Psychology Appropriate amount of supervision?

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I was trying to figure out what is typical as far as hours of supervision per week. I am worried my program (accredited clinical PhD program) is not providing enough, but I don't actually know what's typical or recommended. I was told at some point by faculty that about 1 hour for every 3-4 client contact hours is appropriate at this stage, but we only get group supervision and not individual supervision, so I don't know if that ratio applies regardless of format. There are not set rules in this program for supervision amount, so some supervisors will meet with students individually at the beginning of training, but group supervision is the only format offered after about the first 9 months or so. The sizes of groups for group supervision can also get up to 10 students or so. Therefore, having a 2 hour group meeting for a 10-person group means that each person gets 12 minutes to talk per week on average. And then there are the inevitable issues with certain people monopolizing time in group, getting off-topic, etc. that are hard to get around when there are so many people.

Other students in the program do not necessarily have a problem with this setup and enjoy the independence. However, I worry that clients are getting shortchanged because students don't have much assistance and are learning through trial and error. I can't speak for others' experiences in the program, but I feel like I'm just taking shots in the dark in therapy and hoping something works. I understand that it is important to learn how to be independent, but it seems like a pretty difficult task to function so independently when you have only been seeing clients for such a short time. I have not yet expressed these concerns to anyone because I first wanted to figure out whether my program has typical expectations (that I just need to figure out how to adjust to) versus whether this may be a larger problem. The attitude in the program at least seems to be that having one hour of group supervision per week is entirely sufficient and appropriate.

Thanks in advance!

To the best of my knowledge, APA does not specifically require a set number or proportion of supervision to patient-contact hours for doctoral programs, nor does it specific which proportion must be individual vs. group (conversely, APA does have a minimum requirement of 4 hours of supervision per week for internships, of which at least 2 must be individual). I've certainly heard of doctoral programs in which most or all supervision occurs in a group format. APA does require that some amount of direct observation occur during each practicum evaluation period, though.

I understand your concerns, and would generally agree that it inherently makes sense to have more and closer supervision earlier in the course of training. Whether this occurs is group or individual format is potentially largely up to the program. Part of the idea with group supervision is that even when you aren't discussing your own cases, you can be learning and growing from discussion of other students' cases, which may involve situations similar to those you're facing (or will face). However, at the point of internship applications, particularly for larger cohort program (which yours does not sound to be), I have seen a student receiving only group supervision raise concerns amongst reviewers.

If you aren't feeling competent in treating patients due to the level and type of supervision, I would say it's worth discussing with the practicum supervisor. I would imagine if they've been supervising for any length of time, they've had prior students with similar concerns. They may be able to setup additional supervision either by themselves, or by a more senior graduate student or intern (the latter of which is very common).

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