American Counseling Association Code Of Ethics

The American Counseling Association provides a Code of Ethics (2014) that clearly establishes a set of ethical obligations that ACA members must follow. The Code also guides professional counselors and counselors-in-training to ethical practices and strengthens professional counselor identity. Through this Code, the ACA clarifies its current and prospective members’ ethical responsibilities and informs those who are served by the ACA members. ACA members using the Code’s ethical decision-making guide develop ethical courses of action when faced with dilemmas.
There are many different kinds of ethical dilemmas inherent in counseling. One of them occurs when a counselor’s personal values conflict with the Code of Ethics (2014). At least two
recent legal cases highlight these values conflicts, as they resulted in the dismissal of counselors-in-training who refused to comply with the Code on the grounds of value conflicts. In the legal case, Ward v. Wilibanks (2010), a master’s student in her counseling practicum with Eastern Michigan University (EMU) refused to see an LGBT client, because she claimed it went against her religious beliefs. Instead of completing a remediation plan with the university, she wanted a formal hearing, and the program leaders dismissed her. After multiple appeals, the case was settled out of court before it went to jury trial, and EMU’s counseling program retained the right to use the Code as the ethical behavior standard and guide (Elliott, 2011).
In the other case, Keeton v.
Augusta State University (2011), a graduate student was dismissed from her master’s program in counseling after refusing to complete a remediation plan that would help her to separate her religious beliefs about sexuality morality from her professional and ethical counseling obligations (Remley & Herlily, 2016). Furthermore, the remediation plan was designed specifically to address the student’s previously stated desire to impose her own religious and moral values and beliefs on LGBT clients. In 2012, a federal judge in a United States District Court determined that ASU did not violate the student’s rights in their remediation plan or in their dismissal of her (Elliott, 2011). Recently, legislation has been enacted in at least one state (Arizona) which asserts that universities cannot discipline or discriminate against a counseling or other mental healthcare program student if the student’s religious beliefs conflict with the client’s counseling goals, thus, precluding the student from treating the client (Remley & Herlily,
2016).
Counseling professionals have been exploring different teaching methods and ethical decision-making techniques that will help counselors and counselors-in-training to internalize the ACA’s professional collective values by helping them to resolve conflicts between their personal values and the profession’s values (Francis & Dugger, 2014). If these value conflicts are not resolved, then it is more than likely that a counselor will act unethically in her treatment of a client by imposing her values on the client, thereby harming the client.
Elliott (2011) points out that while value conflicts about gender identity and sexual orientation get a good deal of attention, other value conflicts are also important to consider, such as counseling issues related to abortion, marital infidelity, treating offenders, and euthanasia. The Code states, “Counselors are aware of – and avoid imposing – their own values, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors. Counselors respect the diversity of clients…and seek training in areas in which they are at risk of imposing their values onto clients, especially when the counselor’s values are inconsistent with the client’s goals or are discriminatory in nature” (ACA, 2014, §A.4.b.). Additionally, “Counselors do not condone or engage in discrimination against prospective or current clients…based on age, culture, disability, ethnicity, race, religion/spirituality, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, marital/ partnership status, language preference, socioeconomic status, immigration status, or any basis proscribed by law” (ACA, 2014, §C.5.).
Elliott (2011) discusses a suggested solution to value conflicts that is based on the core conditions of client-centered counseling. A component of Carl Jung’s psychodynamic theory suggests a perspective to be used by those who have conflict between personal values and the ethical guidelines. The counselor or counselor-in-training must accept the concept of “both/and” rather than “either/or” as a view of reality. This is a process that takes courage, supervision, consultation, and the use of a respected ethical decision-making model. This technique is supported by aspects of psychodynamic, cognitive developmental, and behavioral theories (Elliott, 2011). The author also mentions that there are some ethicist who believe that if counselors and/or counselors-in-training cannot follow the ACA’s ethical guidelines, then they should leave the profession altogether or find a place where they do not have to abide by the ethical guidelines of licensure boards and professional counseling associations (Elliott, 2011, p. 40).
Francis and Dugger (2014) provide the introduction of the Journal of Counseling and Development’s volume 92, issue 2 “special section” that explores the ACA’s Code of Ethics (2014) and its importance to the establishment and maintenance of professional counselor identity and the profession itself.
The authors particularly recognize the ethical dilemma of value-based conflict in counseling. Francis and Dugger (2014) note that value conflicts are not new in counseling, but that some issues are more recent than others. They suggest that when a counselor is faced with a value conflict, she should think of the potential harm that could befall the client if the counselor imposed her values and beliefs on the client. Because client-centered therapy requires a counselor to have unconditional positive regard, it is hoped that this will convince the counselor to follow the ACA’s ethical guidelines. The following articles discussed are from the “special section” mentioned
above.
Ametrano (2014) points out that counselor educators are ethically obligated to help students resolve their conflicts between personal and professional values. He suggests that counselor educators focus on teaching about how values influence ethical decision-making, how decision-making is multi-faceted, and the importance of client welfare. In his study evaluating the effects of using this teaching technique on students, he reports that students demonstrated an observable increased ambiguity-tolerance. Students were also more aware of their own values. They were able to relate how value conflicts can negatively affect their abilities to make ethical decisions and how this can harm clients (Ametrano, 2014).
Kocet and Herlily (2014) discuss using their strategy of ethical bracketing and the Counselor Values-Based Conflict Model as tools when attempting to reconcile conflicts arising between personal and professional values. “When counselors deliberately set aside or bracket their personal values to honor their professional obligations, they help to avoid imposing those values onto clients and contributes to empowering clients to achieve their therapeutic goals” (Kocet & Herlily, 2014, p. 182). The Counselor Values-Based Conflict Model (CVCM) is a working model that helps counselors examine themselves specifically when they are experiencing a value-based conflict between themselves and a client, supervisee, or student. Kocet and Herlily (2014) also point out that this model can be adapted to effectively use between clinical supervisors and supervisees and between counselor educators and students. It is important to note that the CVCM is meant to be used in adjunct with a more traditional ethical decision-making model (Kocet & Herlily, 2014).
In Choudhuri and Kraus’s (2014) study, they discuss the possibilities of applying Buddhist principles to values conflicts in the counseling relationship. They note that interest in the combination of counseling and spirituality has increased over the recent years. They use clinical case studies that illustrate a spiritual framework using relevant Buddhist principles. This technique bases on the idea that all relationships require an innate struggle, but that inherent struggle is productive. “As we meet clients who present us with the opportunity to be uncomfortable and shake up our established assumptions and expectations, we would be instructed by Buddhist practice to invite that discomfort and be curious about it rather than fend it off” (Choudhuri & Kraus, 2014, p. 200).
One ethical dilemma that involves value conflict is presented and discussed in the ACA Ethical Standards Casebook (2015) is the case of two parents who are in counseling, because they are trying to cope with their 4-year-old son’s failing health. Later the son is diagnosed with terminal Leukemia and is given six months to live. His doctors want to make his quality of life the best it can be by continuing to give the boy blood transfusions and pain medications. The mother does not want her son to take the pain medications, as she feels this could expedite his death. On the other hand, she does not want him to get blood transfusions, because this might prolong his suffering by keeping him alive longer. The father, though, wants to have as much time with his son as possible, thus wants to keep his son alive as long as he can. Additionally he wants his son to not be in pain, even though it could hasten his death. They have not reached an agreement and are both unwilling to let their son go (Herlily & Corey, 2015, p. 202-203).
The counselor in this situation may feel very strongly aligned with the child’s father in this scenario. The counselor may emphatically value the child’s right to have the best quality of life possible and staunchly feel that the child should receive whatever treatment the doctors believe will make him feel most comfortable. But for the counselor to outwardly align herself with the father would be potentially and likely harmful to the already grieving and struggling mother, as well as to the parents’ relationship with each other. While this is a painful situation to empathize with, the counselor must remain unbiased and provide the couple with a safe space where they can explore all of their options about end-of-life treatment. The son’s well-being does need to be taken into account, surely, but the focus of the counseling sessions is on the parents and helping them to cope with their son’s rapidly failing health and ultimate death. A counselor’s conflicting values in a case like this do not have to prevent the counselor from following the ACA’s ethical guidelines. It is not the counselor’s duty or place to tell either parent what to do, to give advice, or to use the power differential as a counselor to manipulate them. There is a perfectly reasonable way to look at this inner struggle even if the welfare of the client is still not enough to keep a counselor from acting unethically, and that is to recognize the dialectic of the situation. Therein lies the “both/and” versus “either/or” issue. The counselor must be able to recognize both realities – the reality of the counselor’s personal values and the reality of the counselor’s ethical obligations. These two realities can and must be able to coexist if this dilemma is to be resolved (Elliott, 2011).