Supervision from Afar: trainees’ perspectives on telesupervision

ABSTRACT

Telesupervision, or supervision at a distance, has become more widely used due to its many practical and economic benefits, with research suggesting it is as satisfactory as traditional, in-person supervision processes. Particularly as a result of the global pandemic COVID-19 limiting in-person contact, use of telesupervision has even become mandatory for some training sites. In the current article, two doctoral-level clinical psychology student trainees provided their perspectives on participating in telesupervision during practicum training at a telepsychology clinic prior to COVID-19 and briefly highlighted how it has applied to their work in the current environment. Their experiences are discussed in conjunction with relevant supervision literature, as well as the impact on the trainees’ development. The trainees’ perspectives support the notion that telepsychology can be a positive component of training, irrespective of public health concerns, and specific positive factors of using telesupervision are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Telesupervision
• distance supervision
• supervision
• training
• telepsychology

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Paula A. Bernhard

Paula A. Bernhard is currently a forensic psychology postdoctoral fellow at the University of Massachusetts Medical School and attended graduate school at Sam Houston State University in the Clinical Psychology doctoral program.

Joshua S. Camins

Joshua S. Camins is currently a pre-doctoral psychology intern at the Memphis VA Medical Center and attended graduate school at Sam Houston State University in the Clinical Psychology doctoral program.