Therapy
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Who does it?
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Why go to them?
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What do they do
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Approaches
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Techniques
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Does it work?
Evaluating Psychotherapies
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To whom do people turn for help for
psychological difficulties?
Therapists and their Training
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Clinical
psychologists
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Most are
psychologists with a Ph.D. and expertise in research, assessment, and therapy,
supplemented by a supervised internship
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About half work
in agencies and institutions, half in private practice
Therapists and their Training
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Psychiatrists
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Physicians who
specialize in the treatment of psychological disorders
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Not all
psychiatrists have had extensive training in psychotherapy, but as M.D.s they can prescribe medications. Thus, they tend to
see those with the most serious problems
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Many have a
private practice
Therapists and their Training
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Clinical or
Psychiatric Social Worker
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A two-year Master
of Social Work graduate program plus postgraduate
supervision prepares some social workers to offer psychotherapy, mostly to
people with everyday personal and family problems
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About half have
earned the National Association of Social Workers’ designation of clinical
social worker
Therapists and their Training
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Counselors
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Marriage and
family counselors specialize in problems arising from family relations
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Pastoral
counselors provide counseling to countless people
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Abuse counselors
work with substance abusers and with spouse and child abusers and their victims
Why go to a therapist and not just a friend?
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Objectivity
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Experience
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How many of you have dealt with a suicidal
individual?
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Evidence based approaches
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Reading
the research
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Creative methodologies
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Privacy and Comfort
General Approaches to Therapy
History of Treatment
Historical methods (still used in limited cases)
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Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT)
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therapy for severely
depressed patients in which a brief electric current is sent through the brain
of an anesthetized patient
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Psychosurgery
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surgery that removes or
destroys brain tissue in an effort to change behavior
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lobotomy
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now-rare psychosurgical
procedure once used to calm uncontrollably emotional or violent patients
Therapy- Psychoanalysis
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Psychoanalysis
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Freud believed the patient’s free associations,
resistances, dreams, and transferences – and the therapist’s interpretations of
them – released previously repressed feelings, allowing the patient to gain
self-insight
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use has rapidly
decreased in recent years
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Resistance
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blocking from
consciousness of anxiety-laden material
Therapy- Psychoanalysis
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Interpretation
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the analyst’s noting
supposed dream meanings, resistances, and other significant behaviors in order
to promote insight
Humanistic Therapy
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Client-Centered
Therapy
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humanistic therapy developed by Carl Rogers
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therapist uses techniques such as active listening within a
genuine, accepting, empathic environment to facilitate clients’ growth
Humanistic Therapy
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Active
Listening-empathic listening in which the listener echoes, restates, and
clarifies
Behavior Therapy
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Behavior Therapy
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therapy that applies
learning principles to the elimination of unwanted behaviors
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Counterconditioning
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procedure that
conditions new responses to stimuli that trigger unwanted behaviors
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based on classical
conditioning
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includes systematic
desensitization and aversive conditioning
Behavior Therapy
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Exposure Therapy
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treat anxieties by
exposing people (in imagination or reality) to the things they fear and avoid
Behavior Therapy
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Systematic Desensitization
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type of counterconditioning
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associates a pleasant,
relaxed state with gradually increasing anxiety-triggering stimuli
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commonly used to treat
phobias
Behavior Therapy
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Systematic Desensitization
Behavior Therapy
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Token Economy
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an operant conditioning procedure that rewards desired
behavior
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patient exchanges a token of some sort, earned for exhibiting
the desired behavior, for various privileges or treats
Cognitive Therapy
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Cognitive Therapy
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teaches people new, more adaptive ways of thinking and acting
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based on the assumption that thoughts intervene between
events and our emotional reactions (mind over body?)
Cognitive Therapy
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The Cognitive Revolution
Cognitive Therapy
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A cognitive perspective on psychological
disorders
Group and Family Therapies
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Family Therapy
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treats the family as a system
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views an individual’s unwanted behaviors as influenced by
or directed at other family members
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attempts to guide family members toward positive relationships
and improved communication
Drug Therapies
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Psychopharmacology
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study of the effects of drugs on mind and behavior
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Lithium
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chemical that provides an effective drug therapy for the mood
swings of bipolar (manic-depressive) disorders
Drug Therapies
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The emptying of U.S. mental hospitals
Depression: Excess serotonin is blocked by drug (e.g., prozac)
Drug Therapies
Most Psychologists
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Eclectic Approach
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an approach to
psychotherapy that, depending on the client’s problems, uses techniques from various forms of therapy