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Dear LDHEN,
Do any of you make explicit use of Motivational Interviewing (MI) as part of your Learning Development repertoire?
In the words of Wikipedia, Motivational Interviewing “attempts to increase the client's awareness of the potential problems caused, consequences experienced, and risks faced as a result of the behavior in question . . . the strategy seeks to help clients think differently about their behavior and ultimately to consider what might be gained through change.”
MI tends to be used in health promotion, to address diet, substance dependence, or behaviours such as gambling. It focuses on the behaviour rather than attempting to solve any underlying factors such as mental health, illness or money problems, for which more specialist help is sought.
In an educational setting, the behaviours would include lack of engagement, procrastination or denial of academic convention. I am sure we all offer general “Study Skills” advice on things like time management or effective revision techniques, but Motivational Interviewing by trained specialists might help to address more harder to reach cases.
So: does any have any direct experience of MI? And does anyone know of any published evidence of its effectiveness in an HE setting?
Many thanks
David
David Bowers,
Head of Learning Development,
University Campus Suffolk,
Neptune Quay,
Ipswich,
IP4 1QJ,
United Kingdom.
Tel: (+44)/(0)1473 338707
Secretary and Steering Group member of the Association for Learning Development in Higher Education (www.aldinhe.ac.uk)
Chair of the SIGMA Network for cross-university Mathematics and Statistics Support (www.sigma-network.ac.uk)