Establishing a school counseling system based on the opinions of junior high school students and their attitudes toward counseling

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Three hundred and sixty-one students were required to describe their views and opinions with respect to their school counseling services (study 1). Subsequently, these descriptions were classified into the following 9 categories: (1) "Hesitation in Seeking Help," (2) "Stigma Concerns," (3) "Concerns about the Counselor's Responsiveness," (4) "Help-seeking Skills," (5) "Fear of Self-disclosure," (6) "Unfamiliarity of the Counseling System," (7) "Negative Attitude toward Counseling," (8) "Fear and Reluctance toward Seeking Counseling Services," and (9) "Positive Aspects of Helping." From these 9 categories, we developed 36 items to assess the students' views and attitudes toward school counseling. Exploratory factor analyses in a sample of 366 junior high school students (study 2) revealed a 5-factor solution of internally consistent subscales, including "Positive Aspects of Helping," "Help-seeking Skills," "Fear and Reluctance toward Seeking Counseling Services," "Hesitation in Seeking … More Help," and "Fear of Seldisclosure." A separate study of 982 junior high school students was conducted to examine the contact hypothesis (study 3). The results indicated the following: (1) those who recognize the availability of the school counselor indicate a positive score in "Positive Aspects of Helping," "Hesitation in Seeking Help," "Fear and Reluctance toward Seeking Counseling Services," and "Fear of Self-disclosure"; (2) those who have had a conversation with the school counselor reported a positive score in "Fear and Reluctance toward Seeking Counseling Services" and "Fear of Self-disclosure"; and (3) those who have sought help from the school counselor reported a positive score in "Positive Aspects of Helping," "Fear and Reluctance toward Seeking Counseling Services," and "Fear of Self-disclosure." These results support the contact hypothesis (Fisher and Farina, 1995). The following implications of these results were discussed: (1) the school counselor should create opportunities to meet students and (2) the counselor shoud consider using nonverbal methods (Tokuda, 2002) and help resolve the actual problems (Nakamura, 2004). Less