Validation

Validation is a fundamental skill in psychotherapy. Our ability to give our clients the feeling that they are seen, heard and understood is vital for their willingness to join into the psychotherapy process.

This unit presents a brief description of Validation, followed by an infinite number of possible practice rounds, tailored to your personal professional needs.

Validation involves letting the client know that within their life’s context, their experience makes sense. There are six different levels of Validation. Validation starts from the basics of active listening, and then builds up until we are capable of simply and honestly appreciating the client for who he is and what he choses to share with us.

(first time?? read the ‘how to get the best out of practice’!)

A deeper dive into Validation

Validation is a fundamental skill in all therapy settings. One therapy model that has refined the use of Validation into an art, is Dialectical Behavioral therapy (DBT). Below is a brief description of the six level of validation, with some important tips on what to do and what to avoid when validating.

For further reading on the DBT validation scale see:

Carson-Wong A, Rizvi S. Reliability and validity of the DBT-VLCS: A measure to code validation strategies in dialectical behavior therapy sessions. Psychother Res. 2016;26(3):332-41. doi: 10.1080/10503307.2014.966347. Epub 2014 Oct 8. PMID: 25297056.