Supervisee nondisclosures in clinical supervision: a meta-analysis

ABSTRACT

Objectives

Supervisee nondisclosure (SND), a prevalent phenomenon in clinical supervision, hinders the learning process in supervision and may ultimately harm clients. The purpose of this study was to explore the relationship between supervisee nondisclosure and supervisee characteristics, supervisor characteristics, supervisory relationship, and supervision outcome.

Method

A comprehensive search following PRISMA guidelines was performed to collect studies that met the inclusion criteria. A meta-analysis was conducted with 61 articles (213 effect sizes, 12,376 participants).

Results

A low-to-moderate relationship was found between SND and supervisee characteristics. A moderate relationship was found for SND and supervisor characteristics. A moderate-to-high relationship was found for SND and supervisory relationship. Supervisee role conflict/ambiguity, supervisor multicultural competence/orientation, and supervisory working alliance showed the highest effect sizes in relationship to SND. Finally, a moderate relationship was found between SND and supervision outcome, demonstrating that SND was related to lower supervision satisfaction, perceived competence, and self-efficacy.

Conclusions

Our findings demonstrate the importance of attending to nondisclosures in supervision. Supervisors should seek to create a collaborative and culturally sensitive relationship that can help the supervisee feel safe in providing information.

Key Points

What is already known about this topic:

1. During clinical supervision, supervisees often withhold information from their supervisors.

2. Concealment of perceived clinical errors or negative reactions to the supervisor may limit the learning opportunities of the supervisee, and affect their capability to provide quality services.

3. Nondisclosure in supervision is related to the supervisee’s characteristics (e.g. attachment), the supervisor’s characteristics (e.g. supervisory style), supervisory relationship (e.g. supervisory alliance), and supervision outcome (e.g. self-efficacy).

What this topic adds:

1. This research is the first to conduct a comprehensive meta-analysis of supervisee nondisclosure including all supervision related variables that have been studied over the past 27 years. This meta-analysis enables an exhaustive coverage of the current literature on nondisclosures in supervision.

2. Although nondisclosures are affected by supervisee characteristics, this connection may not necessarily be strong. Rather, variables pertaining to the supervisor or the supervisory relationship, such as the quality of the working relationship or supervisor multicultural competence/orientation, may contribute more to SND.

3. Synthesis of individual studies show that nondisclosures may negatively impact supervision outcomes such as supervision satisfaction and supervisee competence. This calls for the importance of attending to SND.  

KEYWORDS:

• Supervision
• supervisee nondisclosure
• supervision outcome
• meta-analysis

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, Kim, K., upon reasonable request.

Additional information

Funding

This paper was supported by the Education and Research Promotion Program of KOREATECH in 2023.