Noor Syamilah Zakaria, Neerushah Subarimaniam, Wan Marzuki Wan Jaafar, Ahmad Fauzi Mohd Ayub and M. Iqbal Saripan
Keywords: counseling ethics competency, assessment tool, registered counselors, ethical counselors
Abstract: Ethics competency is often depicted as an experience acquired through the combination of knowledge, awareness, and skills. It is essential in addressing morally unclear circumstances. However, ethical competency is a complex concept and not noticeably distinct as it involves broad ethical dimensions. Counselors who have inadequate expertise in evaluating ethical matters are not always capable of recognizing and resolving ethical dilemmas. Efforts to address this issue is truly neccesary. To date, there is insufficient research conducted on ethical competence and there is no comprehensive scale available to measure counseling ethics competency among Malaysian registered counselors. Hence, this study aims to present a scale as an assessment tool to measure ethics competency among Malaysian registered counselors. A documentary analysis of the Malaysian Counselors Codes of Ethics was conducted to generate a pool of items, which represents eight components in the Malaysian Counselors Codes of Ethics. The eight components were set by the Board of Counselors (Malaysia) to provide specific standards to cover most of the situations during counseling process. A total of 213 Malaysian registered counselors was recruited as sample to test the counseling ethics competency scale. The Confirmatory Factor Analysis provided evidence of construct reliability; and concomitantly, validated the factor structure of the scale. As such, the eight-factor model consisting 70 items offered a framework on investigating counseling ethics competency. The development of counseling ethics competency scale interwoven with core values and ethical principles would significantly contribute to the advancement of counseling profession.
