Therapists’ views on the use of questions in person-centred therapy

Abstract

This study collated person-centred therapists’ views on their use of questions in person-centred counselling. It asked whether the therapists considered that questions are useful and how they seek to implement them. Six experienced person-centred therapists were interviewed and their comments analysed using Thematic Analysis. Therapy transcripts by Rogers and Mearns were also analysed to obtain examples of their questioning techniques. Results suggested that these person-centred therapists ask questions regularly for many reasons including; to check their understanding or to clarify an issue for the client; to challenge the client; to enable the client’s processing; and sometimes just out of curiosity. However generally, questions were used to represent the counsellor’s way of being and subtly facilitate progress in the counselling relationship.