Enhancing Motivation for Change in Substance Use Disorder Treatment - Part 1 (DA2034)

Course Format

This course is online. All course material is available online and is accessible immediately after purchase from your account homepage. Certificate of Completion is available immediately upon passing the exam.

Course Overview

This course is chapters 1-3 of the TIP titled “Enhancing Motivation for Change in Substance Use Disorder Treatment” produced by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), updated in 2019. This Treatment Improvement Protocol (TIP) reflects a fundamental rethinking of the concept of motivation as a dynamic process, not a static client trait. Motivation relates to the probability that a person will enter into, continue, and adhere to a specific change strategy.

This course presents an overview of motivational counseling approaches, including screening, brief intervention, and referral to treatment and contains an explanation of the nature of motivation and its link to changing substance use behaviors. The course concludes with a review of the spirit of MI, the principles of person-centered counseling, the core counseling skills of MI, and the four processes of MI giving the student a concrete basis and multiple processes to use in the practice of MI.

Course Objectives

1. Describe motivation, its benefits in substance use disorder treatment and new perspectives in addiction treatment.


2. List the stages in the SOC model.


3. Present the elements of effective motivational counseling approaches and the counselors' focus in each stage of the SOC model.


4. Explain the core skills of MI.


5. Define the four processes in MI and the benefits to addiction counselling.

Course Outline

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