Counseling Center Clinicians Experience Providing Assessments of Risk to Self versus Risk to Others

As part of collecting information for the purpose of threat assessment and management regarding a person of concern within an institution of higher education, a threat assessment and management team or another institutional official may request that a campus counseling center conduct a risk assessment of dangerousness-to-others. This study measured counseling center clinicians’ training and experience in conducting risk assessments of dangerousness-to-others. Survey data from mental health providers practicing in counseling centers within institutions of higher education revealed that these practitioners had significantly less training and experience in assessing dangerousness-to-others as compared to the training and experience they have in assessing dangerousness-to-self. This lack of training and experience brings into question the appropriateness of counseling center mental health providers conducting these assessments.