When your concerns require support from multiple resources or campus offices, your Department Case Manager (Counseling Psychologist) will help you identify your needs, connect you with appropriate campus and community resources, and provide ongoing coordination and follow-up to ensure you receive the support you need. In contrast, individual counseling focuses on helping you explore yourself, process your emotions, and cope with life's challenges through confidential conversations with a counseling psychologist.
Our Center operates a Department-Based Case Management System. Each academic department is assigned a Department Case Manager (Counseling Psychologist) who provides case management and resource coordination for students in that department. If individual counseling is recommended, your Department Case Manager will help arrange a referral to a Psychologist for individual counseling.
As a result, you may work with both a Department Case Manager and a Psychologist for individual counseling. While they have different professional roles, they work collaboratively to provide coordinated support throughout your academic journey and university life.
Psychological counseling is a professional service provided by licensed psychologists or psychologist interns (hereafter referred to as “psychologists”). It involves clinical conversations, the use of artistic media, or other professional techniques to help clients clarify and explore the difficulties they are currently facing. The aim is to enhance their courage and ability to confront challenges, ultimately leading to the resolution and management of these issues.
Consultation, on the other hand, is more focused on problem-solving and providing information. Compared to counseling, it involves less emotional processing and hardly any psychological assessment. It is primarily aimed at facilitating cognitive changes and adjustments by providing advice and resources. This differs from counseling, which emphasizes helping the client discover and find a path that works best for them.
Counseling is like a journey shared by the psychologist and the client. On one hand, it relies on the psychologist to help the client clarify and sort out their current mental and emotional state and explore possible ways to address the issues. On the other hand, it also depends heavily on the client’s willingness to foster deeper self-awareness, openness, and the courage to take steps toward change, as well as their readiness to face the uncertainties, efforts, and challenges throughout the process. The collaborative effort between both parties is what unlocks the true potential of counseling.
Our assistance are available to currently enrolled students at NTNU.
Students typically seek help for the following reasons, though there may be other circumstances depending on individual needs:
1. Experiencing abnormal signs, such as sudden binge eating or loss of appetite, prolonged insomnia, persistent low mood, depression, frustration, or loneliness.
2. Experiencing sudden external stress events that cause trauma, such as earthquakes, floods, car accidents, loss of a loved one, marital issues, breakups, sexual assault, or harassment.
3. A desire to improve life adaptation problems, such as anxiety over failing a class or wanting to improve interpersonal relationships (with classmates, roommates, or romantic partners).
4. A desire to engage in deeper self-exploration, such as managing anxiety about future career direction, uncertainty about personal interests and profession, or seeking a deeper understanding of certain aspects of oneself.
Most people who come for counseling do so voluntarily, with about 99% of them voluntarily making appointments. Only a very small number of clients are referred by their advisers, faculty members, or friends and family who believe they need assistance. However, many of these involuntary clients often end up having a positive experience with counseling, and later return voluntarily.
Students on suspension of studies are advised to contact the Department Case Manager (Counseling Psychologist)(refer to the Full-time Psychologists section on our website) to consult on available resources.
In compliance with clinical ethics, the Personal Data Protection Act, and the Psychologist Act, your attendance and all session contents are generally kept confidential. However, to ensure paramount welfare, confidentiality boundaries do not apply if there is a risk of self-harm, threat of harm to others, or illegal activities.
The individual counseling services provided by the Center are one-on-one sessions, so bringing others along is not permitted.
The Center posts current service information, including the individual counseling schedule and specialty of our psychologists) on our official website before the start of each semester. Students are welcome to refer to this information online and make appointments.
All of our counseling services are free of charge!
To ensure that all students in need have access to this resource, the Center operates on a short-term counseling framework. Consequently, a standard counseling block is typically structured around 1 to 6 sessions. Sessions are held once a week, each lasting 50 minutes (equivalent to one class period).
All counseling services at the Center are processed through an online booking system. You can log in to NTNU Portal, go to “Applications,” then “Student Affairs Related System,” and select “Counseling Service System” to submit a request. Alternatively, you can visit the Center in person, where our staff will assist you with the appointment process.
There are waiting areas where students can relax and read books. Currently, there are 19 counseling rooms (16 at the Heping Campus and 3 at the Gongguan Campus). Each room varies in size and layout.
However, every room is designed to prioritize comfort—furnished with two armchairs, a small table, and warm decor such as paintings and potted plants. Our goal is to create a warm and welcoming atmosphere, where students feel at ease to express themselves.
If you are unable to attend a scheduled session, please cancel your appointment by phone, email, or in person at least one day before the session. (Same-day cancellations will be considered a missed appointment.) You can also visit the Center in person at any campus to cancel.
Contact: Heping Campus II 7749-5363, 7749-5364; Gongguan Campus 7749-6451
Email: counseling@deps.ntnu.edu.tw
Important Note: If you miss or cancel two sessions, your subsequent appointments will be automatically canceled, i.e., only one missed or one canceled session is allowed. Furthermore, missed or canceled sessions will still be calculated toward your total allotted session count.
We recommend that you first discuss these feelings with your current psychologist. If you have any thoughts about the counseling process or the psychologist, we encourage you to be open and honest with the psychologist. A perceived mismatch may stem from either you, the psychologist, or the dynamics between the two of you. Challenging the professional and authoritative image of a psychologist can be difficult for many, but a good and professional psychologist has the capacity to handle this and take responsibility for addressing your concerns productively.
If you still find it too difficult to bring it up, you may report your situation to the Center. We will facilitate the closure of the current case and allow you to reapply when appropriate.
You can contact your department/graduate institute’s designated counseling psychologist (available on the Full-time Psychologists page) or your designated departmental advisers from the Student Adviser Office.
You can also reach out to the 24-hour Student Emergency Hotline at 02-7749-3123.
In addition to individual counseling, the Center offers other services, including group counseling, psychological assessments, and class seminars.
Group counseling provides an environment where you can better understand yourself and others, helping you find the direction and strength for the future.
The Center also offers various psychological assessments, such as career interest exploration, self-exploration and understanding, and personality trait analysis, all of which can help you gain deeper insight into yourself.
Class seminars address relevant psychological topics, helping you with self-exploration, emotional management, and interpersonal communication skills for better life and academic adaptation.