<br>
slide36. Course of Reality Therapy The rest of therapy focuses on how clients can make better choices. There are more choices available than clients realize, and the therapist explores these possible choices.
Clients may be stuck in misery, blaming, and the past, but they can choose to change—even if the other person in the relationship does not change. Wubbolding points out that clients can learn they are not at the mercy of others, are not victims, are capable of gaining a sense of inner control, and have a range of choices open to them.
In short, clients in reality therapy often acquire a sense of hope for a better future.<br>
slide37. Wubbolding’s WDEP System Wubbolding uses the acronym WDEP to describe key procedures in the practice of reality therapy.
The WDEP system can be used to help clients explore their wants, possible things they can do, opportunities for self-evaluation, and design plans for improvement
Each of the letters refers to a cluster of strategies: W = wants, needs, and perceptions; D = direction and doing; E = self-evaluation; and P = planning.<br>
slide38. Wants (Exploring Wants, Needs, and Perceptions) Reality therapists assist clients in discovering their wants and hopes. All wants are related to the five basic needs.
The key question asked is, “What do you want?”
Through the therapist’s skillful questioning, clients are assisted in defining what they want from the counseling process and from the world around them.
Part of counseling consists of exploring the “picture album,” or quality world, of clients and how their behavior is aimed at moving their perception of the external world closer to their inner world of wants.<br>
slide39. Helping Clients Pinpoint What They Want If you were the person that you wish you were, what kind of person would you be?
What would your family be like if your wants and their wants matched?
What would you be doing if you were living as you want to live?
Do you really want to change your life?
What is it you want that you don’t seem to be getting from life?
What do you think stops you from making the changes you would like?<br>
slide40. “Wants” (continued) People have a great deal more control than they often perceive, and these questions help clients move from a sense of external control to a sense of internal control. This line of questioning sets the stage for applying other procedures in reality therapy.
It is an art for counselors to know what questions to ask, how to ask them, and when to ask them. Relevant questions help clients gain insights and arrive at plans and solutions.
In this phase of counseling, clients begin to commit to making changes in their behavior.<br>
slide41. D = Direction and Doing The focus on the present is characterized by the key question asked by the reality therapist: “What are you doing?”
Even though problems may be rooted in the past, clients need to learn how to deal with them in the present by learning better ways of getting what they want.
Early in counseling it is essential to discuss with clients the overall direction of their lives, including where they are going and where their behavior is taking them. The therapist holds a mirror before the client and asks, “What do you see for yourself now and in the future?”<br>
slide42. Direction and Doing (continued) Reality therapy focuses on gaining awareness of and changing current total behavior.
To accomplish this, reality therapists focus on questions like these: “What are you doing now?” “What did you actually do yesterday?” “What did you want to do differently this past week?” “What stopped you from doing what you said you wanted to do?” “What will you do tomorrow?”
Listening to clients talk about feelings can be productive, but only if it is linked to what they are doing.
Rather than focusing mainly on these feelings, however, reality therapists encourage clients to take action by changing what they are doing and thinking.<br>
slide43. E = Evaluation/Self-Evaluation Self-evaluation is the cornerstone of reality therapy procedures. “Conducting a searching and fearless self-evaluation is the royal road to behavioral change” (Wubbolding).
Clients are asked to make the following self-evaluation: “Does your present behavior have a reasonable chance of getting you what you want now, and will it take you in the direction you want to go?”
This evaluation involves the client examining behavioral direction, specific actions, wants, perceptions, new directions, and plans (Wubbolding).<br>
slide44. Evaluation/Self-Evaluation Wubbolding believes that clients often present a problem with a significant relationship, which is at the root of much of their dissatisfaction
The counselor can help clients evaluate their behavior by asking this question: “Is your current behavior bringing you closer to people important to you or is it driving you further apart?”
Through skillful questioning, the counselor helps clients determine if what they are doing is helping them.<br>
slide45. Suggested Questions (Wubbolding) Is what you are doing helping or hurting you?
Is what you are doing now what you want to be doing?
Is your behavior working for you?
Is there a healthy congruence between what you are doing and what you believe?
Is what you are doing against the rules?
Is what you want realistic or attainable?
Does it help you to look at it that way?
Is it really true that you have no control over your situation?
How committed are you to the therapeutic process and to changing your life?
After carefully examining what you want, does it appear to be in your best interests and in the best interest of others?<br>
slide46. Motivation to Change Individuals will not change until they first decide that a change would be more advantageous. Without an honest self-assessment, it is unlikely that clients will change.
Reality therapists are relentless in their efforts to help clients conduct explicit self-evaluations of each behavioral component. When therapists ask a depressing client if this behavior is helping in the long run, they introduce the idea of choice to the client.
The process of evaluation of the doing, thinking, feeling, and physiological components of total behavior is within the scope of the client’s responsibility.<br>
slide47. Being More Directive With Some Clients In working with clients who are in crisis, for example, it is sometimes necessary to suggest straightforwardly what will work and what will not.
Other clients, such as alcoholics and children of alcoholics, need direction early in the course of treatment, for they often do not have the thinking behaviors in their control system to be able to make consistent evaluations of when their lives are seriously out of effective control.
As they grow and continue to interact with the counselor, they learn to make evaluations with less and less help from the counselor (Wubbolding).<br>
slide48. P = Planning and Action Much of the significant work of the counseling process involves helping clients identify specific ways to fulfill their wants and needs. Once clients determine what they want to change, they are generally ready to explore other possible behaviors and formulate an action plan.
The key question is, “What is your plan?”
The process of creating and carrying out plans enables people to begin to gain effective control over their lives.
If the plan does not work, for whatever reason, the counselor and client work together to devise a different plan.<br>
slide49. Planning and Action The culmination of the cycle of counseling rests with a plan of action. Although planning is important, it is effective only if the client has made a self-evaluation and determined that he or she wants to change a behavior.
Wubbolding uses the acronym SAMIC to capture the essence of a good plan: simple, attainable, measurable, immediate, involved, controlled by the planner, committed to, and consistently done.
Wubbolding contends that clients gain more effective control over their lives with plans that have certain characteristics (next slide)<br>
slide50. Characteristics of Successful Plans The plan is within the limits of the motivation and capacities of the client. Skillful counselors help clients identify plans that involve greater need-fulfilling payoffs. Clients may be asked, “What plans could you make now that would result in a more satisfying life?”
Good plans are simple and easy to understand. They are realistically doable, positive rather than negative, dependent on the planner, specific, immediate, and repetitive. Although they need to be specific, concrete, and measurable, plans should be flexible and open to revision as clients gain a deeper understanding of the specific behaviors they want to change.<br>
slide51. Characteristics of Successful Plans (continued) The plan involves a positive course of action, and it is stated in terms of what the client is willing to do. Even small plans can help clients take significant steps toward their desired changes.
Counselors encourage clients to develop plans that they can carry out independently of what others do. Plans that are contingent on others lead clients to sense that they are not steering their own ship but are at the mercy of the ocean.
Effective plans are repetitive and, ideally, are performed daily.<br>
slide52. Characteristics of Successful Plans (continued) Plans are carried out as soon as possible. Counselors can ask the question, “What are you willing to do today to begin to change your life?”
Plans involve process-centered activities. For example, clients may plan to do any of the following: apply for a job, write a letter to a friend, take a yoga class, substitute nutritious food for junk food, devote two hours a week to volunteer work, or take a vacation that they have been wanting.<br>
slide53. Characteristics of Successful Plans (continued) Before clients carry out their plan, it is a good idea for them to evaluate it with their therapist to determine whether it is realistic and attainable and whether it relates to what they need and want.
After the plan has been carried out in real life, it is useful to evaluate it again and make any revisions that may be necessary.
To help clients commit themselves to their plan, it is useful for them to firm it up in writing.<br>
slide54. Clients’ Commitment to Plans Commitment is not an all-or-nothing matter; it exists in degrees.
Wubbolding maintains that it is important for a therapist to ask about clients’ level of commitment, or how much they are willing to work to bring about change. This communicates in an implicit way to clients that they have within them the power to take charge of their lives.
It is essential that those clients who are reluctant to make a commitment be helped to express and explore their fears of failing. Clients are helped by a therapist who does not easily give up believing in their ability to make better choices, even if they are not always successful in completing their plans.<br>
slide55. Strengths from Multicultural Perspective The core principles of choice theory and reality therapy have much to offer in the area of multicultural counseling. In cross-cultural therapy it is essential that counselors respect the differences in worldview between themselves and their clients.
Counselors demonstrate their respect for the cultural values of their clients by helping them explore how satisfying their current behavior is both to themselves and to others.
Once clients make this assessment, they can formulate realistic plans that are consistent with their cultural values.
It is a further sign of respect that the counselor refrains from deciding what specific behaviors should be changed.<br>
slide56. Strengths from Multicultural Perspective (continued) Wubbolding asserts that the principles underlying choice theory are universal, which makes choice theory applicable to all people. We are all members of the same species and have the same genetic structure; therefore, relationships are the problem in all cultures.
All of us have internal needs, we all make choices, and we all seek to influence the world around us. Putting the principles of choice theory into action demands creativity, sensitivity to cultures and individuals, and flexibility in implementing the procedures of reality therapy.
Reality therapy principles and procedures need to be applied differently in various cultures and must be adapted to the psychological and developmental levels presented by individuals<br>
slide57. Adapting Reality Therapy for Other Cultures Wubbolding’s experience in conducting reality therapy workshops in Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Korea, India, Kuwait, Morocco, Malta, Romania, Australia, Slovenia, Croatia, and countries in western Europe has taught him the difficulty of generalizing about other cultures.
Growing out of these multicultural experiences, Wubbolding (2000) has adapted the cycle of counseling in working with Japanese clients. He points to some basic language differences between Japanese and Western cultures.
North Americans are inclined to say what they mean and to be assertive. In Japanese culture, assertive language is not appropriate between a child and a parent or between an employee and a supervisor. Ways of communicating are more indirect. To ask some Japanese clients what they want may seem harsh and intrusive to them.<br>
slide58. Adapting Reality Therapy to Japanese Culture Examples The reality therapist’s tendency to ask direct questions may need to be softened, with questions being raised more elaborately and indirectly. It may be a mistake to ask individualistic questions built around whether specific behaviors meet the client’s need. Confrontation should be done only after carefully considering the context.
There is no exact Japanese translation for the word “plan,” nor is there an exact word for “accountability,” yet both of these are key dimensions in the practice of reality therapy and are central to Japanese culture.
In asking clients to make plans and commit to them, Western counselors do not settle for a response of “I’ll try.” Instead, they tend to push for an explicit pledge to follow through. In Japanese culture, however, the counselor is likely to accept “I’ll try” as a firm commitment.<br>
slide59. Limitations of Reality Therapy from Multicultural Perspective One of the shortcomings of reality therapy in working with clients from certain ethnic groups is that it may not take fully into account some very real environmental forces that operate against them in their everyday lives.
Counselors need to be broadly trained and be able to compensate for the limitation inherent in all counseling theories
There is a danger that some reality therapists may overstress the ability of these clients to take charge of their lives and not pay enough attention to systemic and environmental factors that can limit the potential for choice. Some reality therapists may make the mistake of too quickly or too forcefully stressing the ability of their clients to take charge of their lives.<br>