83 The Professional Counselor | Volume 13, Issue 2 Table 1 Participant Demographic Data Demographics n % Gender Female 158 84.0 Male 27 14.4 Non-Binary 1 0.05 Race/Ethnicity White 153 81.4 Black/African American 12 6.4 Latine/Hispanic 5 2.7 Asian 13 6.9 American Indian 3 1.6 Age Range 18–29 48 25.6 30–42 64 34.1 43 and older 74 39.4 Prior History of Counseling Yes 135 71.8 No 51 27.1 Prior History of Eating Disorder Yes 52 27.7 No 134 74.3 BMI Range Underweight 4 2.1 Average 64 34.0 Overweight 54 28.7 Obese 60 31.9 Note. N = 189. The subscales of Counselor Trust and Counselor Selection align well with our study. The subscale of Advice Following may seem counterintuitive when used with the counseling profession. The term advice equates to the construct of counseling together and incorporates the concept of counselors helping clients create and follow treatment goals, exploring ideas together for change, and even assigning homework. Advice aligns with how clients perceive what counselors do rather than the skills they use. For example, counselors using motivational interviewing and questions such as “What would it take for you to go from a 2 to a 4 in your willingness to reduce your alcohol consumption?” can be seen as advising clients to reduce their alcohol consumption. We chose to use the term advice instead of counsel so all participants, regardless of their experience with counseling, would understand the questions. Parallel to Puhl and colleagues’ (2013) study, we then created three different versions of the questionnaire. Using Qualtrics, an electronic survey platform, consenting participants received a random assignment to one of three questionnaire versions. Seventy (37%) of the study participants completed the first version of the questionnaire, which described a hypothetical counselor as an
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