Ho, Rainbow T. H.Rainbow T. H.HoFong, Ted C. T.Ted C. T.FongChau, K.Y., KathyK.Y., KathyChauDr. CHAN Kar-pui, CaitlinCaitlinDr. CHAN Kar-puiLam, WinnieWinnieLam2025-09-102025-09-102019Ho, R. T. H., Fong, T. C. T., Chau, K. K. Y., Chan, C. K. P., & Lam, W. (2019). Evaluation of counseling service scheme for young residents and residential care staff in Hong Kong: A 2-year longitudinal study. In Annals of Behavioral Medicine (Ed.). Society of behavioral medicine 2019 annual meeting abstracts. 40th Annual Meeting & Scientific Sessions of the Society of Behavioral Medicine, Washington, DC (pp. 32). Oxford University Press.0883-6612http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11861/25090Introduction: Young residents in foster care homes are prone to psychological impairment out of their difficult family background and in need of intensive counseling service. Yet, existing social workers and superintendents often have enormous workload and may not cater to their emotional needs. The present study examined the efficacy of adding a counselor post in foster care home setting on the young residents and existing staff.<br> Research Design: This is an ongoing three-year evaluation project from Apr 2016 to Apr 2019 in four residential care homes in Hong Kong. The four counselors hired in the residential care homes provided continuous individual counseling sessions for 133 counselees who completed the Counselor Rating Form before and after counseling. The counselees were rated on Child Behavior Checklist by their superintendents and the existing staff in the residential care homes completed the Copenhagen Burnout Inventory and Role Questionnaire every three months. Latent growth modeling was conducted to examine longitudinal trends of counselees’ behavioral problems, burnout, and role ambiguity/conflict for the two-year data collected so far. Results: All of the measurement scales showed good levels of reliability. The counselees reported a significant increase (Cohen d = 0.47, p < 0.01) in counseling rating after counseling. The counselees displayed linear decreases in total, internalizing, and externalizing problems throughout the 1.5-year follow-up period. Significant decreasing trends were found the social workers in terms of personal burnout (annual change = -2.2, p < 0.01, SD = 6.5) and personal burnout (annual change = -1.9, p < 0.01, SD = 6.1) but not client burnout, role conflict, and role ambiguity.<br> Conclusions: The current findings suggest that the counseling service could have a beneficial effect in reducing the counselees’ problem behaviors and ameliorating social workers’ levels of burnout over time.<br> Acknowledgments: This work was supported by the Keswick Foundation Limited. The Keswick Foundation Limited was not involved in study design, in the collection, analysis, and interpretation of data, or in the writing of this abstract. We would like to thank Ms. Irene Cheung and the staff of the four residential care homes for their help with data collection and study coordination and the counselees for their participation in the study.enConference Paper10.1093/abm/kaz007