Assessment & Testing

Assessment is a helpful, ongoing aspect of the counseling I provide. It is an important part of goal setting (and tracking the progress of growth), discerning where someone is stuck (and what kind of help they need in order to grow and heal), and clarifying their personality mix (so that counseling can be tailored to what will work best for them).

Working Together to Help You Grow

All of the assessing I do is very collaborative in nature—I believe that the more I can involve you in your own growth process, the more effectively you will grow. So as I form hypotheses I also share those with you so that we can test them out together. And when you feel like something does not fit, or is not quite working for you, I encourage you to share that with me so that we can adjust things accordingly. I will check-in with you throughout the counseling process regarding how you are experiencing yourself, me and your growth journey.

I check-in with you in a more structured way via a two-part feedback scale which I use each session. The first part I have you complete at the beginning of each session and the second part you complete at the end (both are short and quick). The beginning scale helps you reflect on how you have felt about yourself and aspects of your life since the previous session. I find this reflective exercise can help bring important things to the surface for us to work on in our time together. And it also serves as a way for you to reflect on your growth. The ending scale helps you reflect on your experience of our time together that day, and in particular how you experienced me, which we then process together.

I use all assessment methods (both structured and unstructured) to create helpful feedback loops that enable you and I to stay connected with, and in regular communication about, how your growth is progressing and how you are experiencing the counseling process. This makes it safe for you tell me when something is not working, or even if you have experienced me negatively somehow. And it also models (and helps you learn) how growth works. Growth and healing are ongoing processes of creating a hypothesis, trying out that hypothesis, and then using the feedback of how well (or not) the hypothesis worked to create a modified (or completely new) hypothesis, which then starts the loop over again. My goal is not just to help you grow and heal, but to help you build the muscles and skills to be able to fuel your growth into the future.

Relationship Assessments

Premarital and married couples wishing to strengthen their relationship may be interested in the PREPARE/ENRICH Assessment (which can only be taken in conjunction with scheduling sessions with me). For couples (married or dating) who would like to work on their relationship without counseling sessions I recommend the Couple Checkup (which is based on the PREPARE/ENRICH).

Psychological Quizzes, Testing & Assessment

In addition to the above, there are many forms of structured assessments and tests in psychology and counseling. These can include things such as IQ tests, personality tests and vocational assessments, as well as assessments related to areas of distress such as depression, ADHD and learning disability tests (check the Resources page for several helpful online quizzes). If you are only needing an assessment (e.g., if you have been instructed to be tested regarding something specific), or if you believe you would benefit from a structured, formal assessment regarding something you are struggling with, I highly recommend my colleagues, Dr. Phil Wickline Ph.D. and Wesley Shelley Ed.S., who both specialize in psychological assessment and testing. You will find them both to be very kind, collaborative and thorough.

If you have come to the Transitions website primarily seeking counseling, and are unsure whether the specialized form of assessment that Dr. Wickline and Wesley Shelley provide is necessary or not, feel free to schedule an initial counseling session with me and we can explore that further. Alternatively, if you are currently only seeking a specialized psychological assessment, and later (after being assessed by Dr. Wickline or Wesley Shelley) decide you would like to try out counseling you are welcome to schedule a trial session with me to explore that further. (Dr. Wickline only provides assessment services—he does not provide counseling. Wesley Shelley provides limited counseling services—he primarily provides assessments.)

Explore more Counseling Topics and learn about my Counseling Approach. When you are ready, Schedule ▦ a trial session at half-price.