Chapter 15: Psychological Therapies

Treatment of Psychological Disorders: Past to Present

15.1

• Therapy: treatment methods aimed at making people feel better and function more effectively
• Electic: approach to therapy that results from combining elements of several different approaches or techniques
• Psychotherapy: therapy for mental disorders in which a person with a problem talks with a psychological professional
• Insight Therapies: therapies in which the main goal is helping people to gain insight with respect to their behavior, thoughts, and feelings
• Action Therapy: therapy in which the main goal is to change disordered or inappropriate behavior directly
• Biomedical Therapies: therapies that directly affect the biological functioning of the body and brain
  • Therapies for mental disorders in which a person with a problem is treated with biological or medical methods to relieve symptoms

Insight Therapies: Psychodynamic and Humanistic Approaches

15.2 Psychotherapy Begins: Freud’s Psychoanalysis

• Latent Content: the symbolic or hidden meaning of dreams
• Free Association: psychoanalytic technique in which a patient was encouraged to talk about anything that came to mind without fear of negative evaluations
• Resistance: occurring when a patient becomes reluctant to talk about a certain topic, by either changing the subject or becoming silent
• Transference: in psychoanalysis, the tendency for a patient or client to project positive or negative feelings for important people from the past onto the therapist
• Directive: therapy in which the therapist actively gives interpretations of a client’s statements and may suggest certain behavior or actions
• Psychodynamic Therapy: a newer and more general term for therapies based on psychoanalysis with an emphasis on transference, shorter treatment times, and a more direct therapeutic approach
• Interpersonal Psychotherapy (IPT): form of therapy for depression that incorporates multiple approaches an

15.3 Humanistic Therapy: To Err is Human

• Nondirective: therapy style in which the therapist remains relatively neutral and does not interpret or take direct actions with regard to the client, instead of remaining a calm, nonjudgmental listener while the client talks
• Person-Centered Therapy: a nondirective insight therapy based on the work of Carl Rogers in which the client does all the talking and the therapist listens
• Authenticity: the genuine, open, and honest response of the therapist to the client
• Unconditional Positive Regard: referring to the warmth, respect, and accepting atmosphere created by the therapist for the client in person-centered therapy; positive regard that is given without conditions or strings attached
• Empathy: the ability of the therapist to understand the feelings of the client
• Reflection: therapy technique in which the therapist restates what the client says rather than interpreting those statements
• Gestalt Therapy: a form of directive insight therapy in which the therapist helps clients to accept all parts of their feelings and subjective experiences, using leading questions and planned experiences such as role-playing

Action Therapies: Behavior Therapies and Cognitive Therapies

15.4 Behavior Therapies: Learning One’s Way to Better Behavior

• Behavior Therapies: action therapies based on the principles of classical and operant conditioning and aimed at changing disordered behavior without concern for the original causes of such behavior
• Systematic Desensitization: behavior technique used to treat phobias, in which a client is asked to make a list of ordered fears and taught to relax while concentrating on those fears
• Aversion Therapy: form of behavioral therapy in which an undesirable behavior is paired with an aversive stimulus to reduce the frequency of the behavior
• Exposure Therapies: behavioral techniques that expose individuals to anxiety- or fear-related stimuli, under carefully controlled conditions, to promote new learning
• Flooding: technique for treating phobias and other stress disorders in which the person is rapidly and intensely exposed to the fear-provoking situation or object and prevented from making the usual avoidance or escape response
• Modeling: learning through the observation and imitation of others
• Participant Modeling: technique in which a model demonstrates the desired behavior in a step by-step, gradual process while the client is encouraged to imitate the model
• Contingency Contract: a formal, written agreement between the therapist and client (or teacher and student) in which goals for behavioral change, reinforcements, and penalties are clearly stated
• Time-Out: an extinction process in which a person is removed from the situation that provides reinforcement for undesirable behavior, usually by being placed in a quiet corner or room away from possible attention and reinforcement opportunities

15.5 Cognitive Therapies: Thinking is Believing

• Cognitive Therapy: therapy in which the focus is on helping clients recognize distortions in their thinking and replacing distorted, unrealistic beliefs with more realistic, helpful thoughts
• Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT): action therapy in which the goal is to help clients overcome problems by learning to think more rationally and logically, which in turn will impact their behavior
• Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT): cognitive-behavioral therapy in which clients are directly challenged in their irrational beliefs and helped to restructure their thinking into more rational belief statements

Group Therapies: Not Just for the Shy

15.6 Types of Group Therapies

• Group Therapy: form of therapy or treatment during which a small group of clients with similar concerns meet together with a therapist to address their issues
• Family Counseling (Family Therapy): a form of group therapy in which family members meet together with a counselor or therapist to resolve problems that affect the entire family

15.7 Evaluation of Group Therapy

• Self-Help Groups (Support Groups): a group composed of people who have similar problems and who meet together without a therapist or counselor for the purpose of discussion, problem-solving, and social and emotional support

Does Psychotherapy Really Work

15.9 Characteristics of Effective Therapy

• Therapeutic Alliance: the relationship between therapist and client that develops as a warm, caring, accepting relationship characterized by empathy, mutual respect, and understanding
• Evidence-Based Treatment: also called empirically supported treatment, refers to interventions, strategies, or techniques that have been found to produce therapeutic and desired changes during controlled research studies

Biomedical Therapies

15.10 Psychopharmacology

• Psychopharmacology: the use of drugs to control or relieve the symptoms of psychological disorders
• Antipsychotic Drugs: drugs used to treat psychotic symptoms such as delusions, hallucinations, and other bizarre behavior
• Antianxiety Drugs: drugs used to treat and calm anxiety reactions, typically minor tranquilizers
• Antidepressants: drugs used to treat depression and anxiety

15.11 ECT and Psychosurgery

• Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT): form of biomedical therapy to treat severe depression in which electrodes are placed on either one or both sides of a person’s head and an electric current is passed through the electrodes that are strong enough to cause a seizure or convulsion
• Psychosurgery: surgery performed on brain tissue to relieve or control severe psychological disorders
• Prefrontal Lobotomy: psychosurgery in which the connections of the prefrontal cortex to other areas of the brain are severed
• Bilateral Anterior Cingulotomy: a psychosurgical technique in which an electrode wire is inserted into the anterior cingulate gyrus, with the guidance of magnetic resonance imaging, to destroy a very small portion of that brain area with electric current