Deck 5: Being Client-Centered: Understanding Interpersonal Characteristics and Mode Preferences

Question 1

Which of the following definitions accurately represents the Intentional Relationship Model (IRM) view of client-centeredness?

A) Being client-centered involves collaboration, empowerment, and striving to understand the client's experience and desires through verbal and nonverbal means.
B) Being client-centered involves actively and reflectively seeking to know and understand each client's unique interpersonal characteristics and communication preferences.
C) Being client-centered involves understanding clients' levels of participation, in conjunction with empowering them to become more independent in order to achieve greater levels of participation and health.
D) None of the above

Answer 1

Being client-centered involves actively and reflectively seeking to know and understand each client's unique interpersonal characteristics and communication preferences.

Question 2

Which of the following is not a characteristic that an occupational therapist should attend to in attempting to understand the interpersonal characteristics of a client?

A) The client's ability to regulate affect and express emotion
B) The client's degree of need for control
C) How the client typically responds to change, challenge, or frustration
D) A client's range of motion

Answer 2

A client's range of motion

Question 3

The occupational therapist on the inpatient acute care unit at a local hospital is assigned to Ms. Filmore, who just had a total knee replacement. For the past three sessions, Ms. Filmore has consistently asked the therapist numerous questions, demanded to change the goals and course of therapy, and asked the therapist to cite the evidence base behind his approach. In addition to difficulties with trust, what enduring client characteristic is likely being exhibited?

A) A reluctance to communicate
B) Difficulty asserting needs
C) High need for control
D) Difficulty with human diversity

Answer 3

High need for control

Question 4

A therapist working in a neurosurgery intensive care unit notices that a client's manner of speech is unusual in that he speaks excessively and with heightened affect. According to the Intentional Relationship Model (IRM), what category of client characteristic should the therapist think about when establishing rapport with this client?

A) The client's mental status
B) The client's approach to communication
C) The client's range of motion
D) The client's capacity for reciprocity

Question 5

Whether a client wants to share a lot and needs a lot of empathy from the relationship or just wants to get down to business and avoid anything too personal is defined as:

A) A client characteristic known as orientation toward relating
B) An interpersonal event known as a contextual inconsistency
C) A nontherapeutic response
D) The instructing mode

Question 6

When an otherwise polite and easygoing client sounds irritable and raises her voice slightly at an occupational therapist because the occupational therapist did not follow through on a promise, her response may be situational in that it may be appropriate, normative, and reflective of the situation she is facing.

Question 7

It is important to differentiate between the client's situational and enduring characteristics because (although both types of client characteristics must be responded to therapeutically) the nature and extent of the response should be stronger and more direct when the interpersonal behaviors are enduring.

Question 8

It is critical that the therapist demonstrates a capacity to assess and accurately respond to the client's mode preferences as the means of understanding how to best meet the client's interpersonal needs.

Question 9

Understanding a client's need for control can help guide a therapist's choice of modes when using the Intentional Relationship Model (IRM) to guide one's interpersonal behavior in therapy.