The increasingly prominent role of visualization in counseling: Examples and implications for school counseling

The presence of new technologies in modern life is especially evident among school graders. From the extensive variety of computer websites and smartphone apps related to the acquisition of knowledge to new channels of e-learning and e-counseling, children and adolescents are intensively engaged in dealing with these new technologies. However, it should be noted that a prominent feature of engagement in these new technologies is the visual, rather than the literal and/or verbal, domain. Today, youth spend increasingly large amounts of time receiving and sending visual messages. This has major implications for the future of (school) counseling, such as: (a) counselors’ training, (b) counseling methods, (c) measurement and evaluation in counseling, (d) priorities in counseling youth, (e) priorities in using e-counseling vs. traditional face-to-face counseling, (f) the integration of multiple-facet – i.e., child-school-family – counseling, and (g) the intensity and vividness of career counseling, etc. Along with the presentation and discussion of the essence of visualization in counseling, examples of applied implications will be outlined, such as those emerging from two related studies that have recently been conducted on (1) the feasibility of using YouTube in mental health counseling and (2) the integration of pictures in counseling parents of high-school graduates.