Preliminary Establishment of the Dispositional Development Scale: Incorporating the Working Alliance in Professional Disposition Assessment

Abstract

This article discusses the initial development of an instrument which was designed to aid educators in assessing professional dispositions in rehabilitation counselor education students, in accordance with the 2016 Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP) Standards. Furthermore, the development of the instrument was embedded with the concept of the working alliance (Bordin, 1979). The current study leads to the introduction of the Dispositional Development Scale (DDS), which was created using a two-phase approach, including content validation by Certified Rehabilitation Counselors (n = 148). The implications for using DDS in rehabilitation counselor education are significant and include a systematic, more transparent method of evaluating students' nonacademic competencies.