The Factorial Validity of a Scale for Evaluation of Counselors in a University Counseling and Testing Center

Abstract

For a sample of 270 students who sought on their own initiative counseling on academic, career, vocational, and personal matters at a university counseling and testing center, intercorrelations of their responses to 20 statements on the Evaluation of Counselors (EOC) scale were factor-analyzed. The following five factor dimensions were identified: (a) Counselee Satisfaction with the Counseling and Testing Center, (b) Counselor's Facilitation of Counselee's Self-Understanding and Personal Growth, (c) Lack (or Presence) of Confidence in or Rapport with the Counselor, (d) Counselor as a Concerned and Effective Individual in His Relationship with the Counselee, and (e) Counselor Effectiveness in Communication and Interpretation of Information to the Counselee. Thus the EOC scale does not reflect a unitary evaluative dimension, but rather several dimensions of counseling effectiveness. Although the EOC scale was heterogeneous in its factorial content, two internal-consistency estimates of .867 and .921 were obtained for the reliability of the total scale