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Unit 13
Psychological Therapies
History
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Used to be very brutal with how disorders were
handled
Beating/bleeding disorders out of people
 Isolation
 Locked in Cages
 Laughed at
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Phillipe Pinel and Dorthea Dix started movts. to
treat with care and compassion
Psychotherapy
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Techniques involving a trained therapist and
someone looking to overcome a disorder or
achieve personal growth
Childhood repression of impulses that still impact
behavior or feeling
 Historical reconstruction through free association
 Good for learning related disorders (phobias)
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Psychoanalysis
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Freud’s process of free association
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Not editing anything, letting everything out – no matter how
trivial
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Analyst interprets responses
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Normally blocks would infer resistance
Resistances are noted and interpreted by analyst
Dream analysis – latent content (what you remember, censored content
of the dream)
Transfer of feelings towards therapist
Takes a long time/expensive
Psychodynamic Therapy
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Influenced by Freud
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Try to understand current feelings/symptoms based
on childhood experiences
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Help the patient gain understanding and perspective
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Talk face to face (unlike psychotherapy)
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Shorter time working together
Humanistic Therapies
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Realizing potential for self fulfillment and self
awareness/acceptance
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Insight Therapies
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Focuses on present and future more than the past
Conscious rather than unconscious thoughts
Taking immediate responsibility for actions, rather than
looking for hidden causes
Promoting growth instead of curing illness
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Clients, not patients
Humanistic
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Carl Rogers
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Client Centered Therapy
 Focus on person’s conscious self perceptions
 Nondirective
 Listening without judging or interpreting
 Therapists encouraged to exhibit genuineness,
acceptance and empathy – no facades
Respond with honesty
 Deepens self acceptance
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Carl Rogers 
Active Listening
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Echoing, restating and seeking clarification
Unconditional Positive Regard
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A way to give non judgemental responses to a patient
3 techniques used
 1. Paraphrase – summarize what was said in your own
words, rather than say “I know how you feel”
 2. Invite Clarification – ask for examples
 3. Reflect Feelings – “That sounds frustrating”
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Mirror feelings to get better understanding
Behavior Therapies
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Healing power of self awareness
 Learning principles can eliminate certain problems
 Learned behaviors (like phobias and some forms of anxiety)
are learned responses
 These can be conditioned away and replaced
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Classical Conditioning Techniques
 Bedwetting
 Counterconditioning
 Taking the trigger stimulus and pairing it with a new
response
 Exposure therapy and aversion therapy
Behavior Therapy
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Exposure therapy
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Exposing people to things they normally avoid
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Systematic Desensitization
Wolpe
 You cant be anxious and relaxed at the same time
 Proceed gradually
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Progressive relaxation
Fear can be replaced
Virtual reality being used today
Behavioral Therapy
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Aversion therapy
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Getting a negative response or unpleasant feeling
when in the presence of a stimulus
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Alcohol and smoking, chewing nails
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Getting rid of an unwanted behavior by using a negative
stimulus
Behavioral Therapy
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Operant Conditioning
 Behaviors are strongly influenced by their consequences
 Reinforce the desired behaviors, withhold rewards or enforce
punishments for those that are unwanted
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Step by step manner of rewards
 Token economy – rewards given for behaviors that can be
cashed in for privileges or treats
 How likely will they continue the behavior when the
rewards stop?
 Is it ethical to control behavior like this?
Cognitive Therapy
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Thinking influences our feelings
Change the way we think and we can change our
feelings
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Beck’s Theory for Depression
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Patients constantly recalling and reliving their failures
 Catastrophizing themselves – looking through dark
glasses
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Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
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Change the way people think and act
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Labeling behaviors
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Compulsive thoughts labeled and realized
Group and Family Therapy
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Group
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Cheaper
Still effective
Social awareness that patients are not alone
AA
Family
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No person is an island, disorders will have an impact on
everyone
Sometimes can be caused by others, and they may be unaware
Evaluating Psychotherapy
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How can you really measure effectiveness
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Can symptoms be cured or just treated?
Client perspective
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Why is it effective?
1. People enter therapy in crisis
 2. May want to believe that it was worth the effort
 3. Usually speak kindly of therapists
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Evaluating Psychotherapy
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Clinician Perspective
Since most individuals are so unhappy when they
enter therapy and leave happy, clinicians think it is
very important
 Bias
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How can we really tell?
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Meta analysis – stat analysis using large numbers of
studies
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Most people will improve over time, those who get
treatment improved more over time
Which treatments are best?
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Cant really say – too many variables
Alternative therapies
Energy therapy
 Recovered memories
 Rebirthing therapy
 Crisis debriefing
 EMDR – Eye Movement Desensitization and
Reprocessing
 Light Exposure Therapy
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Biomedical Therapy
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Physically changing the brain’s functioning by altering
its chemistry with drugs, electricity, magnetic impulses,
or surgery
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Psychopharmacology
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Antipsychotic drugs – dampen responses
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Side effects – tardive dyskinesia
Antianxiety drugs - reduce symptoms , but don’t solve
problems
Antidepressants - Blocking neurotransmitters
Biomedical Therapy
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Brain stimulation
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Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT)
Introduced in the 1930s
 No memory of treatment
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Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (rTMS)
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No amnesia
Deep brain stimulation
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Implanted electrodes with a type of pacemaker
Psychosurgery
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Surgery that removes or destroys brain tissue
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Lobotomy
Egas Moniz
 Sever nerves in the brain will stop emotions in
frontal lobes
 Nobel Prize winner
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Lifestyle changes
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Sometimes simple changes can have huge
impacts
Increasing aerobic exercise
 Sleeping more
 Light exposure – Seasonal Affective Disorder
 Social Connections
 Anti rumination – enhancing positive thoughts
 Diet and nutritional supplements
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