Social Work Now, issue 50, pages 14-23.
This paper is based on research that focused on investigating if a vicarious traumatisation framework resonated with counsellors who were registered to undertake therapy with sexual abuse survivors in New Zealand. It was important to allow participants to tell their personal narratives of vicarious traumatisation as they had experienced it over their careers. This focus facilitated discussion of the factors that mitigate the effects of vicarious traumatisation and act as protective factors that can sustain counsellors over the course of their careers.
Once the sources of stress and trauma were identified, the aim was to develop a theoretical model of stress and trauma among those involved in counselling trauma survivors to suggest models of practice to ameliorate the effects of vicarious traumatisation for the worker. The counsellors’ individual experiences of vicarious traumatisation helped to identify the protective factors that they found useful in maintaining their professional effectiveness on the job.