107 The Professional Counselor | Volume 13, Issue 2 and resources to populations navigating stigma concurrently with TDV (Walker et al., 2020). These findings affirm that even professional counselors are subject to the inherent and socially constructed biases regarding relationship abuse and further emphasize the importance of counselor training to increase one’s professional capacity to treat all survivors of TDV. These outcomes also support a feminist conceptualization of TDV to dismantle gender disparities in treatment and the importance of empowering survivors of all genders experiencing TDV. Implications for Counselors and Counseling Programs Collectively, the study’s findings point to the need for enhanced counselor training, reflexivity, and knowledge on the intersection of age, relationship status, violence, and gender issues. Counseling students must understand that relationship violence can happen at any age and has damaging, long-lasting impacts on an adolescent’s well-being, future relationships, and mental health (e.g., depression, suicidal ideation, drug use, self-injury; CDC, 2021; Kann et al., 2018). TDV has detrimental consequences on an adolescent’s psychological well-being and decision-making (CDC, 2021; K. E. Hunt et al., 2022), thus making it critical that counselors do not underestimate the impact dating violence can have on a relationship regardless of age. Because counselors may encounter the presence of relationship violence in teens within various settings (e.g., counseling centers, schools, and universities), they must be familiar with and adept at recognizing and addressing these factors for client safety and aid in ending the abuse cycle. Although counselor education programs produce very competent and knowledgeable counselors, there remains an inability to comprehensively cover all the necessary content to prepare counselors for working with clients (Henriksen et al., 2010; Khubchandani et al., 2012). Some of these topic areas, like TDV, must be explored further in continuing education. More emphasis must be placed on traumainformed approaches to assist all clients, including teens in a critical developmental age at which TDV threatens current and future mental health (Foshee et al., 2013; Temple et al., 2013). Strengths-based and advocacy-informed trauma approaches have been influential in healing relationship trauma (Ogbe et al., 2020) by assisting teens in preventing pervasive patterns of violence in future relationships. At the same time, other relevant factors, such as unacknowledged biases, should be examined personally and within supervision. Counseling students, new professionals, and supervisors must be willing to broach biases and assumptions regarding gender in counseling and supervision to prevent them from affecting clients. Counselors must understand the impact of gender and age on highly stigmatized topics, such as TDV and sexuality, to prevent biases and misunderstandings from guiding assessment and treatment. Counselor educators can teach students about TDV using theoretical lenses that deconstruct stigma. For example, a feminist perspective could lend to classroom dialogue uncovering societal power differentials. At the same time, structural functionalism theory or conflict theory could offer unique lenses to discuss systemic inequities in the quality and delivery of mental health care. Counselor education programs are essential in helping counseling students develop strong case conceptualization skills that affirm diverse clients and consider strengths-based and trauma-informed interventions. Therefore, counselor training must incorporate instruction and practice for adolescent risk assessment of TDV. Counseling students who gain experience using TDV screening tools may increase their confidence when clinical decision-making is required, such as disclosing abuse. Mandatory reporting is not always transparent for students. Instructional role plays and a review of the limitations of confidentiality may also prompt further growth and development for counseling students, in addition to reviewing state laws and any differences with our profession’s ethical
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