Asking Good Questions

Marilu Dionisio-Tumuran, MA,

RGC
 Questions:
-help to open up new areas for discussion.
-assist to pinpoint an issue
-assist to clarify ambiguous information
-invite clients to think or recall information (aids
self-exploration)
too many questions ??????
Effective questioning techniques :

-nature of the client

-ongoing relationship with the counsellor
Types of questions used in counselling:

(1) Open ended

(2) Closed ended

 What is open ended questions?
1. cannot be answered in a few words
2. encourage the client to speak
3. opportunity to gather information about the
client
4. assist the counselee in clarifying or exploring
thoughts or feelings
5. to begin an interview
6. encourage a counselee to use more information
7. request specific examples of a client’s issues or
concerns.
 8. you ask it with the intent of getting a long answer
9. has no correct answer.
10. begin with: what, why, how or could.

How? 
 enables talk about feelings and/or process.
What? lead to facts and information.


When? brings out the timing of the problem, including what


preceded and followed it.
Where? 
 enables discussion about the environment
and situations./place


Why? Most often brings out reasons.



 
 Purposes of Open Ended Question

 To begin an interview
 To encourage client elaboration
 To elicit specific examples
 To motivate client to communicate
 Open Ended Questions are great for:
 Starting the information gathering part of the
session
 Keeping the client talking
 Guidelines for Asking Questions:

 1. ask open-ended questions that get clients to

talk about specific experiences, behaviors and
feelings.
 2. Avoid double questions too many questions,
or assuming an interrogatory role.  
 3. As much as possible avoid “why” questions.
 4. Ask questions that are on topic.
 5. Best approach is to follow a response to
an open-ended question with a paraphrase
or reflection which encourages the client to
share more and avoids repetitive patterns of
question/answer/question/answer, etc.
 
 
Types of Open Questions:
 1. Encourage Exploration (clients to
begin talking)
  2. Explore Expectations about helping
 3. Explore Different Parts of Problems
 (asking client’s expectations )
  4. Request Exploration
 
5. Encourage Clarification or Focus
(vague, rambling, tense and unclear)
 6. Encourage Exploration of Thoughts
 7.  Encourage Exploration of Feelings
(talk more deeply)
 8.  Request Examples ( provide concrete
evidence to obtain a clear tense of the
problem)
 What is closed questions?
 easily answered with a “yes” or a “no” or
brief information
 to request missing information or specific
fact
 to manage over talkative counselees

 Examples….
 Purposes of Closed-Ended Question

 To obtain specific information

 To identify parameters of a problem or issue
 To narrow the topic of discussion
 To interrupt an over talkative client
 What is
empathy?
Marilu Dionisio-Tumuran, MA, RGC
 Think back to a specific situation in your life when
you were in deep emotional pain and someone
attempted to be helpful but instead made things
worse.
 What did this individual do or not do that add to
your distress?
 What did you need from this person instead?

 What was your response?

 Now reflect on time where the result was the
opposite; you were in agony and the person with
you was helpful in some way. What in particular
helped you feel well cared for?
What
do you think is the
meaning of empathy?
 What is the difference of pity, sympathy, empathy
and compassion?
 In Filipino…
Pity evokes a tender or sometimes
slightly contemptuous sorrow or
empathy for a people, person, or animal
in misery, pain, or distress.

1 a: sympathetic sorrow for one

suffering, distressed, or unhappy b:
capacity to feel pity
2: something to be regretted.

 
Pity:
* does not necessarily prompt one
to act for the benefit of the one
being pitied.

* emotions are evoked through the

viewing of another's suffering.
Sympathy is a social affinity in which
one person stands with another
person, “closely” understanding
his or her feelings.

inclination to think or feel alike

Empathy???
1909, the psychologist Edward
Titchener translated the German
Einfühlung (‘feeling into”) into English
as ‘empathy’.
 
What empathy is NOT?
-is not agreeing with the emotions of
the reactions of the counselee
-is unexpressed is not empathy
-I understand (???) – what you
understand?
- is not a question (it is reflective
statement)
 “You feel happy because you got
engaged”
Empathy is not sympathy ( you are feeling
for the counselee rather than feeling with the
counselee. )
What is EMPATHY?

ability to experience the feelings of

another person
beyond sympathy
ability to recognize the private, inner
experience and feelings of the client
and to communicate this recognition to
the client.


29
 What is EMPATHY?
 “being with’”
 A. seeing someone else’s situation from his
perspective
 B. sharing his emotions, including, if any, his
distress.
 ‘It means very little to know that a
million Chinese are starving unless you
know one Chinese who is starving.”

 John Steinbeck


31
 Sympathy

 difference?... when you have sympathy, you are not

experiencing another’s feeling
 sympathy and empathy is compassion
 Compassion recognizes the "me" in "you,"
 COGNITIVE AND AFFECTIVE EMPATHY:
A. Cognitive
B. Affective
Cognitive- cognitively/ intellectually,
understand the counselee’s emotion and
the cause (content) of that emotion.
Empathy that is only felt or understood
internally by the counselor and not
expressed in some ways is not empathy in
the eyes of the counselee.

37
 Affective- involves an emotional
response or connection to the
counselee’s affect.

A counselor should be able to step

into someone else’s experience and
“rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn
with those who mourn” (Romans
12:15)
 Challenge in Affective?

Without losing your sense of self.

Losing happen when you listen to a counselee’s
story and:
1.  Feel as if you lived through yourself.
2. Feel a need to rescue, fix or erase the
counselee’s problem because it is difficult for you to
hear
3. Cannot identify how your feelings, thoughts and
perspectives differ from those of the counselee’s.
Christian Foundations of Empathy:
JESUS modeled it….
Story of Samaritan woman (John 4:4-
26)
Rich young ruler’s dilemma of being
torn between serving him and having to
give up his wealth (Mark 10:17-22)
Jesus’s perceptive understanding
motivation of the woman who anointed
his feet with perfumes and wiped them
with her hair. (Luke 7:37-39)
 Benefits of Empathy:

 1. reduces prejudice and racism

2. increases altruism (helpful even if it goes
against one’s self –interest)
 3. decreases bullying and aggressiveness
 4. promotes heroic acts
 5. counters inequality , and inequality can reduce
empathy
“Rejoice with those who rejoice, mourn
with those who mourn.” Romans 12:15
“To answer before listening-that is folly
and shame.”
Proverbs 18:13
 
3 Functions of Empathy in Therapy (Elliot, et. Al.
2003, p. 112-114)

1. It promotes a positive working alliance.

2. It helps explore and deconstruct clients’
worldviews and assumption about the self and others.
3. It promotes and enhances clients’ capacities to
regulate their affect.
 
 Examples of Empathic response:

I really hear you saying….

 You must have felt…
 It seems to me (you)…
 You mentioned that…

Listening to you it seems as if…

 You appear…
 Empathy is not the best response in the midst of a
crisis

 Highlyemotional counselees may benefit more from

cognitive empathy

 Trueempathy is never used for the counselor’s gain

but is for the counselee’s benefit.
 
 What are some barriers to empathy?

 1. Planning what you are going to say next while the

other person is talking.
 2. Jumping to conclusions before the message is
complete.
 3. Focusing on content only.
 “WHEN YOU GO THROUGH DEEP
WATERS, I WILL BE WITH YOU.”

Isaiah 43:2
 
How would you describe your feelings
and reactions around confrontation in
your personal relationships with friends?
Family and colleagues, etc?

Ona scale of one to ten, how

comfortable are you with the idea of
being confronted? Explain your score.
Who is someone in your life who can
confront you and still feel better?

How do you understand confrontation?

Storiesin the Bible of
Confrontation….:
2 Samuel 12

Nathan confronts David through the

use of story, showing David the
underlying them in what he had done
by murdering Uriah.
John 21:15-19
Jesus’ confrontation of Peter, after
Peter’s denial
- more direct and concrete

Relational connection
John 4 - woman at the well
living with a man who was not her
husband
Mark 10
rich young ruler

prizing money and financial security

over obedient service to God,
Confrontation means challenging
another person over a discrepancy or
disagreement.

 
Guidelines in Confrontation:
1. Confrontation is a skill that can assist clients
to increase their self-awareness.
2. increases the counselor's level of
understanding as well as helping the client form
a more realistic perspective of incongruous
perceptions.
3. It can be used to highlight discrepancies that
clients have previously been unaware of,
overlooked or avoided.
4. used after rapport has been developed
between client and counsellor.
 5. is not always required.

 
Benefits of confrontation:
-It can be very enlightening,
empowering and connecting when
done appropriately.

Ina formula, this sound like: “On

the other hand, _________________,
but on the other
hand_____________________.”
There are three steps to
confrontation in counseling:
1. Involves the identification of
mixed or incongruent messages
2. Requires the counsellor to bring
about awareness of these
incongruities and assist the client to
work through these.
3. Involves evaluating the
effectiveness of the intervention
evidenced by the client’s change and
growth.
Four (4) discrepancies which the client
could display.
The discrepancy can be between:
1. Thoughts and feelings
2. Thoughts and actions
3. Feelings and actions or
4. A combination of thoughts,
feelings and actions.
 
Examples:
“You say you would like to do further
study but you haven’t contacted the
training institution.”
“Your words say you would like to
spend more time with your sister, but
your actions say that it’s not a
priority for you.”
What makes confrontation a “care-
frontation”?  
Establish a good base relationship of
mutual trust and caring. -
-helps establish a foundation of trust and
mutual respect
Be tentative- words “sometimes”, “maybe”
or perhaps can soften a direct confrontation
- allowing counselees to consider what has
been said without feeling as if they need to
defend or refute the reflection as an absolute
in the story.
 
Consider the spirit in which the
confrontation is given.
-Self reflection and self awareness on
the part of the counselor
- you are aware of your motivation
when confronting a counselee
- is it a way of expressing frustration
or annoyance with the counselee
Or is the confrontation truly coming
from a place of care, consideration
and empathy
 
CAUTIONS WHEN USING CARE-
CONFRONTATION:
1. Do not assume that confrontation is to be
used in all counseling relationships.
2. Do not confront early in counseling process.

- confrontation too early in the counseling

process risks sounding like a verbal villain.

3. Do not expect drastic changes from one

confrontation.
 
 When to use care-confrontation…  

Fails to own problem.

“On the other hand, you’re unsatisfied
with your relationships, but on the other
hand, you think everyone else needs to
change.”
 When to use care-confrontation…  

Fails to identify the problem in

solvable ways (AKA “I can’t).
“On the one hand, this is a problem you
want to solve, but on the other hand,
you feel helpless and aren’t sure there’s
really anything that you can do.”
When to use care-confrontation…  

 Fails to identify or understand

consequences of behavior.
 “On the one hand, you don't
understand why you were put in
detention, but on the other hand,
you’re saying you shoved Jacob on
the playground.”
When to use care-confrontation…  

 Fails to interpret critical

experiences, behaviors of
feelings.
 “On the one hand, you’re crying as
you tell me about this really helpful
breakup, but on the other hand,
you’re telling me that it wasn't a big
deal and you’ve moved on.”
Points to remember, when you confront:
State the discrepant elements in the
client’s message and encourage the client
to explore these discrepancies.
Be tentative
Be prepared to explore feelings
Don't use this skill as a mean of
punishment or revenge
Your comments shouldn't include
accusations, judgment or solutions to
problems
 Describe a time in which you were
involved in a confrontation that went
poorly. In light of what you learned,
what could have made the
confrontation a care-frontation, and how
might that have changed the
experience?
 
“ Instead, speaking the truth in love, we
will grow to become in every aspect the
mature body of him who is head, that is,
Christ.”
Ephesians 4:15