Research on IAPT referrals, the effectiveness of university counselling and parents’ perceptions of school counselling are among the work being highlighted by BACP staff at a national psychotherapy research conference.

Six members of our research team will be speaking at the Society for Psychotherapy Research (SPR) UK chapter conference in Leeds this weekend.

Their presentations span the variety of counselling and psychotherapy research our team is involved in – including looking at counselling in schools, universities and the NHS, the impact of the pandemic on psychotherapy research, addictions counselling, and therapy outcomes.

The team’s work helps to build the evidence base for the counselling professions.

Greater impact

This event will help ensure this research reaches a wider audience and has a greater impact.

Dr Clare Symons, our Head of Research, said: “As an organisation, we’ve had a close relationship with SPR for many years so it’s great that we’re able to support this event and to bring our research to a wider audience of psychotherapy researchers.

“The projects the team is sharing represent a huge amount of work in collaboration with academic partners which – as with all our work – we’ve undertaken and supported to meet our strategic aims of contributing to the evidence base and further improving the credibility of BACP and the counselling professions.”

Presentation topics

The research team presenting at the event, and the titles of their presentations, are:

Charlie Duncan, Senior Research Fellow: Referrals to high intensity interventions in IAPT: Level playing field or rigged game?

Robert Scruggs, Research Fellow: The impact of psychological distress and counselling on academic outcomes: outcomes from a practice-based dataset.

Jennifer O’Donnell, Research Fellow: Towards a standard minimum dataset for counselling services in higher and further education: Part of the SCORE project.

Dr George Salaminios, Senior Research Fellow: Developing a Counselling and Psychotherapy Competency Framework for Addictions.

Phaedra Longhurst, Research Assistant: “They need somebody to talk to”: Parents’ and carers’ perceptions of school-based humanistic counselling.

Dr Clare Symons, Head of Research: Contribution to structured discussion - Relevant or irrelevant?: Implications of the pandemic for psychotherapy research.

Find out more about the Society for Psychotherapy Research UK chapter conference.

BACP research conference

If you’re interested in counselling and psychotherapy research, bookings are now open for our 28th Annual BACP Research Conference: Striving for equality, diversity and inclusion in research, practice and policy.

Find out more about our research conference.