Adapted from Rosengren, DB. (2009). Building Motivational Interviewing Skills: A Practitioner Workbook
OARS: Open ended questions; Affirmations; Reflections; Summarizing are the techniques of motivational interviewing. This assignment focuses on the first two techniques: Open ended questions & affirmations
Open Questions Practice
Convert the closed questions below to open ones. Remember there are many possible responses. Be creative. Come up with three open questions for each example. You want your questions to elicit what the patient knows, wants, believes, thinks, and feels. It is usually wise to avoid asking why questions, as they tend to have an accusatory or demanding tone, and thus put people on the defensive.
How many times have you used meth in the past six months?
Is there some reason you can’t check your blood sugar twice a day?
You know your smoking puts your kids at risk for getting asthma? Right?
Forming Affirmations Practice
1.Think of a friend, relative, client, or patient that you know who has challenges or is challenging for you to be around. List several strengths, virtues, and positive qualities you see in this person (everyone has something good about them).
2. Now provide several affirmations that you might offer to this person related to particular strengths or qualities that you identified. Affirmations are statements that commonly begin with you. For example:
– That took a lot of courage to…
– You’re a very resourceful person.
– You showed a lot of patience when…
– You put in many hours of hard work to achieve…
Affirmations are more effective when they are specific. State them in a positive manner and ensure that you are being genuine.
Example: Trudy smokes two packs of cigarettes a day. She knows it isn’t good for her and is fed up with people reminding her of it. Over time, she has come to realize that her smoking has moved from a social habit to a harmful addiction. She feels guilty about her smoking and tries to hide it from her family. At some point, she will stop, but just not yet. With everything else going on in her life, this is one area she feels is her own.
Strengths:
• Independent, doesn’t let others unduly influence her.
• Aware of changes in her behavior and is bothered by it.
• Wants to be more healthy
• Affirmation: You are somebody who makes up her own mind. You’re aware of the negative effects of smoking and when you’re ready to make a change you’ll do what’s needed to be successful.
Forming Affirmations:
1. Strengths:
2. Affirmation: