Evidence-Based Mental Health Counselling Model for College Students

Abstract

Professional counselling is essentially a process of interpersonal interaction, dialogue and communication based on the faith that each human being has an underlying capacity to take and implement appropriate decisions concerning his/her life. Although one of the oldest therapeutic dialogues was recorded in the Bhagavad Gita, the professional counselling which focuses on the comprehensive development of a person has not become popular in India. The increased incidence of campus violence, ragging menace, adolescent suicides, antisocial activities and complex inter and intrapersonal issues have warranted the need for counselling and social work services in the higher education sector in India. Due to the fact that the widely acknowledged counselling theories and techniques are of Euro-American origin, a strong need arises for indigenous counselling models which reflect the worldview of the Indian sub-continent for efficient intervention and effective outcome. This study uses counselling outcome reports and archival data of student-clients, together with the autoethnography study of the researcher’s counselling process, propose a ‘Single-Session Developmental Counselling’ as an evidence-based indigenous model for counselling Indian college students.