Perceptions of counselling in a small island community context: a Gozitan perspective

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to explore the perceptions of counselling with particular reference to the small island community context of Gozo. Seven young adult community members volunteered to participate in this research in which they spoke about their personal thoughts, feelings and experience in their own words. The research adopted an lnterpretative Phenomanological Approach (I.P.A) both in the collection and analysis of the data that was gathered through in-depth semi­structured interviews. A number of themes were derived from the analysis which foreshadowed the unique experiences of the participants. The main super-ordinate themes include counselling and the way it is acknowledged by individuals who live in Gozo, the personal experience of dealing with difficulties, possible community characteristics that are impinging the way counselling is viewed as an option to treatment and salient tools that help expanding the service in Gozo. Each of these themes has several implications f or practice and training which can help move the service as well as the counselling profession forward. For this to be realized, this research calls for awareness about the counselling profession and services, an improvement in the existing services as well as the establishment of newer ones. A number of recommendations for future research were also made.