The Qualitative Study on the Counselor Experience of Graduate Students: Centered on CQR

Objectives By exploring the counseling experiences of master and doctoral students attending S Graduate School, this study aims to study the meaning of their counseling experiences, the development of counselors, and their counseling competence. Methods To this end, in-depth interviews were conducted with 21 masters and doctors enrolled in S graduate school to collect data from qualitative research methods. Data were collected using the consensus qualitative research (CQR) method, and then analyzed by applying the CQR technique developed by Hill. Various opinions and reactions of participants were induced through semi-structured interviews and open-ended questions, and objectivity was further strengthened by reflecting various perspectives in the data analysis and interpretation process through collaboration between the research team and external auditors. This approach contributed to increasing the reliability of the research results. Results As a result of analyzing the interview data collected from the study participants, four central areas were composed. And in order to construct the central area, first, 461 meaningful concepts were found, and 20 core concepts were derived by collecting meaningful concepts. And by classifying core concepts, 9 categories were derived. Therefore, it was analyzed that the study participants' willingness to solve problems was ahead of them while having a receptive mind to clients as a counselor's initial intention. And it turned out that they are beneficial counseling experiences to have a direction of listening, empathy, psychological questions, hypothesis setting, and counseling in the role of a counselor. As a result, they also experienced the development of counselor-specific expertise. However, this experience served as an opportunity to recognize the lack of counselor competency and the urgent need to be supplemented. Conclusions Participants in the study experienced using counseling techniques through beneficial experiences as counselors, and they also experienced the development of counselors along with their desire for counseling expertise. In order to become a professional counselor, it became an opportunity to recognize the importance and necessity of the counselor's experience and the counselor's competence, and it was an opportunity to receive useful experiences and stimulations in preparing the path of a professional counselor.