Characteristics of Guidance and Counselling in Education
Back to: Childhood and Growing Up – Unit 3,4
Guidance and Counselling
Guidance and counselling is the act of helping individuals to overcome their difficulties. It is the process to help individuals discover their potentialities and develop the same. Although guidance and counselling are often treated as the same concept, guidance is the advice given by superiors to an individual to overcome a difficult situation. Counselling, on the other hand, is the advice given by a professional counsellor to a counselee to help them overcome their difficulties. Mathewson viewed guidance and counselling to be both educational and developmental.
Characteristics of Guidance and Counselling
The main characteristics of guidance and counselling are as follows:
Continuous Process
Guidance and counselling is continuous process. It enables an individual to recognise their abilities and potentialities irrespective of their age for lifelong fulfilment due to which it is a continuous process.
Complex Process
Human life is complex and guidance and counselling is a process that takes the experiences of life into account due to which it becomes a complex process.
Life Related
Guidance and counselling take real-life situations into account and help the individual accomplish his or her goals according to these situations.
Assists in Adjustment
Human life is filled with changes that are inevitable and universal. Due to this, guidance and counselling help individuals to adjust to these constant changes.
Provides Required Assistance
Guidance and counselling is a process of giving assistance to individuals to overcome their personal and psychological difficulties. It helps them go through the process of development.
A Universal Phenomenon
Guidance and counselling is meant for all individuals. It does not discriminate against any individual on the basis of any social criteria which makes it universal.
Not Synonymous
Although guidance and counselling are terms generally used together, they are not synonymous. Counselling is a part of guidance and a specialized service of guidance.
Helpful Process
Guidance and counselling is a process that helps individuals recognize their abilities and develop them to contribute to society.
