Don't sweat it! Skin Conductance as Mediator in the Relationship between Self-Efficacy and Facilitative Interpersonal Skills in Therapists

We still have limited knowledge about why some therapists outperform others. This may be due to our little understanding about which variables predict higher facilitative interpersonal skills (FIS). With the aid of a Pearson correlation analysis, we aimed to determine whether therapists with higher self-efficacy (GSE) were more likely to perform better in the FIS-task. Previous literature that has analysed self-efficacy’s effect on performance is contradictory and incomplete in the therapist population. We also still have little understanding on whether and to what extent therapists’ physiological arousal impacts their performance. Hence, we also aimed to determine whether skin conductance mediated the relationship between therapists’ self-efficacy and their FIS-scores. In this randomised, counterbalanced study, 74 therapists filled in the general self-efficacy scale (GSE-S) and participated in the FIS-task, which measured their verbal and non-verbal behaviours while responding to...Show moreWe still have limited knowledge about why some therapists outperform others. This may be due to our little understanding about which variables predict higher facilitative interpersonal skills (FIS). With the aid of a Pearson correlation analysis, we aimed to determine whether therapists with higher self-efficacy (GSE) were more likely to perform better in the FIS-task. Previous literature that has analysed self-efficacy’s effect on performance is contradictory and incomplete in the therapist population. We also still have little understanding on whether and to what extent therapists’ physiological arousal impacts their performance. Hence, we also aimed to determine whether skin conductance mediated the relationship between therapists’ self-efficacy and their FIS-scores. In this randomised, counterbalanced study, 74 therapists filled in the general self-efficacy scale (GSE-S) and participated in the FIS-task, which measured their verbal and non-verbal behaviours while responding to pre-recorded video clips of benign and difficult client case stories. Inconsistent with a priori expectations, our results revealed that in the challenging condition, therapists with higher GSE performed worse in the FIS-task. Furthermore, skin conductance did not mediate the relationship between therapists’ self-efficacy and their FIS-performance. We suggested the possibility of an inverted U-model relationship between GSE and therapists’ FIS-scores, and the importance of including more therapists with low GSE in future replications. We also addressed several limitations in our study, which if remedied, hold promising prospects for future investigations regarding the effect of therapists’ self-efficacy and physiological arousal on therapists’ performance.Show less

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Don't sweat it! Skin Conductance as Mediator in the Relationship between Self-Efficacy and Facilitative Interpersonal Skills in Therapists