Motivational Interviewing
Abstract
Motivational interviewing (MI) is client-centered counseling style that focuses on exploring and resolving ambivalence, and centers on motivational processes within the individual to facilitate change. Consistent with the transtheoretical model of behavior change, MI asserts that the therapy should be tailored to the person's level of readiness or motivation to change. MI utilizes four basic principles to address ambivalence in order to increase motivation to change: express empathy, support self-efficacy, roll with resistance, and develop discrepancy. MI was first implemented in the treatment of addiction and has been most extensively evaluated as an approach to facilitate health behavior change, but it has also been used to treat a variety of other emotional disorders.
Publication Title
Encyclopedia of Clinical Psychology
Recommended Citation
Dennhardt, A., Yurasek, A., & Murphy, J. (2015). Motivational Interviewing. Encyclopedia of Clinical Psychology, 1-5. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118625392.wbecp245
