Addictions Counseling and Career Counseling

Addictions Counseling is a very lucrative field with the “alarming” prevalence of “drug and alcohol abuse today” and with an estimated “50 million Americans” being not only “addicted either to drugs or alcohol” (Doweiko, 1993) but also a wide range of other addictions like “eating disorders, sexual addictions, gambling addictions, and countless others” which makes it to be “increasingly sought by mental health counselors, school counselors, counselors who work in criminal justice, and counselors in private practice” (Richard & Bailey, 1995). Similarly, ‘Career counseling’ also bears tremendous potential to benefit the practicing counselors with lucrative salary, being “one of the few applied psychology fields in which individuals can make substantial amounts of money” (Pope, 2003).
The field of career counseling with its “relatively long history” dates back to the “early 1900s” (Pope, 2000), providing a “large body of data, knowledge, theory and skills” (Pope, 2003). In contrast, the field of addiction counseling has received much attention due to the alarming growth in the use of chemichal drugs and alcohol abuse.
The researcher also notes that while both the fields are highly positive, focussing upon the “inner strengths” of individuals, there is no “shame and guilt” attached to the seeking of career counseling by individuals and the filed is therefore “not been tainted with the mental illness medical model approach to counseling” (Pope, 2003) making it “relatively impervious to forays by medical model practioners” (Lowman, 1993).
While several groups are in the process of developing their individual processes of certification in addcition counseling, the satndards for certification of addiction counselors are “examined in detail” bearing in mind the impact these organizations could have on the domain of addiction counseling and those seeking counseling (Richard & Bailey, 1995). The base of “career counseling” is beginning to further expand with the huge presence and influx of multi-cultural clients from the minority and immigrant communities of the United States of America (Pope, 2003).
References
Doweiko, H. F. (1993). Concepts of chemical dependency. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
Lowman, R.,L., (1993). Counseling and psychotherapy of work dysfunctions. Washington, DC: Amercian Psychological Association.
Pope, M., (2000). A brief history of career counseling in the United States. The Career Development Quarterly, 48, 194-211.
Pope, M., (2003). Career counseling in the twenty-first century: Beyond cultural encapsulation. The Career Development Quarterly; Sep 2003; 52, 1; ABI/INFORM Global pg. 54

Page R., & Bailey, J., (1995). Addictions counseling certification: An emerging counseling specialty. Journal of Counseling and Development: JCD. Alexandria: Vol. 74, Issue, 2; pg. 167

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