Terminology's Impact on Expectations about and Intentions to Seek Psychological Services

Abstract

Recent research has suggested that psychologists could reframe counseling services as coaching in order to increase the use of psychological services by the general public. This study explored the differential impact of the terminology suggested by replacing the term counseling with the term coaching when assessing college students' expectations about and intentions to seek psychological services. Results indicated that students in general had similar expectations for directiveness, motivation, outcome, or intentions to seek psychological services regardless of terminology used to describe the services.

KEYWORDS:

• terminology
• counseling
• coaching
• psychological services
• expectations
• intentions
• reframing
• students
• professional
• outcome
• motivation
• directiveness