Responding to Ethical and Legal Issues
Counselors often face ethical and legal issues while dealing with a client. Therefore, it is critical for counselors to be equipped with knowledge of selecting an ethical decision-making model that will enable him or her to make the right decision. The ethical decision-making model that will be used for this assignment is the Practitioner’s Guide to Ethical Decision Making as it has proved to be effective. The Practitioner’s Guide to Ethical Decision Making model equips the clinician with relevant skills to come up with decisions that are ethical and compliant to the law. Additionally, the Practitioner’s Guide to Ethical Decision Making model enables clinicians to solve ethical and legal issues when dealing with clients from a diverse background. As a result, effective counseling will be achieved as the clinician will be able to help clients across all cultures and social-economic classes (Barnett and Johnson, 2015). The Practitioner’s Guide to Ethical Decision Making model will be used to solve the ethical and legal issues in the case study and prove that the model is effective even in solving ethical challenges among clients from diverse backgrounds.
Effectiveness of the Decision-Making Model
The Practitioner’s Guide to Ethical Decision Making model is effective in solving ethical and legal issues among clients from a diverse background because of several reasons. First, the model is guided by autonomy, which ensures that client independence and self-determination are respected. Consequently, the decision-making model will enable the counselor to solve the ethical or the legal issue effectively by empowering the client to choose what is best for him or her (Davis and Forester-Miller, 2011). For example, when working with an African-American mother client who is a drug addict, the counselor may empower the client to select a program that will enable her to stop substance abuse so that she can keep custody of the child. Secondly, the Practitioner’s Guide to Ethical Decision Making model is effective in solving ethical and legal issues among clients from different backgrounds through the principle of beneficence. The principle stipulates that the counselor should protect the client from harm, which enables the clinician to make effective ethical and legal decisions that prioritize the client’s interests. For instance, when a clinician suspects that an unemployed client is experiencing domestic abuse, he or she will intervene early by helping the client find a job to make it easy for the client to leave the abusive partner.
The other reason why the Practitioner’s Guide to Ethical Decision Making model is effective is that justice guides it. The ethical decision-making model is guided by the principle of equality by ensuring that clients are treated equally, and there is no form of discrimination (Davis and Forester-Miller, 2011). Thus, the clinician is able to solve any ethical and legal issue involving clients from diverse background. For example, when a counselor is dealing with a group composed of people with diverse culture, he or she should not favor individuals who share the same culture with him or her. The fourth reason why Practitioner’s Guide to Ethical Decision Making is effective is that it enables the clinician to remain loyal and faithful to the client. Loyalty and faithfulness enables a client to trust a clinician leading to a sound therapeutic relationship where the client will open up to deeper issues affecting him or her. If a clinician adheres to his or her obligation to the client, he or she will be able to make effective decisions even if ethical and legal issues are involved, making the Practitioner’s Guide to Ethical Decision Making model effective.
Integrating the Decision Making Model to Resolve Ethical and Legal Issues
The Practitioner’s Guide to Ethical Decision Making model may be applied using several steps to solve the ethical and legal issue in the case study, facilitating effective ethical and legal decision-making. The first step to ethical decision making is to resolve client’s ethical and legal issues is collecting as much information as possible regarding the client problems. Having all relevant information concerning a client’s disturbance is essential as it enables a clinician to make an informed choice (Barnett, J. E., and Johnson, 2015). Furthermore, writing the information down enables the clinician to understand the problems clearly and help him or her remain objective to facilitate effective decision-making, solving the ethical and the legal issues.
In the case, essential information about the client was collected such as there is a history of mental disorder as her mother had bipolar. In addition, the client father had a history of alcohol abuse and the client experienced domestic abuse as her father would assault her mother. Among the ethical and legal issues affecting the client, include negligence of teachers, as they knew she had a learning disability and did not employ any intervention. In addition, the teacher used to say that Simone had a low IQ in front of her, which amounts to emotional neglect. Another legal ethical issue is that Simone openly admits that she takes marijuana to deal with her anxiety and sells it to generate an income despite having a toddler.
I would include a couple of ethical standards and laws to ensure that I come up with an appropriate response for the ethical and legal situation. The first ethical standard that I would use is section A.4. The section states that a clinician should avoid harming and imposing personal values to a client. By avoiding from harming the client in any manner, I will be able to develop an effective intervention that will help resolve the clients ethical and legal problems. Another ethical standard I might use is section C.5 of the ACA codes of ethics. The section states that a clinician should not discriminate a client based on anything including mental capability (ACA, 2014). As a result, I will gain the clients trust, as she will see I understand her, which will make her more willing to comply with intervention I will offer her. The legal law that will be used is in this case is the Tort law as the client’s teachers were negligent even after knowing that she had a learning disability. Negligence is seen as the teacher knew that Simone had a learning disability yet they breached their duty of helping Simone, which led to her damages in form of her not appreciating school leading to her drop out and lack of interest to return to school (Bussani and Infantino, 2015). The other legal issue in the case is that the client is selling marijuana yet she does not have a license or the premises to produce and sell the controlled substance (Houserand Rosacker, 2014). The laws and the code of ethics will influence the choice I make in that I will make the right choice.
The next step that will be taken to ensure that ethical and legal decision is arrived at while helping the client is applying the ACA code of ethics. After gathering all information about the client it is essential to apply the ACA code of ethics, as it will guide the clinician to avoid ethical dilemmas and come up with a sound decision. Moreover, using the code of ethics will enhance my effectiveness in coming up with good decision that prioritizes the client’s needs. One of the ACA codes of ethics that I would apply to resolve the client’s problem is section B.1.a., which emphasizes on respecting the clients culture (ACA, 2014). respecting the clients diversity and applying cultural competence will enhance the therapeutic relationship, motivating the client to comply with the intervention that I will develop to help her cope with her situation.
The third step of solving the client’s ethical and legal issues using the Practitioner’s Guide to Ethical Decision Making model is to determine the nature of the dilemma. Examining the nature of the dilemma enables a clinician to solve the ethical and legal issue easily as he or she understands the nature of the dilemma. In this step, I would evaluate the nature of the dilemma by checking whether it is related to beneficence, fidelity, or autonomy (Levitt, D. H., Farry, T. J., and Mazzarella, 2015). The case study’s ethical dilemma relates to fidelity, as the client engaged in some activities that are illegal and unethical, which makes it difficult for me to decide whether to break the client’s confidence or not (Barnett, and Johnson, 2015). The client broke the law when she started selling marijuana and it is my obligation as counselor to report her to the relevant authorities. However, reporting her would strain our therapeutic relationship, which makes it difficult for her trusting me. Therefore, referring to the ACA codes of ethics and law will enable me to make a sound decision that is both ethical and legal. Further, consulting other mental health professionals is important to enable effective decision-making.
The fourth step to solving the client’s legal and ethical issues is generating appropriate course of action. After determining the nature of the dilemma, the next step is developing solutions for ethical and legal challenges by coming with multiple solutions to the problems. During the fourth stage, brainstorming as many as possible course of actions is the best thing to do because it enables a clinician to have multiple solutions to tackle the problem. According to ACA code of ethics section C.2.e (2014), I would consult colleagues because they may have helped a client with similar problems. The ACA code of ethics utilized in this stage will enable sound decision making as the right procedures will be applied when consulting other colleagues.
Moreover, other clinicians may help in resolving the ethical and legal dilemma by giving their diversified perspectives about the issues. However, if a clinician has to share the client’s information the client should give an informed consent (Barnett and Johnson, 2015). Among the solution to the client problems is teaching her self-care skills to help her cope with anxiety, enabling her to cope with anxiety without taking marijuana, which may compromise her ability to take care of the child. Another solution is educating the client about the importance of going back to school or at least getting GED so that she has a better chance of getting employment. Getting the client a job is also a solution, as she will stop selling marijuana to make money. The other solution is reporting Simone’s teacher to the relevant authorities for negligence as the client deserved to be assisted with her learning disability to make learning easy.
The fifth step is of solving the client’s problem using Practitioner’s Guide to Ethical Decision Making model is evaluating the consequence of all the course of action and selecting the best solution. At this stage, I would analyze the information I have gotten so far including the potential courses of actions (Davis and Forester-Miller, 2011). The next step would be to select the best course of action that best suits the client’s needs and concerns. The potential solutions that do not give the desired result will be disregarded. Among the best solutions that I would choose is, educating the client the importance of self-care skills to empower her to accept being taught how to take care of herself as method of coping with anxiety. As a consequence, the client will be able to use activities such as exercising to deal with anxiety and stop using marijuana, which is wrong given that she is raising a toddler. The client will also stop selling marijuana to her neighbor to get money to purchase more marijuana to calm her down when she experiences anxiety. The other solution that I would select and recommend is finding the client a job so that she can be able to take care of her child without the need of grants.
The sixth step is evaluating the selected course of actions to see whether they present new ethical consideration. At this stage I will assess whether the course of actions are fair, universal and could be released to the public without any ethical or legal issues. Evaluation is crucial because it enables a clinician to spot any gap and come up with a remedy to fill it. The final step of the process is implementing the selected set of solutions. Implementation may not be as easy as people think because a client may decide not to adhere to the intervention plan. Additionally, implementation may require the counselor to monitor the client.
Ethical Guidelines Demonstrating Developmental and Cultural Sensitivity
The ACA codes of ethics have several sections that demonstrate cultural sensitivity to ensure fair treatment of clients from diverse culture. One of the cultural sensitive guidelines is section C.5 of the ACA code of ethics, which stipulates that counselors should not condone any form of discrimination to any type of client especially those from diverse cultural background. Also section E.5.b guides counselors to adhere to cultural sensitivity by suggesting that culture affects how a client defines and experiences a problem (ACA, 2014). Hence, counselors need to employ cultural competency when diagnosing and developing a treatment plan so that an accurate diagnoses can be achieved. The cultural sensitive guidelines may be used when dealing the clients from diverse culture by the counselor considering the clients’ culture when diagnosing them because having different culture makes individuals experience problems differently.
Impact of Counselor’s Personal Values When Solving Ethical and Legal Issues
Counselor’s personal values may impact his or her ability to solve an ethical dilemma in a couple of ways. First, a counselor’s personal value may impact his or her ability to solve an ethical dilemma negatively, making her unable to arrive at a sound decision, which is dangerous. Secondly, personal values may cloud a clinician judgment when facing an ethical dilemma making him or her liable when a client sues because of incompetence (Davis et al., 2015). Also, a counselor that allows personal values take over when dealing with a client may wrongly diagnose the client which could worsen the clients condition. For example, when a clinician believes that when a person is unable to eat and sleep he or she has depression, such a counselor may misdiagnose some patients as other mental conditions’ symptoms include lack of sleep and appetite.
Strategies to Address the Influence of a Counselor’s Personal Values
A few strategies may be used to help a counselor in addressing ethical decision making without the influence of personal values. The first strategy that a clinician may use is following the ACA code of ethics guidelines (Barnett and Johnson, 2015). The ACA code of ethics stipulates guidelines that will help the clinicians to make sound ethical decision without the influence of the personal values. Another strategy that counselor may use to avoid personal values influencing his or her decision is consulting colleagues. Consulting other mental health professionals enables a clinician to get varied perspectives, enabling the clinician to make decision based on facts rather than personal values.
References
American Counseling Association. (2014). ACA Code of Ethics: As Approved by the ACA Governing Council... American Counseling Association.
Barnett, J. E., and Johnson, W. B. (2015). Ethics desk reference for counselors (2nd ed.). Alexandria, VA: American Counseling Association.
Bussani, M., and Infantino, M. (2015). Tort law and legal cultures. The American Journal of Comparative Law, 63(1), 77-108.
Davis, T., and Forester-Miller, H. (2011). A Practitioner’s guide to ethical decision making. Dictionary. com.(nd). Retrieved, 12.
Houser, K. A., and Rosacker, R. E. (2014). Tigh times: a history of marijuana laws in the United States. International Journal of Business & Public Administration, 11(2).
Levitt, D. H., Farry, T. J., and Mazzarella, J. R. (2015). Counselor ethical reasoning: Decision‐making practice versus theory. Counseling and Values, 60(1), 84-99.