Use of information technologies in counselling and psychotherapeutic work with groups during the COVID-19 epidemic

Abstract

The outbreak of the Covid-19 epidemic brought many sudden changes in the counselling and therapeutic space. The counselling and therapy service providers had to change the way they work in a short period of time and move from in-person counselling to online counselling. The resulting situation has increased distress among the service users, which has consequently increased the need for professional treatment. However, the analysis of the situation has shown that the counsellors and therapists have had to adapt to changes without unambiguous guidelines and instructions as well as evidence of the effectiveness of new forms of work. The purpose of this paper is to highlight the theoretical findings of research into forms of group counselling and therapeutic work of teleworking, to highlight the pros and cons of using such information technology and to present the practical experiences and opinions of users of such forms of work in The Counselling Centre for Children, Adolescents and Parents Maribor. All the presented results lead to the conclusion that group counselling and therapeutic work via videoconferencing, despite certain limitations and lack of theoretical evidence of effectiveness, are effective in practice and well accepted among users and thus should also be used in the future.