What is motivational interviewing?
‘Motivational interviewing’ is the name given to a particular counselling
approach, originally developed by William R Miller in the USA to help people change
addictive behaviours and, more recently, found also to be useful in helping people
make other changes in their lives including offending, health behaviours , employment
and education.
Motivational interviewing (MI) uses some core skills common to other person-centred
counselling and therapeutic approaches. These include open questions, affirmation,
reflection and summarising. These skills are employed strategically to help clients
to explore any ambivalence about change, to elicit from them positive statements
about the desirability and possibility of change and to help them move to action.
Ambivalence is what we experience when we feel two ways about something. We want
change AND we want to stay the same! The MI counsellor acknowledges that this is
absolutely normal and facilitates the client to face up to and explore this internal
conflict, exchanging information where appropriate to enable a sound, informed resolution.
Positive statements about the desirability and possibility of change are known as
‘change-talk’. Change-talk is the precursor of actual change and the
counsellor ensures that the client has ample opportunity and invitation to talk
in this way. As change talk emerges it is reflected and summarised to help the client
hear and ‘own’ it. MI is goal-oriented and the counsellor will work
in a focussed way to help the client work out what she or he really wants to do
about a particular behaviour change.
Motivational interviewing has been extensively evaluated in randomised controlled
trials and its effectiveness has been proved in a range of problem areas and contexts.
A key textbook on this approach is Miller WR and Rollnick S (2002) Motivational
Interviewing; preparing people for change, Guilford; New York
For information on introductory and advanced training go to our page on
motivational interviewing courses and training.