Ethical and Legal Considerations of the Developing Counselor
Ethical and Legal Considerations of the Developing Counselor
Randi Whittington
Grand Canyon University: UNV 502
July 21, 2019
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Ethical and Legal Considerations of the Developing Counselor
Ethical and Legal Viewpoints
Professional counseling relationships between counselors and clients heavily rely on the
counselor’s ability to understand and uphold the values and ethics covered in the
NAADAC/NCC code of ethics for the Association of Addiction Professionals. This paper will go
over and discuss some of the main topics of the code of ethics and why it is so critical to uphold
them to create lasting client relationships that are both held to the highest ethical and legal
standards in order to reach a beneficial outcomes for all clients.
Beneficence/Stewardship
As counselors we strive towards the primary objective of nonmaleficence, to do no harm
and reach a beneficial outcome. However, in hindsight as counselors the main objective is
ultimately beneficence, to do good and promote health and well-being with clients. It is the job
of a counselor to contiguously do good and help promote the mental health and well-being of
clients. “Addiction Professionals shall provide their client with the highest quality of care.
Providers shall use ASAM or other relevant criteria to ensure that clients are appropriately and
effectively served.” ("NAADAC: The Association for Addiction Professionals", 2016).
Stewardship goes hand in hand with beneficence. Stewardship according to the NAADAC/NCC
code of ethics is “to use available resources in a judicious and conscientious manner, to give
back” ("NAADAC: The Association for Addiction Professionals", 2016). This being said the
counselor will need to take into consideration all of the resources and information given by the
client to determine the best form of treatment that will give the client the best overall result based
on the resources available.
Self-Disclosure
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Ethical and Legal Considerations of the Developing Counselor
When it comes to being and addiction and substance abuse counselor self-disclosure is a
big issue. Self-disclosure or transparency while working with clients is like walking a tight rope
in some cases being completely transparent can be extremely beneficial towards a client’s
therapy and treatment but in other cases depending on what types of experiences you are
disclosing to your client it could end up being detrimental to the relationship. According to
Michelle Baldwins book The Use of Self in Therapy she says that “While it may be easier for
recovering counselors to identify with a comparable experience in their clients, they run the risk
of finding it difficult to separate their own experience from that of their clients. If they do not
step out of their personal experience, they may project their own experience of recovery, thus
compromising their ability to see the client as unique, especially when dealing with the emotion
of shame. As regards countertransference, a no recovering therapist who can empathize may be
