Therapist self-awareness is widely regarded by educators and clinicians as an essential factor that allows psychotherapists to treat clients effectively (Ridley, Mollen, & Kelly, 2011b). Accordingly, a central goal of therapist training is to increase self-awareness, which is believed to lead to important training outcomes, such as stronger trainee self-efficacy in clinical abilities (e.g., Barnes, 2004; Daniel, Roysircar, Abeles, & Boyd, 2004). Despite this common belief, there is a scarcity of theory and research on the role of self-awareness in affecting therapist training outcomes (Pieterse, Lee, Ritmeester, & Collins, 2013). Using a Social Cognitive Model of Counselor Training (SCMCT; Larson, 1998) as a guiding theoretical framework, the present study examined therapist trainees' self-awareness as a mediator in the relations of trainees' person variable (self-compassion) and training variables (clinical experience and supervisory rapport) to trainees' counseling self-efficacy (CSE).

Path analysis was conducted to analyze data from a sample of 466 graduate-level therapist trainees. Results showed that self-awareness partially mediated the relations of clinical experience and self-compassion to CSE. The mediation effect was not significant for supervisory rapport, although supervisory rapport did directly predict CSE. Post-hoc moderation analyses suggested that self-awareness might play a more significant mediational role for trainees with more clinical experience compared to trainees with less experience, and for trainees with more supervisory rapport versus trainees with less supervisory rapport. These findings provide valuable empirical support for self-awareness as a crucial factor in facilitating desirable training outcomes in therapist trainees. The importance of advancing theory and research in this area is highlighted.