ИСТИНА

One of the greatest purposes of higher education in psychology is to encourage independent learning, enable students to think critically about human interactions and to apply this knowledge in clinical settings. However, greater access to digital learning materials combined with the swift decline in ‘reading for pleasure’ amongst the millennial generation (Hanson et al., 2010), means that students are becoming passive consumers of information, less proactive and poor in academic self-regulation (Zimmerman, 2011). Engagement strategies such as book clubs, can allow for independent construction of knowledge by providing discourse opportunities (Daniels, 2002) and development of interpersonal skills (Polleck, 2010). Therefore, this study aimed to evaluate the utility of book clubs as a supportive teaching tool for fostering counselling skills in Psychology Students. The study was conducted at a branch campus of an international university in Dubai, UAE. Students were assigned a psychotherapy-related book as prior reading, which was then discussed in the monthly group meetings that were facilitated by clinically-experienced psychology lecturers. Fifteen semi-structured interviews were carried out and analyzed using thematic analysis, which generated four primary themes (a) learning through sharing of opinions (diversity in perspectives) (b) differentiated learning environment as a facilitator (stepping outside the classroom) (c) exposure to the practical aspects of being a psychotherapist (reality orientation) (d) evaluating oneself and personal experiences (sparking self-insight). Students described their participation as purely self-motivated and the experience as thoroughly enjoyable. The findings highlight the usefulness of book clubs to foster deeper conceptualizations of therapeutic relationships and self-generated knowledge.