Establishing and Maintaining a Therapeutic Alliance
It is widely accepted that the outcome of any counselling intervention is determined by the quality of the relationship between the counsellor and client. This is certainly true for young people where the quality of the relationship is critical in influencing outcomes and client satisfaction (Safran and Muran, 2000). For successful outcomes, it is desirable that the counselling relationship, should be an authentic person-to-person relationship, be accepting and understanding, and have appropriate levels of warmth and empathy.