We measure the quality of the response by the following 7 metrics. We provide the definition of each metric and the corresponding strategies, guidances and examples.
| Strategies | Guidances | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Information | The response should supply psychological, counselling or mental health data, facts, resources, theory, etc.. It may be specifically related to the counseling process and client's behavior. It may answer direct questions but does not include directions for what the client should do. | There is a psychological effect on first love, called Zeigarnic effect. |
| Direct Guidance | The response should provide suggestions, directives, instructions, or advice about what the client should do to change. This consists of directions or advice that the counselor suggests for the client, or for the client and counselor together, either within or outside the counseling session. | To cope with your OCD, plan ahead by discussing your concerns with your husband and setting boundaries. |
| Approval and Reassurance | The response should provide emotional support, reassurance, encouragement, approval, or reinforcement. It may imply sympathy or tend to alleviate anxiety by minimizing client's problems. | Let me give you a warm hug! / It's wonderful to hear that you are feeling better and finding the diary and thought tables beneficial. |
| Restatement & Reflection & Listening | The response should show its understanding on what the client is feeling or what the client's message means. Then the response should provide repeating or rephrasing of the client's statement(s), or meaning of the question, put its understanding into one's own words (code) and feed it back for the client’s verification. It must contain reference to stated or implied feelings. It may be based on previous statements, or knowledge of the total situation. It may be phrased either tentatively or as a statement. | You feel like you are becoming violent. / It seems like you are struggling with finding a balance in your relationships, especially when it comes to having deep, personal connections. |
| Interpretation | The response should go beyond what the client has overtly recognized. It might take one of several forms: It might establish connections between seemingly isolated statements or events; it interprets defenses, feelings, resistance, or transference (the interpersonal relationship between counselor and client): it might indicate themes, patterns, or causal relationships in the client's behavior or personality. It usually gives alternative meanings, reasons or explanations for old behavior or issues. | I think you love your mom very much. |
| Self-disclosure | The response should share the psychiatrist's own personal experiences and feelings with the client; may begin with an "I". Note that not all statements that begin with an "I" are self-disclosure; it must have a quality of sharing or disclosing. | This question brings back to me some similar memories |
| Obtain releveant information | The response should use appropriate questions. It may request a clarification of feelings or an exploration of the situation without purposely limiting the nature of the response to a yes or no or a one- or two-word response. | Can you provide an example of a change you are considering and why it is challenging for you? |
@book{hill2009helping,
title={Helping skills: Facilitating, exploration, insight, and action},
author={Hill, Clara E},
year={2009},
publisher={American Psychological Association}
}
@misc{sun2021psyqa,
title={PsyQA: A Chinese Dataset for Generating Long Counseling Text for Mental Health Support},
author={Hao Sun and Zhenru Lin and Chujie Zheng and Siyang Liu and Minlie Huang},
year={2021},
eprint={2106.01702},
archivePrefix={arXiv},
primaryClass={cs.CL}
}