Psychological counselors are often also teachers. They may be full-time faculty and part-time counselors, or adjunct faculty who work full-time in mental health. Combining teaching with counseling can have significant professional advantages. On-going practical experience can give an instructor credibility that non-practitioners lack and provide a fresh stream of practical experience from which to draw in class. However, the two roles, counselor and teacher, also have the potential for collision, creating conflicts of interest.

Dual-role Relationships in Psychological Counseling
According to the Code of Ethics (1995) of the American Counseling Association (ACA), "The primary responsibility of the counselor is to respect the dignity and to promote the welfare of clients." Fulfillment of this primary responsibility requires that counselors remain loyal to their clients. Otherwise, clients would not trust their counselors, would not disclose their deepest secrets, and would therefore not work through their "unfinished business". Loyalty requires that counselors maintain independence of judgment in matters related to their clients' welfare, interests, and needs. Where a counselor's independence of judgment is compromised by a conflict of interest, the welfare and dignity of clients are likely to suffer.

A person can be said to have a conflict of interest when he or she is in a relationship with one or more others requiring the exercise of judgment in the others' behalf but has a special interest tending to interfere with the proper exercise of judgment in that relationship. Conflicts of interest sometimes arise for counselors when they take on or maintain "dual-role relationships" with their clients. Such relationships exist when counselors occupy two or more different (professional or personal) roles with respect to the same client.

Dual-role relationships do not always involve conflicts of interest; nor are they necessarily morally problematic. For example, a counselor-educator in a graduate program who is both teacher and supervisor to a graduate student-intern need not have a conflict of interest. However, dual-role relationships that involve conflicts of interest are invariably morally problematic. For example, dual-role relationships in which a counselor counsels a client with whom he or she shares (or has formerly shared) a personal relationship (for example, friend or sexual partner) typically involve conflicts of interest and should be avoided.

On the other hand, dual-role relationships may sometimes be morally problematic even if they do not involve a conflict of interest for the counselor. This is the case when the client thinks the counselor has a conflict of interest or when the client otherwise feels uncomfortable about the dual-role relationship even if the counselor does not have any conflict of interest. Thus, dual-role relationships may be morally problematic when there is serious potential for distortion of the client's judgment.

Dual-role relationships may also be morally problematic because they involve a public appearance of conflict of interest. For example, counselors who engage in sexual relationships with former clients (regardless of whether counseling was terminated for the sake of pursuing such a relationship) can adversely affect the public image of counselors, thereby deterring prospective clients from seeking counseling.

Since counselors may also be (and often are) professional educators, they may occupy dual-role relationships arising as a result of working within these two related though distinct professions. There are at least four possibilities for conflict of interest: (1) a counselor agrees to counsel a current student; (2) a counselor agrees to counsel a former student; (3) a current client enrolls as a student in the (current) counselor's class; (4) a former client enrolls as a student in a (former) counselor's class. Let's consider these in order.

Counseling Students
By agreeing to counsel a current student, a counselor takes on responsibilities that are potentially incompatible. Counselors have a primary responsibility to look out for the welfare of their clients. They must encourage their clients to make self-disclosures without fear of reprisal or of being rejected because of their ideas or feelings. To accomplish this, counselors must convey "unconditional positive regard" for their clients in the form of a nonpossessive, nonjudgmental, caring attitude.

Professors, on the other hand, have a primary responsibility to provide fair and competent instruction and evaluation. According to the Statement of Professional Ethics (1990) of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), professors should "make every reasonable effort to foster honest academic conduct and to ensure that their evaluations of students reflect each student's true merit." More specifically, as teachers in counseling education programs, professors are required to act "upon ethical obligations to the profession" and thus to evaluate their students (who are prospective members of the counseling profession) according to "predetermined academic standards that are separate from and not dependent upon the student's level of self-disclosure." (ACA Code, F.3.b)

A teacher-counselor who counsels a current student thus confronts a conflict of interest insofar as maintaining unconditional positive regard for the client tends to hamperor, conversely, tends to be hampered by-assessment of the student according to independent, pre-determined academic standards. Further, even if the individual counselor does not encounter a problem in maintaining independence of judgment in these circumstances, the substantial risk that the client-student will encounter such a problem militates against voluntarily undertaking such a dual-role. The counselor-educator should instead make a suitable counseling referral.

Because counseling former students is a consecutive dual-role relationship, it avoids the simultaneous, discordant responsibilities discussed above. However, such relationships may have the potential to create future conflicts of interest if former students later decide to enroll in further courses taught by the same instructor. It is thus prudent for counselor-educators to explore this possibility with such clients before agreeing to counsel them. Counselors can thereby assure that such clients have given informed consent to the policy of not counseling (current) students. If a student is not prepared to consent, or if the chances that the client will (simultaneously) become a student appear significant, the counselor should provide a suitable referral.

Teaching a Client
Cases in which current or former clients enroll in the counselor-instructor's classes leave the instructor with fewer alternatives than elective dual-role relationships do. Unlike counselors, instructors typically cannot cite conflict of interest to refuse to teach a student enrolled in a class. Instructors may be "stuck" with such a student whether they like it or not. Indeed, as instructors, they are expected to divest themselves of any relationship extrinsic to the teaching relationship that conflicts with it: "Although professors may follow subsidiary interests, these interests must never seriously hamper or compromise their freedom of inquiry." (AAUP, 1990)

When a former student comes in for psychological counseling, the counselor may well consider the possibility of having the client again as a student. When, however, a client has not yet been one's student, there may be no clear indicator of that possibility. Counselor-educators will find it harder to protect against conflicts of interest arising from having (current) clients become (simultaneously) their students. It is therefore prudent for counselors who teach (and teachers who counsel) to be "on the lookout" for possible signs of such impending dual roles before agreeing to take on a new client. They should, for example, consider whether the (prospective) client is planning to attend a university where the counselor teaches or to study a field the counselor teaches, whether the client is already enrolled in a curriculum in which the counselor teaches, and whether the client "needs" for graduation a course the counselor teaches.

Counselors should not turn down clients simply because they are someone's students. However, a counselor who, for example, teaches a required psychology course at a local community college (serving the community in which the counselor practices) should be alert to the dangers of unwittingly getting into such problematic relationships. It is prudent for counselors who teach to make a practice of informing prospective clients of their policy against counseling (current) students.

If a counselor nevertheless winds up with a current client in class, the counselor should discuss possible alternatives with the client, including termination of counseling with an acceptable referral, and the student's withdrawal from the class. In the latter case, options such as taking the course with a different instructor or at another institution might be discussed. The counselor should inform the client of all significant risks related to maintaining the dual-role relationship and encourage the client's own autonomous resolution of the conflict. Consistent with client welfare, the counselor should decline to remain in both roles.

When one finds oneself teaching a former client, the consecutive nature of the dual roles makes it less likely that a conflict of interest will arise. However, since former clients often seek further counseling, counselors should be alert to the possibility that such clients could request further therapy when they are currently students. Should they make such a request, this potential for conflict of interest can be avoided by making a suitable referral.