Impedance is an accompanying phenomenon of psychological counseling.

The concept of impedance was first put forward by Freud. He defined impedance as the inhibition of anxious memory and cognition by patients in the process of free association. So the meaning of impedance is the sum of all mental defense mechanisms in traditional psychoanalysis. Rogers regards impedance as an individual's resistance to self-exposure and emotional experience, and its purpose is not to threaten the individual's self-knowledge and self-esteem. Some behavioral psychologists understand impedance as an individual's disobedience to his behavior correction; Or because individuals have doubts about psychological counseling; Or because of the lack of environmental conditions for individual behavior change. All these theories show that impedance has a profound influence on the process of psychological counseling. Only by actively understanding and controlling can people achieve the expected consulting effect. On the other hand, if the impedance phenomenon is ignored or handled improperly, it will hinder the progress and effect of consultation.

In the practice of psychological counseling, we found that many normal people who came for help and visitors who came for treatment because of mental illness all came for help at the beginning, verbally hoping that psychological counselors would help them analyze the causes of their troubles, relieve their troubles and eliminate the painful symptoms, but in practice, they often denied the analysis of psychological counselors in various open or hidden ways and resisted their treatment. This phenomenon is called "impedance".

There are many factors that affect the smooth progress of psychological counseling, including psychological counselors. When the helper expresses unwillingness to accept some suggestions or methods, it cannot be regarded as a sign of resistance. Those factors that hinder the smooth progress of psychological counseling from the counselor's own reasons cannot be called impedance. For example, psychological counselors do not have the necessary conditions, or do not abide by the consulting principles well, or have positive and negative feelings for visitors, which cannot be properly solved.

Sometimes some personality characteristics of visitors, such as aggression, irritability or defensive mentality, withdrawal, etc., are not only fully manifested in the usual interpersonal relationship, but also reflected in the consultation interview. This kind of impedance is not the impedance produced by psychological counseling itself, nor is it the impedance of psychological counseling significance.

Impedance is essentially the resistance of visitors to self-exposure and self-change in the process of psychological counseling. As long as it is in-depth psychological counseling, as long as it is psychotherapy that touches the inner feelings, it will encounter different degrees of resistance from visitors. Therefore, it can be said that impedance is an accompanying phenomenon of in-depth psychological counseling and treatment, which is independent of human will. The process of psychological counseling is actually a process of impedance generation and breakthrough.

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Impedance performance

In the process of psychological counseling, we can see that the resistance of visitors to counseling is manifested in the following aspects.

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Seek specific methods to solve the problem, so as to avoid the consultant's in-depth exploration.

In the process of psychotherapy, some obsessive-compulsive visitors complain that they are tortured by forced movements. They urgently hope that the psychological counselor will give him a "panacea" or teach them some specific methods to increase their control. Some people with social phobia are afraid to look at others. Let the psychological counselor think of a specific way to make them more courageous. When psychological counselors tell them that it is impossible to control only those symptoms, in fact, they can't control them either, but they should think deeply, find out the causes of these symptoms in their hearts, and re-evaluate them with a rational attitude, and those symptoms will naturally disappear. They often don't believe the consultant's words and insist on giving them specific methods instead of thinking deeply.

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Redundant words and repeated complaints make the counselor unable to explain.

Redundant words are manifested in the endless speeches of visitors during psychological counseling. There are some potential motives behind the surface of actively answering the consultant's questions, such as reducing the opportunity for the consultant to speak, avoiding some core questions and diverting attention. Repeated complaints are more common in patients with neurasthenia. Every time they meet a counselor, they will talk about their symptoms repeatedly. When psychological counselors ask them about the psychological factors that lead to this disease, they often keep silent, or continue to complain regardless of the counselor's questions to control the topic of the interview. They urgently ask the counselors to cure their diseases quickly, but they don't want to touch their psychological difficulties. It is these psychological difficulties that make their mental illness linger.

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The attitude is not positive, and he often responds to the consultant in a silent way.

This form of impedance is common in neurotic patients who need treatment. They all have a certain sense of illness. They verbally appeal to be tortured by "illness" and urgently demand to cure mental illness, but they are not active in action and often respond to psychological counselors in a silent way. They didn't listen to the consultant's explanation, or agreed at that time, thinking that it was in line with their situation and seemed to be very experienced. But in the following interview, I forgot most of the explanations to the consultant, and I didn't write the written homework according to the consultant's instructions. The family members of these visitors often report to the counselors that patients seem to feel much better after each interview with the counselors, and sometimes the symptoms are really relieved, but they don't contact themselves to think.

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Conduct theoretical dialogue or direct debate to defend symptoms.

Theoretical conversation means that visitors try their best to talk with counselors in psychological or psychosomatic terms. The purpose of doing this is to avoid your emotional problems as much as possible, and defending your behavior is a direct way of resistance. For example, patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder complained that endless repetitive actions bothered them and begged the psychological counselor to cure their "disease", but when the psychological counselor analyzed the nature of the disease and pointed out that their compulsive actions should be given up, they said that these actions were not completely unnecessary. On the surface, visitors want to get rid of symptoms, but in their hearts, they think that the psychology and behavior of symptoms are reasonable and necessary, but they just go too far. These visitors not only explain the rationality of symptoms from their own feelings and experiences, but also look for evidence from books. According to the above point of view, they argue with the counselor euphemistically, as if they were arguing with the counselor academically, rather than consulting.

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Blame others for the reason, and you are the victim.

This form of impedance is mainly manifested in the process of in-depth psychological consultation. Many troubled visitors often complain that the reason for their troubles comes from the objective environment, whether it is the superior leader, the husband or wife, or even the children, and the responsibility for their troubles lies entirely with others. According to their ideas, only by changing their attitudes and objective conditions can their troubles be alleviated. However, if we know more about it, we can know that the main reason for most tourists' troubles comes from themselves. When psychological counselors point out the internal causes of their troubles through understanding and analysis, they often deny it. At this time, the consultant needs to guide them to discuss repeatedly, and they may know something. If you ask them to admit their responsibility too early, it will often cause greater resistance.

Above, we analyzed the performance of impedance in the process of psychological counseling. There are negative empathy behind these performances. In the process of psychological counseling, the forms of impedance shown by visitors are not only the above, but also all of the above manifestations may be found in a person. No matter what kind of impedance, it is the individual's self-protection and psychological defense against his own painful experience.

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Causes of impedance generation

Freud believed that when most patients resisted psychoanalysis, they didn't deliberately refuse to cooperate with the psychological counselor, because they came to the psychological counselor for help themselves, but unconsciously blocked the crux of the subconscious and didn't make them conscious. Freud's subconscious crux refers to the Oedipus complex that was not satisfied and properly solved in childhood. Later, psychodynamic therapists of various schools revised the theory of juvenile crux, thinking that juvenile crux is not only a sexual component, especially Oedipus complex. During the treatment, patients may show drug resistance. Many psychological counselors will encounter different degrees of resistance when consulting normal people, as long as they touch the depths of their hearts. From this point of view, the reasons for impedance may be varied.

Michael Kavanagh believes that there are three main reasons for the resistance of help seekers. One is that growing up will inevitably bring some pain; The other is because the disorder of behavior is functional; Another reason is that the seekers may have the motivation to resist psychological counseling. According to Zhong Youbin's research, "growing pains" are more common among normal people who ask for counseling, while others are more common among patients with neurosis and sexual perversion.

Analyzing the situation of visitors in consulting practice, we think that the impedance is caused by the following reasons:

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Impedance is caused by visitors' unwillingness to deny themselves and their fear of facing difficulties.

Visitors will have some changes during the consultation process. Changes in growth always come at a price, which is always accompanied by the pain of eliminating old behavior habits and establishing new ones. In the process of consultation, people who seek help often expect miraculous changes effortlessly. Under this kind of psychological control, they are often prone to resistance, because they are unprepared for the pain brought by growth. At this time, the helper may want to slow down the pace of change, or stop changing old behaviors and establishing new behaviors. On the one hand, visitors feel psychological conflict and pain and demand change, on the other hand, they unconsciously refuse to give up and deny their old selves and unconsciously resist suggestions to promote change. This is the deep reason why visitors show resistance in the process of in-depth psychological counseling.

Facing the disintegration of previous beliefs is painful, and it is also a very difficult process to establish new beliefs and values. Even the most psychologically powerful person, the process of changing old behavior and establishing new behavior will bring him psychological conflict and anxiety. For some people with psychological imbalance, the pain of this process will be more serious.

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Resistance is because visitors are unwilling to give up all kinds of vested interests and try to cover up deep psychological conflicts with unsuitable behaviors.

On the one hand, visitors are anxious about the unsuitable behavior, on the other hand, they are not enthusiastic about asking for help. It seems that impedance comes from maladjusted behavior, which fills the gap of some psychological needs, that is, the helper gets some benefits from it. Because of the appearance of symptoms, the help-seekers eased the inner conflict, and the symptoms benefited the patients. Freud called this interest "first-class interest". The benefits of this reluctance to give up are not realized by the patients themselves. After getting sick, neurosis patients get the care and care of people around them, and even get economic benefits, which Freud called "secondary benefits." Patients are not completely unaware of this benefit. If the disease is cured and the symptoms disappear, he will lose this benefit and face the real society full of contradictions and conflicts. Of course, tourists will consciously or unconsciously resist this treatment.

The reason why the impedance is more hidden is that the helper tries to cover up the deeper psychological conflict with the unsuitable behavior. For example, some people who are called alcoholics, their excessive drinking is only a superficial behavior problem. He only drinks to cover up the psychological contradictions he can't get rid of, such as failure at work, misfortune in marriage, guilt and regret for past behavior, and so on. If the negotiation only starts from the superficial problems and does not touch the fundamental problems, the negotiation will inevitably encounter some resistance.

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The impedance may be caused by the different psychological motives of visitors who oppose counseling or counselors.

Visitors have various motives for seeking help, and some of them will have motives for resisting consultation or confronting consultants. First, some visitors just want to get some recognition from the counselor, or not to change themselves or solve existing problems, but to prove that they are right, while others should be criticized or punished. They regard psychological counseling as a court to denounce some people. Secondly, some visitors just want to prove that they are different, or there is nothing the counselor can do for them. Because of repeated consultation, some clients, some doctors or consultants think that he is "hopeless", which leads to the motivation not to try again. In this case, whenever psychological counselors make suggestions or consultations from various angles, they will say that some hopes are only temporary, or that some possibilities are available to others, but they don't, or that they already know some truth, and so on. Others ask for help, just to prove their "value." Their purpose is not to change themselves and solve some problems they face, but to refute the consultants and get some satisfaction from them. Such help seekers have many difficulties in consulting. Third, some visitors have no sincere motivation to seek treatment. They didn't come voluntarily. They may just be people who have important relationships with them, such as bosses, parents, spouses, etc. I think I have psychological problems and should go to psychological counseling. They come to see a doctor under all kinds of pressure. Because if they don't come to counseling, the result may be worse. In this case, they will also come "voluntarily", but they have deep resistance to the negotiation. At this time, consultation is often difficult or only superficial.

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An effective method to eliminate impedance

Impedance is divided into conscious impedance and unconscious impedance. Conscious resistance, such as distrust of the counselor, or refusal to associate for fear of saying inappropriate things. This conscious resistance can be alleviated through the persuasion of consultants. The method is to point out the impedance performance of the visitors, and analyze the possible reasons and naivety of the impedance, telling the visitors that the unconscious impedance to the consultation is not conducive to their psychological growth and hinders the rapid improvement of the disease, and asking the visitors to treat the help of the consultants correctly. Unconscious impedance is more meaningful and difficult to solve in individual psychological counseling. Because the visitor didn't realize his psychological impedance and didn't admit that it was an impedance, even if the psychological counselor pointed out its impedance, he felt wronged or didn't understand it. Therefore, conquering impedance is the hardest work in psychoanalytic consultation. Freud believed that what people don't want to talk about, what they can't admit to themselves or others, may be more therapeutic and meaningful than what they talk about. If patients can recognize their own resistance and admit it, it will be a great progress in treatment. We also realize that overcoming resistance is the key to the success of psychological counseling, especially psychotherapy.

In psychological counseling, how to overcome the resistance is still an arduous task, and the patient's inability to give up the resistance to counseling is often an important reason to stop counseling. According to our experience, the following methods can effectively overcome the impedance of visitors to some extent.

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Make a correct diagnosis

The correct diagnosis of the consultant helps to reduce the impedance of the visitors. The problem that the seeker initially talked about may only be superficial. In the face of deep-seated problems, it will be helpful for consultants to grasp them as soon as possible. As a consultant, we should be good at understanding the difference between the distrust of visitors and the consulting impedance, and also be good at understanding the difference between the personality characteristics such as the grumpy withdrawal of visitors and the consulting impedance, so as to make a correct impedance diagnosis.

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Respond to the boycott with sincerity and helpfulness.

In the process of psychological counseling, once it is confirmed that the visitor has resistance, the counselor should feedback this information to the helper. When giving feedback, we must set out from the perspective of helping the visitors and put forward the impedance of the visitors to each other with the attitude of discussing problems with each other. Never take the impedance of visitors as intentional interference.

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Mobilize the enthusiasm of tourists and actively face resistance.

The main purpose of dealing with impedance is to explain the impedance and understand the causes of impedance, so as to finally surpass the cracking impedance and make substantial progress in consultation. The key here is to arouse the enthusiasm of the other party, let them find the source of impedance together with the consultant and recognize the essence of impedance.

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Counselors should let their guard down.

The psychology of disarmament means that consultants don't have to take impedance too seriously. Consulting interviews seem to have obstacles everywhere. If the counselor adopts this attitude, he may have distrust of the helper, thus affecting the atmosphere of the interview and the consulting relationship; On the one hand, consultants should understand the causes and manifestations of impedance, so that when impedance really appears, it can be found and treated in time; On the other hand, there is no need to be "all grass and trees are soldiers", which makes the negotiation atmosphere too tense. Due to over-emphasis on resistance, the applicant may be regarded as a competitor in the consultation. In this way, the consultant's "growth motivation" and the candidate's "resistance motivation" will turn the interview into a win-lose confrontation.

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Combine eliminating impedance with dealing with empathy.

Conscious direct impedance is easy to overcome, while indirect impedance is often expressed by empathy, and the removal of impedance must be combined with empathy. Negative empathy is one of the manifestations of resistance, and counseling without empathy will not have a good counseling effect. Only by properly handling empathy can we finally break the resistance, let the patients understand and the symptoms disappear.

Impedance is an important phenomenon that hinders the smooth progress of psychological counseling and treatment. The process of psychological counseling is the process of breaking through impedance, and there is a contest between impedance and reverse impedance in psychological counseling. Because of the complexity of impedance itself, it needs to be summarized in practice to effectively solve the impedance problem of visitors.