No full-text available
To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the author.
An eclectic definition of psychotherapy
... Studies were included if: (a) study participants had an intellectual disability evidenced by data to indicate Full-Scale IQ <70, or other evidence to indicate an intellectual disability (i.e., an assessment of adaptive behaviour focused upon conceptual, social, and practical daily living skills). Studies that also included participants with borderline intellectual disabilities (IQ score between 69 and 79) alongside people with mild to profound intellectual disabilities were not excluded, (b) the participants were older than 5 years, (c) contained at least one intervention that was a form of psychotherapy, defined by Norcross [51] as "the systematic application of interventions based on well-established psychological principles and techniques aimed at the prevention or treatment of emotional, behavioural or mental health problems", and (d) at least two independent groups were included, where one group received a psychotherapy which was compared to a control group who did not receive a psychotherapy and, (e) they were published in English within a peer reviewed journal. ...
Objective
The aim of this systematic review and meta-analysis (PROSPERO 2020 CRD42020169323) was to evaluate the efficacy of psychological therapy with people with intellectual disabilities.
Method
A comprehensive literature search yielded 22,444 studies which were screened for eligibility. Studies were eligible for inclusion if a psychological therapy was delivered to people with intellectual disabilities compared to a group who did not receive the therapy. Thirty-three controlled trials were eligible for inclusion in the review, with 19 included within a DerSimonian-Laird random effects meta-analysis. Subgroup analysis was completed by clinical presentation, and by comparing randomised trials to non-randomised trials, and group-based to individually delivered psychotherapy.
Results
Following the removal of outliers, psychological therapy for a range of mental health problems was associated with a small and significant effect size, g = 0.43, 95% CI [0.20, 0.67], N = 698. There was evidence of heterogeneity and bias due to studies with small sample sizes and a lack of randomisation. Non-randomised studies were associated with a large effect size, g = 0.90, 95% CI [0.47, 1.32], N = 174, while randomised studies were associated with a small effect size, g = 0.36, 95% CI [0.17, 0.55], N = 438, excluding outliers. Individually delivered psychological therapy was associated with a small and non-significant effect size, g = 0.32, 95% CI [−0.01, 0.65], N = 146, while group-based interventions were associated with a small and significant effect size, g = 0.37, 95% CI [0.05, 0.68], N = 361, again, excluding outliers. Psychological therapy for anger was associated with a moderate effect size, g = 0.60, 95% CI [0.26, 0.93], N = 324, while treatment for depression and anxiety was associated with a small and non-significant effect size, g = 0.38, 95% CI [−0.10, 0.85], N = 216, after outliers were removed.
Conclusions
Studies are fraught with methodological weaknesses limiting the ability to make firm conclusions about the effectiveness of psychological therapy for people with intellectual disabilities. Improved reporting standards, appropriately powered and well-designed trials, and greater consideration of the nature and degree of adaptations to therapy are needed to minimise bias and increase the certainty of conclusions.
... Second, there has been a history of studying interpersonal synchrony, which is argued to promote cooperative behavior, affiliation, and compassion. The alignments can occur in levels of neural, perceptual, affective, physiological, and behavioral responses during social interaction (65)(66)(67)(68)(69). Specifically in psychotherapy, since therapists assist clients through verbal interactions, previous studies showed relationships between dyadic synchrony and the quality of interpersonal interactions in therapist-client dyads in psychotherapy. ...
Introduction: Previous studies explored the preferences for therapists’ attire and office setting based on initial impressions as a reference for the formality in psychotherapy. This study examines the formality of psychotherapy by investigating therapists’ and clients’ use of discourse particles, the linguistic marker and quantifier of the formality in speech, in relation to therapist empathy in different stages of psychotherapy.
Methods: Four psychotherapy sessions (representing early, mid, and late stages) each from 39 therapist-client dyads were analyzed. Trained observers rated therapist empathy in each session using the Therapist Empathy Scale.
Results: Results of multilevel modeling show that synchrony in particle usage, hence synchrony in formality, between clients and therapists is not associated with therapist empathy. Therapists’ use of particles (i.e., absolute formality of therapists) was also not associated with therapist empathy. In contrast, the relative formality of therapists plays significant roles: therapist empathy is generally observed when therapists are relatively more formal than the clients (i.e., lower relative usage of particles by the therapists when compared to the clients). However, for clients who speak formally with few particles, therapist casualness (i.e., higher relative usage of particles than the clients) at the beginning of therapy may be interpreted as therapist empathy as therapists help these clients ease into the therapeutic relationships.
Discussion: Our results suggest that the examination of therapists’ and clients’ use of particles across different stages of treatment may illuminate dynamic interactional styles that facilitate or hinder the psychotherapy process.
... Cependant, nos auteures se positionnent différemment. Elles s'appuient sur The American Psychological Association (APA) qui définit la psychothérapie comme « l'application éclairée et intentionnelle de méthodes cliniques et de positions interpersonnelles dérivées de principes psychologiques établis dans le but d'aiderles personnes à modifier leurs comportements, leurs cognitions, leurs émotions et/ou leurs caractéristiques personnelles dans la direction que la plupart aurait souhaitée »(Norcross, 1990(Norcross, , p. 2018. La psychothérapie doit être dispensée par un professionnel de santé qualifié et englobe un large éventail de pratiques « conçues pour apporter un soulagement des symptômes et un changement de personnalité, réduire les futurs épisodes symptomatiques, améliorer la qualité de vie, promouvoir le fonctionnement adaptatif au travail/à l'école et dans les relations et augmenter la probabilité de faire des choix de vie sains » (APA, 2013, p. 102).Pour nos auteures, la définition de la psychothérapie de l'APA est compatible avec le travail du conseiller en génétique. ...
En ce début de XXIe siècle, les avancées de la biologie moléculaire et des biotechnologies sont prometteuses d’une révolution en médecine clinique. Cependant, ces avancées spectaculaires ne doivent pas faire disparaître la dimension humaine des consultations médicales, « au lit du patient ». Il nous semble que le conseil génétique, qui correspond à la fois à un processus et à une consultation, a su préserver cette dimension humaine. Il est l’objet de cette recherche, de sa création à nos jours, en particulier au regard de l’accompagnement psychologique. En effet, comment traiter l’angoisse d’anticipation provoquée par les tests présymptomatiques et génétiques ? Il y a deux modèles : le modèle nord-américain qui s’appuie sur l’éthique du Care et s’enracine dans la sphère privée, à l’origine pour combattre l’eugénisme ; le modèle français qui s’appuie sur la psychopathologie de l’angoisse, la nosographie psychiatrique et psychanalytique, le biodroit. Or, notre analyse du positionnement des conseillers en génétique nord-américains montre qu’il présente de nombreux intérêts, dont celui d’apporter un soutien psychologique efficient et d’échapper au biopouvoir. Notre hypothèse est qu’il serait souhaitable qu’il se généralise à la consultation de médecine clinique du futur.
... All relevant studies were considered eligible if they included the following: randomization; an appropriate comparison group (ie, treatment as usual, usual care, or another active treatment); adult patients (aged 18+) diagnosed with AUD, AD, or alcohol abuse 5,18-23 (details found in Table S2); participants receiving a form of psychotherapy (S3), defined by the American Psychiatric Association (APA), 24 and classified using the Nottingham Classification of Psychotherapies ( Figure S3), as a single or major intervention or as an auxiliary means of integration; assessment of the percentage of days abstinent (PDA), the change in drinks per drinking day (change in DDD) and the change in craving using a validated measure. ...
Purpose:
Accumulating research suggests that psychotherapy helps improve abstinence but the difference in the efficacy of multiple psychotherapies in alcohol use disorder (AUD) remains to be explored.
Patients and methods:
A systematic search of databases (Pubmed, Embase, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL), and EBSCO) for studies (published from inception to April 10th.) of adults diagnosed with AUD accepting psychotherapies was conducted. Studies covering 9 countries and regions. The qualitative analysis pooled 2646 individuals from 34 randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and the networks included 1928 participants (23 RCTs). The outcomes included percentage of days abstinent (PDA), change in drinks per drinking day (change in DDD), and change in craving compared among individuals accepting various psychotherapies. The protocol followed the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA), and was registered on the International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews (PROSPERO).
Results:
For the network of PDA, motivational enhancement treatment (MET) (35.44, 11.78 to 59.09, high-certainty) and couple therapy (CT) (28.89, 13.42 to 44.36, moderate-certainty) were significantly different from treatment as usual (TAU) with the surface under the cumulative ranking curve (SUCRA) mean rank 1.9 and 1.9 respectively. TAU+supportive psychotherapy (SP) was better than TAU for the change in DDD in the high-quality direct comparison.
Conclusion:
The motivational enhancement and the couple therapy show potential amelioration for alcohol abstinence. Additionally, the preferred interventions are different for improving PDA and change in DDD. The evidence network remains to be strengthened.
... Psychotherapy is the informed and intentional application of clinical methods and interpersonal stances derived from established psychological principles for the purpose of assisting people to modify their behaviors, cognitions, emotions, and/or other personal characteristics in directions that the participants deem desirable. (Norcross, 1990, p. 218-220) ...
What helps a client embrace change? Growth mindset and positive mental health aid psychotherapeutic change. Positive mental health facets aiding change include wellbeing, emotional regulation, distress tolerance, interpersonal effectiveness, self-control, self-awareness, and spirituality. The literature review examined the formulation, principles, critique, and function of growth mindset construct within contexts of success, talent, neuroscience, trauma, impairment, and each positive mental health facet. The review indicated growth mindset impacts change. The objective involved testing for evidence of associated relationship between growth mindset and positive mental constructs using Pearson's correlation coefficient. Utilization occurred of eight self-rating measures, one each for wellbeing, emotional regulation, distress tolerance, interpersonal effectiveness, self-control, self-awareness, and spirituality. Growth mindset measures received individual comparison with nine positive mental health measures. The null hypothesis was r ≤ .03. There were nine alternative hypotheses, one per positive mental health measure. The sample size was 148, obtained by internet survey distribution. The result was failure to reject the null hypotheses for all nine alternative hypotheses allowing for the following conclusions: no evidence of associated relationships; growth mindset and positive mental health constructs are meaningful and useful; belief alone does not lead to change effort. Recommended research includes qualitative case studies, quasi-experiment comparisons, development of enhanced measurements, or longitudinal observation.
Keywords: growth mindset, fixed mindset, positive mental health, psychotherapeutic change, change beliefs
... Psychotherapy with its "purpose of assisting people to modify their behaviors, cognitions, emotions, and/or other personal characteristics in directions that the participants deem desirable" (Norcross, 1990, page 218) is highly relevant for the clinical application of attachment: Bowlby (1988) stressed the dynamic nature of internal working models, suggesting that the attachment system displays significant continuity but is also open to modification and change, for instance through psychotherapy, that may help the individual to create a more coherent autobiographical narrative. ...
... These are linked to positive evaluations of teacher-student (Bernieri, 1988) and spousal relationships (Julien et al., 2000), and are claimed to promote cooperative behavior, affiliation, and compassion (Hove and Risen, 2009;Valdesolo and DeSteno, 2011). Psychotherapy is a highly relevant context for investigating interpersonal synchrony, as therapists assist clients to modify behaviors, cognitions, and emotions through verbal interaction (Norcross, 1990). Koole and Tschacher (2016) outline three interlinked levels of synchronous processes: perceptual-motor processes like movement, facial expressions, and gestures, complex cognitive processes like memory and language, and emotion regulation. ...
Interpersonal synchrony is the alignment of responses between social interactants, and is linked to positive outcomes including cooperative behavior, affiliation, and compassion in different social contexts. Language is noted as a key aspect of interpersonal synchrony, but different strands of existing work on linguistic (a)synchrony tends to be methodologically polarized. We introduce a more complementary approach to model linguistic (a)synchrony that is applicable across different interactional contexts, using psychotherapy talk as a case study. We define linguistic synchrony as similarity between linguistic choices that reflect therapists and clients’ socio-psychological stances. Our approach involves (i) computing linguistic variables per session, (ii) k-means cluster analysis to derive a global synchrony measure per dyad, and (iii) qualitative analysis of sample extracts from each dyad. This is demonstrated on sample dyads from psychoanalysis, cognitive-behavioral, and humanistic therapy. The resulting synchrony measures reflect the general philosophy of these therapy types, while further qualitative analyses reveal how (a)synchrony is contextually co-constructed. Our approach provides a systematic and replicable tool for research and self-reflection in psychotherapy and other types of purposive dialogic interaction, on more representative and limited datasets alike.
... Based on a suggestion by Norcross (1990), we defined psychological treatment for mental disorders as any intervention that has been developed to treat mental disorders, is based on a psychological theory, and uses psychological methods to modify individuals' behaviors, cognitions, emotions, and/or other personal characteristics. ...
An important aim of basic research in Clinical Psychology is to improve clinical practice (e.g., by developing novel interventions or improving the efficacy of existing ones) based on an improved understanding of key mechanisms involved in psychopathology. In the first part of this article, we examine how frequently this translation has happened in the past by reviewing all 40 evidence-based psychological interventions recommended in current clinical guidelines for five important (groups of) mental disorders. Results show that only 23% of treatments showed a very strong link between basic research and the development of the intervention, and further 20% showed a strong link. These findings thus suggest that the route from basic research to clinical innovation may not be as strong historically as is commonly assumed. Important challenges for translational research in clinical psychology are reviewed, leading to the introduction of a new framework, and a discussion of possible solutions to overcome these challenges. Suggestions include increased attention to robust and replicable research findings, a stronger focus on experimental psychopathology research to establish causality of psychopathological mechanisms, a more systematic structural integration of basic and applied research in clinical psychology, a stronger emphasis on mechanisms of change and moderators of clinical interventions, increased attention to clinical subgroups, and emphasizing improvements to existing interventions over the development of novel interventions.
... Психологическое консультирование или психотерапия представляет собой информированное и целенаправленное применение клинических методов и интерперсональных установок, выведенных из установленных психологических принципов, с целью помогать людям модифицировать их паттерны поведения, когниции, эмоции и/или другие личностные характеристики в том направлении, которое участники считают желательным [2]. ...
В статье предполагается, что речевое взаимодействие между психологом и клиентом обладает рядом особенностей лингвистического характера, которые должны быть учтены в работе психолога.
Ключевые слова: психотерапия, язык, речь, лингвистика, общение
... Here is where we introduce our cognitive linguistic example for the rest of the chapterthe normalized usage frequencies of metaphors in a consecutive series of 60 weekly psychological counseling sessions. Psychological counseling (or psychotherapy) is defined as a mental healthcare activity where therapists use clinical methods and interpersonal stances to modify behaviors, cognitions, and/or emotions in clients (Norcross 1990). Metaphors are frequently used to conceptualize and express things that are otherwise hard to describe (McMullen 2008;Tay 2013), but relevant research has tended to focus on isolated examples and their therapeutic functions and overlook usage patterns across the span of treatment (Tay 2017). ...
... Based on a suggestion by Norcross (1990), we defined psychological treatment for mental disorders as any intervention that has been developed to treat mental disorders, is based on a psychological theory, and uses psychological methods to modify individuals' behaviors, cognitions, emotions, and/or other personal characteristics. ...
An important aim of basic research in Clinical Psychology is to improve clinical practice(e.g., by developing novel interventions or improving the efficacy of existing ones) based on animproved understanding of key mechanisms involved in psychopathology. In the first part of thisarticle, we examine how frequently this translation has happened in the past by reviewing all 40evidence-based psychological interventions recommended in current clinical guidelines for fiveimportant (groups of) mental disorders. Results show that only a small minority of interventionswere developed based on basic research findings, suggesting that the route from basic research toclinical innovation may not be as strong historically as is commonly assumed. Importantchallenges for translational research in clinical psychology are reviewed, leading to theintroduction of a new framework, and a discussion of possible solutions to overcome thesechallenges. Suggestions include increased attention to robust and replicable research findings, astronger focus on experimental psychopathology research to establish causality ofpsychopathological mechanisms, a more systematic structural integration of basic and appliedresearch in clinical psychology, a stronger emphasis on mechanisms of change and moderatorsof clinical interventions, increased attention to clinical subgroups, and emphasizingimprovements to existing interventions over the development of novel interventions.
... 3. Full texts of the selected articles were read and were retained if the case study was a psychotherapy case and the discussion of the case in the article was a minimum of about two pages. 3 Articles were classified as a psychotherapy case study if they met the criteria put forward by Norcross (1990), Strupp (1978), and Wampold (2001) stating that psychotherapy necessary includes the following five elements: (a) Interpersonal process; (b) A person seeking help for problems, complaints, disorder; (c) A (trained) therapist/ qualified professional; (d) Adapted to the particular client; and (e) Psychological principles as basis. ...
Case study methods are increasingly recognized as crucial methods to enhance understanding of the complexity of psychotherapy processes and as way to bridge the science-practice gap. The Single Case Archive (SCA) was constructed to facilitate access to the existing field of case study research for academic, clinical, and educational purposes. Cases were selected through systematic screening of relevant peer-reviewed journals in the field of psychotherapy research and rigorous snowball sampling. All cases meeting inclusion criteria were inventoried using the Inventory for Basic Information in Single Cases that maps study, patient, therapist, and therapy characteristics. About 3,471 cases from 175 peer-reviewed journals published between 1955 and 2019 were included in the SCA database. The SCA comprises cases from different theoretical backgrounds, discussing patients from different age categories, with different presenting problems going through a diversity of psychotherapeutic treatments that are studied using a range of methods. Cases differ strongly with respect to the amount of information that is present in the case study, and the field should pay more attention to ethical considerations like informed consent and providing relevant basic descriptive information. An online platform makes the SCA database searchable by researchers, clinicians, and students. In conclusion, the SCA is a unique resource that makes case studies more easily accessible, facilitates meta-studies and reviews of case studies, and stimulates methodological developments in the field of case study research. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).
... La prima è la definizione adottata dall'American Psychological Association in una risoluzione circa l'efficacia della psicoterapia e basata su una definizione di Norcross (cfr. American Psychological Association, (2012), Recognition of psychotherapy effectiveness e Norcross, J. C. (1990), ...
The purpose of the article is to present how research in psychotherapy is flawed by methodological and theoretical errors that have to do with both a misconception of the clinical moment as understood along the lines of medical-pharmacological sciences, and with the very purpose of the psychological treatment, which is a healthcare goal. It will be shown how the clinical moment in psychotherapy, unlike medicine or pharmacology where it is considered the final part of the research process, is an independent experimental moment, and is different from any other type of psychological investigation as it represents the moment of investigation of the subject understood in an organic and complete way, otherwise it can't be examined. For this reason, the standard medical-pharmacological research setting is unable to demonstrate the effectiveness of the treatment because it is unable to distinguish the aspects of suggestion from the specific results of the treatment. The paper concludes by demonstrating how the Freudian approach is, on the contrary, able to distinguish the theoretical validity of constructions from suggestion because it moves within an alternative paradigm that gives autonomy to clinical research by devising an intra clinical experimental protocol. From this perspective, psychoanalytic practice is knowledge oriented and not healthcare oriented. It is precisely the acceptance of a cognitive purpose which ultimately can determine the possibility of therapeutic efficacy.
... Preventive intervention can be either psychological or psychoeducational. Psychological interventions aim to assist people in modifying behaviors, cognitions, emotional states or feelings that cause discomfort/distress (Campbell et al., 2013;Norcross, 1990), while psychoeducational interventions provide informative materials about anxiety such as lectures, leaflets, emails or information websites. It is assumed that these two modalities share similar working mechanisms of action. ...
The aim of this study was to assess the available evidence on potential moderators of psychological and psychoeducational interventions for the prevention of anxiety. A systematic review using PubMed, PsycINFO, Web of Science, Embase, OpenGrey, and CENTRAL was performed up to October 2019. Two independent researchers assessed the fulfillment of eligibility criteria, extracted the data and performed a quality assessment of the included studies. Outcomes were moderators of the reduction of anxious symptoms or the incidence of anxiety disorders. Fourteen studies reporting results on moderator analyses performed in 13 randomized controlled trials were included. Twenty-seven potential moderators were organized into six categories: sociodemographic, clinical characteristics, cognitive variables, life events, interpersonal functioning and intervention characteristics. The most frequently examined variables were gender, age and baseline anxiety. We found insufficient evidence for all moderator categories studied. In children and adolescents, we found some studies with significant results for the low family support variable and higher levels of anxiety symptoms at baseline, which were both associated with higher effectiveness. Limited conclusions can be drawn about for whom and under what conditions interventions work in the prevention of anxiety. A strong need to improve the methodological quality and the number of moderator studies was identified.
... teachers, advertisers). Psychotherapy, defined as the application of clinical methods and interpersonal stances to modify behaviors, cognitions, emotions, and other personal characteristics (Norcross, 1990), is no exception. A key difference between psychotherapy and other forms of medical practice is that it is a 'talking cure' . ...
Five key therapeutic functions of metaphors are often discussed by psychotherapists. They (i) help clients express emotions and experiences, (ii) help therapists and clients explain difficult concepts, (iii) introduce new frames of reference, (iv) help work through client resistance, and (v) build a collaborative relationship between therapists and clients. Research on how these functions are enacted in psychotherapy talk tends to assume that they are indeed perceived as such by clients, and that metaphorical language is preferred to comparable literal language in performing them. This paper reports a survey study ( N = 84) to critically interrogate these assumptions. Participants read two constructed therapy dialogues, controlled and counterbalanced for presentation sequence, where therapist and client discuss an issue using metaphorical and literal language respectively. Each dialogue is followed by a 15-item questionnaire to rate how well the presumed functions were performed (e.g. the therapist and client can work effectively together, the therapist is able to explain difficult concepts ). A combined Confirmatory (CFA) and Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) suggests that, instead of the five distinct functions proposed in the literature, participants discerned three functions which reflect a more holistic view of what metaphors can do. A second EFA conducted on literal responses yielded only two factors. This contrast in factor structure further suggests that (i) literal language is less functionally nuanced, and (ii) metaphors are not simply perceived as an ‘add-on’ to literal language, but are evaluated across an extended narrative in fundamentally different ways. Within-subjects metaphor vs. literal ratings of the items under the emergent three-factor structure were then compared. Metaphor ratings were significantly higher in all factors ( p < 0.01), suggesting that metaphorical language is indeed perceived as more effective than literal language when discussing clients’ issues. Implications, limitations, and future directions are discussed.
... Preventive intervention can be either psychological or psychoeducational. Psychological interventions aim to assist people in modifying behaviors, cognitions, emotional states or feelings that cause discomfort/distress (Campbell et al., 2013;Norcross, 1990), while psychoeducational interventions provide informative materials about anxiety such as lectures, leaflets, emails or information websites. It is assumed that these two modalities share similar working mechanisms of action. ...
The aim of this study was to assess the available evidence on potential moderators of psychological and psychoeducational interventions for the prevention of anxiety. A systematic review using PubMed, PsycINFO, Web of Science, Embase, OpenGrey, and CENTRAL was performed up to October 2019. Two independent researchers assessed the fulfillment of eligibility criteria, extracted the data and performed a quality assessment of the included studies. Outcomes were moderators of the reduction of anxious symptoms or the incidence of anxiety disorders. Fourteen studies reporting results on moderator analyses performed in 13 randomized controlled trials were included. Twenty-seven potential moderators were organized into six categories: sociodemographic, clinical characteristics, cognitive variables, life events, interpersonal functioning and intervention characteristics. The most frequently examined variables were gender, age and baseline anxiety. We found insufficient evidence for all moderator categories studied. In children and adolescents, we found some studies with significant results for the low family support variable and higher levels of anxiety symptoms at baseline, which were both associated with higher effectiveness. Limited conclusions can be drawn about for whom and under what conditions interventions work in the prevention of anxiety. A strong need to improve the methodological quality and the number of moderator studies was identified.
... In psychological counseling, counselors apply mental health principles to assist clients to modify problematic behaviors, cognitions, and emotions (Norcross, 1990) by "talking through" them. Picture-based counseling (PBC) is an innovation practiced across different counseling paradigms, supplementing their traditional conversational delivery. ...
Health care is shaped by often complex communication between multiple people such as doctors, nurses, patients and carers. Research has repeatedly shown that effective communication is key to safe and high-quality care yet improving communication remains a challenge across health systems. In recent years, the field of natural language processing has developed analytic tools to supplement the study of verbal communication through visual representation of analysis. To date, these tools have primarily been used on English data. This study used the software tool Discursis to compare visual representations of Cantonese conversational data that were analysed before and after English translation. Results indicate that some linguistic features of Cantonese that carry meaning may be lost in translation into English. Specific concerns relate to the multidimensional issues of equivalence, ranging from cultural and social associations to semantic, lexical and conceptual differences. These results highlight the importance of developing visual analytic tools that can be used on Cantonese data. Generating visual representations of such data contributes to local and international understandings about communication in health care.
... Psychotherapy, the 'talking cure', is a mental health activity that applies clinical methods and interpersonal stances to modify behaviors, cognitions, emotions, and/or other attributes (Norcross, 1990). Though grounded in psychological principles, its verbal and interactive nature has fostered a tradition of linguistic analysis (Labov & Fanshel, 1977;Pittenger, Hockett & Danehy, 1960). ...
This paper illustrates an analytical approach combining LIWC, a computer text-analytic application, with cluster analysis techniques to explore ‘language styles’ in psychotherapy across sessions in time. It categorizes session transcripts into distinct clusters or styles based on linguistic (di)similarity and relates them to sessional progression, thus providing entry points for further qualitative exploration. In the first step, transcripts of four illustrative therapist-client dyads were scored under ten LIWC variables including ‘analytic thinking’, ‘clout’, ‘authenticity’, ‘emotional tone’, and pronoun types. In the next step, agglomerative hierarchical clustering uncovered distinct session clusters that are differently distributed in each dyad. The relationships between these clusters and the chronological progression of sessions were then further discussed in context as contrastive exemplars. Applications, limitations and future directions are highlighted.
... The claims of conceptual metaphor theory (Lakoff, 1993) have led to many applied studies in different language, discourse, and cognitive contexts. A good example is psychological counseling, defined as the verbal mental health activity where clients are guided to change their behaviors, cognitions, and emotions (Norcross, 1990). Many theorists and practitioners across counseling paradigms agree that speaking and/or thinking metaphorically can be useful for a range of processes and outcomes. ...
Metaphor theory bears many implications for counseling processes, but metaphor in extended counseling talk is seldom evaluated. This article reports an exploratory skin conductance and discourse analysis of metaphorical versus literal communication styles in facilitating affective engagement over time. After background interaction with the counselor-experimenter, role-playing clients (N = 60) were asked either a metaphorical or literal stimulus question related to the topic of academic problems. This was followed by spontaneous elaboration of either stimulus. A mixed-effects model with random subject intercepts suggests that both styles are tied to increased affective engagement, but the increase was significantly more apparent in the metaphorical style. However, no significant differences were found immediately after stimulus. The results are corroborated by a post-experiment survey where the metaphorical style was rated significantly better for expressing emotions and experiences and introducing new frames of reference. A further exploratory analysis of discourse features uncovered key components of the metaphorical style and their specific implications for engagement. The study suggests that a metaphorical style is more affectively engaging but requires sustained follow-up and spontaneous metaphor elaboration skills. Limitations are critically discussed, given the infancy of the present approach.
... We included outcome studies of psychotherapy broadly defined (Norcross, 1990), published in the English language, which explicitly integrated R/S throughout the psychotherapeutic process, either through incorporation of R/S content within a standard technique (e.g., Christian cognitive therapy) or the addition of R/S practices (e.g., prayer, meditation, and reading sacred texts) as an adjunctive to sessions. Additionally, all studies that we considered for inclusion compared an R/S-accommodated treatment with either (a) a no-treatment control condition or (b) an alternate treatment. ...
Some religious or spiritual (R/S) clients seek psychotherapy that integrates R/S values, while others may be reticent to disclose R/S-related aspects of struggles in a presumably secular setting. The authors meta-analyzed 97 outcome studies ( N = 7,181) examining the efficacy of tailoring treatment to patients’ R/S beliefs and values. They compared the effectiveness of R/S-tailored psychotherapy with no-treatment controls, alternate secular treatments, and additive secular treatments. R/S-adapted psychotherapy resulted in greater improvement in clients’ psychological ( g = .74) and spiritual ( g = .74) functioning compared with no treatment and non-R/S psychotherapies (psychological g = .33; spiritual g = .43). In more rigorous additive studies, R/S-accommodated psychotherapies were equally effective to standard approaches in reducing psychological distress ( g = .13) but resulted in greater spiritual well-being ( g = .34). The chapter features several clinical examples and concludes with evidence-based therapeutic practices.
... Meanwhile, a context where affective attitudes and 50 discursive outcomes are of immediate relevance to producers themselves is psychological counseling. In this "verbal activity where therapists (or counselors) apply mental health principles to assist clients to modify their behaviors, cognitions, (and) emotions" (Norcross, 1990), both counselor and clientgenerated metaphors have been claimed to perform important affect-related functions. These include helping clients to express difficult-to-describe feelings (McMullen, 1996), appreciate alternative per-55 spectives (Kopp & Craw, 1998;Lyddon, Clay, & Sparks, 2001), and enhance their sense of participation (Gelo & Mergenthaler, 2012;Rasmussen & Angus, 1996). ...
The relationship between symbolic expression and affect tends to be investigated from the perspective of recipients in contexts like media, politics and advertising. A more producer-centric context is picture-based counseling (PBC) where clients are prompted by counselors to interpret pictures creatively as part of the treatment process. Nevertheless, the affective and discursive outcomes of these interpretations remain poorly understood. This paper reports a combined experimental and discourse analytic study which compares prompting strategies in terms of affective engagement, contrasts the discourse characteristics of interpretations following ‘topic-present’ and ‘topic-absent’ prompting strategies, and offers potential implications for PBC practice. Analysis of skin conductance levels suggests that the two prompting strategies which invite symbolic interpretation are more affectively engaging than the literal control (F(2,32)=6.356, p=0.005), but not significantly different from each other. A follow-up discourse analysis revealed the prominence of metaphors in symbolic interpretations, as well as nuanced differences between the discourse outcomes of prompting strategies. Topic-present interpretations tended to produce more systematic ensembles of metaphorical expressions, while topic-absent interpretations were less systematic. The combined findings suggest that orienting clients towards symbolic interpretation is affectively engaging, but the ideal prompting strategy is best determined by context-specific circumstances to be judged by counselors.
... Indeed, according to van Deth (2013) "psychotherapy is more than just talk therapy" (p. 6). Moreover, Norcross (1990) eclectic definition reads as follows: "Psychotherapy is the informed and intentional application of clinical methods and interpersonal stances derived from established psychological principles for the purpose of assisting people to modify their behaviors, cognitions, emotions, and/or other personal characteristics in directions that the participants deem desirable" (p. 218). ...
Behavior analysts have shown that a single-subject experimental design (SSED) is a useful tool for identifying the effectiveness of specific therapeutic techniques, whereas researchers outside applied behavior analysis (ABA) maintain that randomized placebo-controlled trials (RPCT) provide the most definite test of efficacy. In this paper the possible benefits that could result from supporting SSED studies by placebo control groups are discussed. However, the use of placebo groups in psychotherapy research arouses considerable controversy and many researchers argue against it. The main aim of this paper is to clarify theoretical and methodological problems associated with using placebo groups in psychotherapy research and to demonstrate that these problems can be solved if the assumptions on which they are based are reformulated. The article also discusses ethical issues about the use of placebo groups in research on the effectiveness of psychotherapy.
... We included outcome studies of psychotherapy broadly defined (Norcross, 1990), published in the English language, which explicitly integrated R/S throughout the psychotherapeutic process, either through incorporation of R/S content within a standard technique (e.g., Christian cognitive therapy) or the addition of R/S practices (e.g., prayer, meditation, and reading sacred texts) as an adjunctive to sessions. Additionally, all studies that we considered for inclusion compared an R/S-accommodated treatment with either (a) a no-treatment control condition or (b) an alternate treatment. ...
Some religious or spiritual (R/S) clients seek psychotherapy that integrates R/S values, while others may be reticent to disclose R/S‐related aspects of struggles in a presumably secular setting. We meta‐analyzed 97 outcome studies (N = 7,181) examining the efficacy of tailoring treatment to patients’ R/S beliefs and values. We compared the effectiveness of R/S‐tailored psychotherapy with no‐treatment controls, alternate secular treatments, and additive secular treatments. R/S‐adapted psychotherapy resulted in greater improvement in clients’ psychological (g = 0.74, p < 0.000) and spiritual (g = 0.74, p < 0.000) functioning compared with no treatment and non R/S psychotherapies (psychological: g = 0.33, p < 0.001; spiritual: g = 0.43, p < 0.001). In more rigorous additive studies, R/S‐accommodated psychotherapies were equally effective to standard approaches in reducing psychological distress (g = 0.13, p = 0.258), but resulted in greater spiritual well‐being (g = 0.34, p < 0.000). We feature several clinical examples and conclude with evidence‐based therapeutic practices.
... The second part investigated the use of selected transtheoretical principles of change in the participant's practice. The list of principles was derived in three steps: (1) principles that could be employed intentionally as clinical strategies by a therapist were selected from Grencavage and Norcross (1990), Lampropoulos (2001b), and Tschacher, Junghan, and Pfammatter (2014); (2) duplicates were removed and similar principles were merged, producing a list of 10 principles; and (3) the list was reviewed by six psychotherapy experts (representatives of psychotherapy training institutes who represented all four major theoretical orientations) to assess whether it covered all of the essential principles of the change process from their point of view (they all found the list to be satisfactory). Given that an exhaustive list of such principles is difficult to construct, the rationale of this step was to ensure that our list was representative of counselling and psychotherapy as practiced in the Czech Republic. ...
Many authors have proposed the existence of common principles of counselling and psychotherapeutic change. However, little is known about how practitioners use these change principles. A sample of N = 373 Czech psychotherapists and counsellors participated in an online survey and rated their use of ten psychotherapy change principles in their practice over the last year. The frequency of the use of the ten change principles is reported. Furthermore, three principal components of the change principles were identified: Exploration, acceptance, and understanding of clients’ experience, Attending to clients’ own resources, and Furnishing clients with new skills and advice. The use of these components was mainly associated with the practitioner's theoretical orientation. The implications of the component structure for psychotherapist and counsellor training and practice are discussed.
... In this IPD MA, we will a) include randomized trials in which b) the effects of a psychological treatment (delivered individually, in a group-, bibliotherapy, internet-based format) were compared with a comparison group (waiting list, care-as-usual, psychological placebo, pill placebo, antidepressant medication) c) in adults d) with clinically relevant depressive symptoms e) but no major depressive disorder at baseline, f) assessed with a standardized diagnostic interview (see below) to exclude participants with full-blown mood disorder at baseline. Psychological interventions are defined as the application of psychological mechanisms and interpersonal stances derived from psychological principles for the purpose of assisting people to modify their behaviours, cognitions, emotions, and/or other personal characteristics in directions that the participants deem desirable [32,33].Clinically relevant depressive symptoms will be defined as scoring above a cut-off score on a self-rating depression questionnaire; scoring above a cut-off score on a clinician-rated instrument; or meeting criteria for minor depression according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM),or the International Classification of Diseases (ICD). We will also include studies in which participants with a diagnosed depressive disorder were examined and we will then exclude participants with a full-blown disorder on an individual basis using the primary data. ...
The quality and impact of psychotherapy sessions are primary concerns in service delivery. However, no published investigations of quality or impact of psychotherapy sessions with American Indian (AI) patients could be found in the scientific literature. We sought to demonstrate that collecting such data is feasible as well as to inform the development of evidence-based practices and cultural adaptations. To this end, we asked psychotherapists treating AIs in outpatient psychotherapy within an urban community clinic to rate the quality and impact of sessions delivered to their clients. Eight psychotherapists self-reported session quality and impact with the Session Evaluation Questionnaire, Form 5 (SEQ-5; Stiles, 1980, 1984) immediately following service delivery to 112 separate, consecutive clients. Session quality was assessed with measures of depth and smoothness. Post-session impact was assessed with measures of positivity and emotional arousal. Overall, sessions were rated as equally deep, but smoother, more positive, and less emotionally arousing in comparison to a sample of experienced university-based psychotherapists (Cummings et al., 1993). However, sessions provided by AI psychotherapists were rated as deeper, less positive, and more emotionally arousing than sessions provided by White psychotherapists. Replicating this study in a larger sample and including client as well as observer ratings will help to move this nascent line of research forward. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).
This paper illustrates a methodological approach that combines computerized text analysis, quantitative analysis, and qualitative discourse analysis in comparing large bodies of therapeutic language. More specifically, it explores how language use in psychotherapy is associated with different therapeutic approaches and therapeutic roles (i.e., therapists and clients). The dataset consisted of 155 therapeutic sessions (over 1,057,000 words) that are illustrative of four approaches, i.e., psychoanalysis, humanistic therapy, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), and eclectic therapy. The transcripts were divided according to therapeutic approaches and therapeutic roles and processed using Linguistic Inquiry Word Count (LIWC) in terms of four summary variables, i.e., analytical thinking, clout, emotional tones, and authenticity. A series of mixed-effects models with session as the random effect was fitted, and the statistical patterns were illustrated using linguistic examples and discussed from a discourse analytic perspective. The approach demonstrates methodological strengths in exploring large-scale data and expanding the research scope permitted by traditional discourse analysis. The findings underline professional knowledge and institutionalized roles as key factors influencing the use of therapeutic language, providing meaningful insights for the clinical understanding and future research into therapeutic language.
Background
The current meta-review of meta-analyses on psychotherapy research for complex post-traumatic stress disorder (CPTSD) and samples at risk of complex traumatization has three aims: first, to provide an overview of efficacy of individual psychotherapies; second, to compare the quality of the meta-analyses; and third, to assess statistical power.
Methods
The literature search was conducted until August 2020. Meta-analyses providing individual treatment effect estimates focusing on CPTSD or samples at risk of complex traumatization (i.e., victims of childhood sexual abuse (CSA), war or torture, refugees, and veterans with PTSD) were eligible for inclusion. The effect sizes were classified according to Cohen as small, medium, or large. The "A MeaSurement Tool to Assess systematic Reviews" (AMSTAR) was applied to assess the quality of the meta-analyses, and power was assessed post-hoc.
Results
Twenty-four meta-analyses were suitable for inclusion. The efficacy of the interventions varied (g = -0.04 (CI -0.39; 0.48), controlled, to d = 2.73 (1.69; 3.76), uncontrolled). Overall, 16 effect estimates were large. On average, the quality of the meta-analyses was good (average AMSTAR total score 7.71 points (range 3-11). Considering quality assessments and power together, nine meta-analyses were evaluated as high quality.
Limitations
No meta-analysis for CPTSD was eligible and the number of individuals with complex traumatization was not directly assessed in the at-risk groups.
Conclusions
For at-risk groups for complex traumatization, on average, good-quality empirical evidence exists. Given the limited research on CPTSD, future studies are needed to further investigate the efficacy of interventions.
Introduction: In Portugal, the performance of nursing psychotherapeutic interventions is regulated as a specific competence of mental health nurses. However, these nurses face several difficulties in their clinical practice in order to perform this type of interventions, as there are significant gaps regarding their structure, content and systematisation. In literature, professional helping relationship can be considered as a nursing intervention. However, it is important to know its characteristics, contents and procedures, in order to validate it as a nursing psychotherapeutic nursing based on nursing knowledge and feasible by mental health nurses.
Aims: To develop and evaluate the content validity of the professional helping relationship as a nursing psychotherapeutic intervention, and to develop the tools which are the foundation for further evaluation of the effectiveness of the professional helping relationship in a clinical setting.
Methods: This research was divided into four studies. The first study was a scoping review, which was carried out recurring to online databases, such as MEDLINE with full text (via EBSCOhost), CINAHL Plus with full text (via EBSCOhost), Web of Science Core Collection (via Web of Science), Scopus (via b-on), ScienceDirect (via b-on), and consultation of the references of the included papers. The data extraction tool was developed having on its basis the model recommended by the Joanna Briggs Institute. The second study was a modified e-Delphi study, in which data were collected between January and May 2018 through two rounds of online questionnaires. The third study was a psychometric study, in which cultural adaptation and evaluation of the psychometric properties of the Nursing Outcome Classification (NOC) outcome "Cognition" were carried out in a sample of Portuguese adults with mental illness. The fourth study aimed to develop a scale for evaluating the quality of the therapeutic relationship, from the perspective of the nurse, through a literature review and subsequent group of experts’ meeting, also comprising the evaluation of the scale's psychometric properties in a sample of 221 mental health nurses. The reliability of the scale was assessed by internal consistency and its construct validity was assessed by exploratory factor analysis, Classic Horn’s Parallel Analysis, and Pure Exploratory Bifactor. Finally, grounded on all the results of the aforementioned studies, a manual for operationalising the helping relationship as a nursing intervention was prepared.
Results: In the first study, 729 papers were found and 13 additional records were identified. After analysing the literature, data related to the aim of the professional helping relationship were gathered, and those data suggested its aim is to train a person to solve a problem. Stress, guilt, mood changes, low self-esteem, suicidal ideation, body image disturbance, and the inability to interact satisfactorily with oneself or with the environment that surrounds the patient were the main problems that the professional helping relationship could address. Regarding the nurse's skills and attitudes, unconditional acceptance, empathy and the ability to not judge others were highlighted. Finally, this study also revealed that the professional helping relationship takes place in a set of phases, which are composed by several activities. The second study made it possible to agree on the aim of the professional helping relationship, its assumptions and the key competences associated with the nurse for its performance, having been reached perfect consensus on empathy, understanding, the ability to not judge, honesty and the ability to listen. It also made it possible to consensualise the nursing focuses that can lead to nursing diagnoses liable to the prescription of professional helping relationship. The focuses that were more consensual were self-esteem, grief and anxiety. Finally, the procedures / contents / activities to be carried out in each session of the intervention were also assessed by the experts. They emphasised the active listening, the clarification of the nursing diagnosis, the identification of the patient's resources, and the identification and training of strategies for problem-solving. In the third study, the final version in European Portuguese of the NOC outcome “Cognition”, composed by 13 items, presented good psychometric properties, and the exploratory factor analysis carried out identified only one factor. In the fourth study the Therapeutic Relationship Assessment Scale - Nurse was developed, and it presented a total internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha) of .93, ranging from .78 to .88 for each of the factors. The scale presented a good temporal stability (ICC = .86), as well as a good adjustment both to a four-factor structure and to a one-factor structure. Finally, the manual allowed the compilation of all the results of the studies that were previously carried out.
Conclusion: Reaching consensus on the content and procedures of the professional helping relationship, assumed as a nursing psychotherapeutic intervention, seems to be important to guide mental health nurses’ practice on the performance of nursing psychotherapeutic interventions, as well as to allow this intervention to be a useful tool in empowering patients to solve, mostly, emotional problems.
Abstract
Objective
As a population male clients are worthy of attention, as they are at greater risk and not as likely to seek help. This research focused on uncovering the experience of males in therapy with female psychologists/psychotherapists.
Method
Semi-structured interviews with 6 Irish males (conducted via Google Meet) were
analysed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). IPA was deemed the most suitable approach as it aims to uncover the lived experience of participants.
Results
Three superordinate themes were generated, each comprised of two subordinate themes:
theme 1 ‘containment’ (“She was just like a wise old woman”; “She held me for boundaries”); theme 2 ‘resistance’ (“The feelings were of shame and fear”; “Afraid to talk about sex”); and theme 3 ‘individuality’ (“It was her skill… she was very talented”; “A bit of a personality thing”). The findings are both consistent and inconsistent with the existing literature in these domains.
Conclusion
An insight gained into male clients’ experience in therapy with females may aid in normalising male attendance in therapy. The findings may also inform female psychologists/psychotherapists working with male clients .
New discoveries in psychological science have changed our understanding of some basic psychological processes. The new science, however, has not of yet been properly incorporated into the practice of psychotherapy. This has created a confusing state of affairs, lacking clear distinctions between therapy interventions rooted in lore and personal insight and those based on systematic scientific inquiry. In this paper, I discuss the problems caused by the current situation and propose a new distinction by which the psychological (science) treatment of psychological disorders is differentiated from psychotherapy. The implications of the proposed distinction for clinical research and training are discussed.
Meta-analyses are susceptible to publication bias, the selective publication of studies with statistically significant results. If publication bias is present in psychotherapy research, the efficacy of interventions will likely be overestimated. This study has two aims: (1) investigate whether the application of publication bias methods is warranted in psychotherapy research on posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and (2) investigate the degree and impact of publication bias in meta-analyses of the efficacy of psychotherapeutic treatment for PTSD. A comprehensive literature search was conducted and 26 meta-analyses were eligible for bias assessment. A Monte-Carlo simulation study closely resembling characteristics of the included meta-analyses revealed that statistical power of publication bias tests was generally low. Our results showed that publication bias tests had low statistical power and yielded imprecise estimates corrected for publication bias due to characteristics of the data. We recommend to assess publication bias using multiple publication bias methods, but only include methods that show acceptable performance in a method performance check that researchers first have to conduct themselves.
A number of reviews and meta-analyses have consistently documented the positive effect of individual psychological intervention with clinical older adults suffering from late-life depression, anxiety disorders, or other mental illnesses. However, many older adults without clinical disorders might seek and benefit from individual psychological interventions too. Given the aging populations across the globe, knowing the potential efficacy of individual psychological interventions with non-clinical older adults therefore is important. However, the research on this topic has not been reviewed systematically. This was the primary aim of the present review. Secondarily, we wanted to find out how many of these studies were conducted in a European context. A systematic literature search identified nine eligible studies yielding an aggregated sample size of 983. Two of these were European. Eight of the nine studies (including one European) reported significant positive effects of individual psychological interventions, that is, increases in psychological well-being and decreases in depression symptoms and distress. Effect sizes were extracted or calculated when possible to estimate the magnitude of the intervention effects. These effect sizes varied across studies and ranged from trivial in size to large and even very large, the median being a medium effect size. The results from the present review suggest that non-clinical older adults benefit from individual psychological interventions. However, the limited number of studies available for review precludes conclusions regarding the comparative efficacy of different types of psychological interventions in this population. Directions for future research are discussed.
The therapeutic value of animals, whether as pets in the family or as visitors in nursing homes, has been recognized for many decades and even centuries. However, only in the last 40 years has the field of animal-assisted psychotherapy (AAP) begun to develop and receive recognition. There is a great amount of confusion surrounding the field, even among those practicing it, as to the goals, approaches, and techniques of AAP. Yet, there is general agreement that AAP is a viable and meaningful therapy approach that can reach the inner emotional world of the client in unique and advantageous ways. This chapter covers the history and general background leading to the inclusion of animals in the psychotherapy setting. In order to understand more clearly the field of AAP and how it has a solid foundation as a subfield of psychotherapy, a general description of psychotherapy is provided, including theory and mechanisms that are especially relevant to the practice of AAP. AAP is then discussed in the context of the general field of psychotherapy, including a discussion of various mechanisms that are unique to AAP. Throughout the chapter, a special emphasis is placed on the relevance to psychotherapy in general, and specifically to AAP, of attachment theory and of the understanding of interpersonal neurobiology. Finally, four examples of psychotherapy modalities employing the integration of animals will be briefly described.
Parish-Plass, N. & Bachi, K. (2020). Psychodynamic animal-assisted psychotherapy: Processing and healing through relationships. In C. Driscoll (Ed.), Animal-assisted interventions for health and human service professionals (pp. 361-405). New York: Nova Science Publishers.
Pictures are an innovative resource in the verbal activity of psychological counseling (Ginicola, Smith, & Trzaska, 2012; Malchiodi, 2011). Counselors often guide clients to interpret and explore them as figurative representations of their situation (Stevens & Spears, 2009). Picture-based counseling is, however, underexplored from both clinical and discourse perspectives, with few published guidelines and analyses of the nature of counselor prompts and client interpretations. Informed by metaphor theory, this paper examines 34 counterbalanced matched-pairs of elicited picture interpretations responding to either a topic-present or topic-absent prompt in Mandarin Chinese. Topic-present metaphor prompts indicate a specific topic to be connected to the picture, while topic-absent metaphor prompts do not. The resulting transcripts were coded for five variables reflecting key aspects of metaphor construction—sources, topics, source–topic connections, uncertainty markers, and metaphor signals. Spearman correlations were calculated and compared across the two prompt conditions, supported by qualitative analysis of examples. Results show stronger correlations and by implication greater integration among the variables in the topic-present condition. This suggests that people are better able to contextualize pictorial elements to a specified target topic of discussion. The present findings motivate follow-up research incorporating more direct counseling outcome measures.
Historically, the psychotherapeutic treatment of psychological problems in old people has had low priority among both clinical psychologists and researchers. Fortunately, this bleak picture is now changing, and a number of reviews and meta-analyses have documented
the effect of psychotherapy with older adults suffering from psychopathology such as anxiety or depression. Yet studies on whether older adults not suffering from a psychiatric disorder benefit from psychotherapy are sparse. The objective of this study is threefold: First, we investigate the effects of individual psychotherapy on subjective well-being and symptoms of depression and anxiety of elderly care recipients.
Second, we investigate whether the treatment effects continue 3 months after the final treatment session. Third, we examine whether wellbeing scores improve relatively more than depression and anxiety scores. We found significant positive treatment effects across all measures.
Effect sizes were moderate to high. There were no significant differences between posttreatment and follow-up scores, indicating lasting treatment effects. Differences in treatment effect size for our three outcome variables indicated that the WHO-5 scores changed the most, followed by anxiety and depression symptoms. Strengths and weaknesses of the study are discussed, and future directions for research and practice are proposed.
ENGLISH: Portugal is one of the countries with the highest rates of psychological disorders and intaking of psychopharmacological drugs. Invariably, this situation produces harmful implications to the country. One of the best ways of approaching this problem is through psychotherapy, whose effectiveness has been evidenced in multiple studies. However, psychotherapy faces some problems, such as negative results and premature termination of treatment (dropouts). To fight these issues, APA has recommended that clincal practice be based on scientific evidence, including the incorporation of the preferences a client might have in psychotherapy. Some empirical studies have indicated that the incorporation of client preferences in clinical practice has the potential of producing better results, of reinforcing the therapeutic aliance and of reducing dropouts. Given that there are no instruments in the Portuguese language that evaluate client preferences in psychotherapy, the present study transculturally adapted two instruments of the sort – the Cooper-Norcross Inventory of Preferences (C-NIP) and the Psychotherapy Preferences and Experiences Questionnaire (PEX.P1). The adapted instruments were then applied to a Portuguese speaking sample of 274 participantes so as to investigate the validity of these transcultural adaptation efforts. The psychometric properties were assessed in terms of psychometric sensitivity, construct validity and construct reliability. Because the C-NIP presented difficulties regarding these aspects we recommend, for the time being, its use as a way of initiating a dialogue with the client about their preferences. For a robust measurement of client preferences in psychotherapy, we recommmend the use of the PEX.P1, which demonstrated good psychometric qualities. _______________________________________________________________________
PORTUGUÊS: Portugal é um dos países com maiores taxas de perturbações psicológicas e de consumo de psicofármacos. Invariavelmente esta situação acarreta implicações nocivas ao país. Uma das melhores formas de abordar este problema é através da psicoterapia, cuja eficácia tem sido evidenciada em múltiplos estudos. Contudo, a psicoterapia enfrenta alguns problemas como os resultados negativos e os abandonos prematuros dos clientes. Para combater estes problemas a APA recomenda que a prática clinica seja baseada em evidências científicas, incluindo a incorporação no tratamento das preferências que um cliente poderá ter em psicoterapia. Alguns estudos empíricos indicaram que a incorporação das suas preferências na prática clínica tem o potencial de optimizar os resultados psicoterapêuticos, reforçar a aliança terapêutica e reduzir os abandonos prematuros. Dado que se constata que não existem ferramentas na língua Portuguesa que apurem as preferências do cliente em psicoterapia, o presente estudo adaptou transculturalmente duas ferramentas neste âmbito – o Inventário de Preferências Cooper-Norcross (C-NIP) e o Questionário de Preferências e Expectativas Psicoterapêuticas (PEX.P1). Os instrumentos adaptados foram aplicados numa amostra de 274 participantes fluentes na língua Portuguesa, a fim de investigar a validade do trabalho de adaptação transcultural. As qualidades psicométricas foram avaliadas em termos de sensibilidade psicométrica, validade de constructo e fiabilidade de constructo. O C-NIP apresentou dificuldades nestes aspectos, pelo que, neste momento, recomendamos o seu uso como forma de estabelecer o diálogo com o cliente sobre as suas preferências. Para uma avaliação robusta das preferências do cliente em psicoterapia, recomendamos o PEX.P1, que demonstrou boas qualidades psicométricas.
Sampaio, F., Sequeira, C., & Lluch Canut, T. (2019). Intervenções psicoterapêuticas em enfermagem: Do modelo à sua implementação na prática. Conferência apresentada no X Congresso Internacional da Sociedade Portuguesa de Enfermagem de Saúde Mental, Portalegre, Portugal.
ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT The study dealt with the Identification, analysis and a discussion of findings of the non African based family systems therapies on Af identify and analyse the Family systems therapies used in Entebbe achieving this was done by carrying out in group discussions and by analysing their written cases. This study was a case study because the researcher intended to intensively assess the effectiveness of family systems therapies in a limited environment to generalise the findings to the entire population used were based on one hour interview with each of the respondent (counsellors) and the analysis of their written cases of practicing counsellors. This study adds to the reading community family therapeutic approaches in academic engagement and contribution to Af ican scholarship and world view. This study also has given to readers a contextualised and an application of elements on the voluminou approaches and many other cardinal principles of family management which have evolved considerably through institutional and substantive growth over the years but especially with non African perspective. This study explored and documente applications and enforceability in the specific context of the African family healing in the context of Entebbe candidates, 10 Masters Holder using snow ball sampling technique and purposive sampling technique. Findings revealed that no family approach is used 100%, and that family therapies are not sufficiently employed by fami therapists. Therapists agreed that even though they use all family therapies eclectically they do not use them at the same level and those other therapeutic models especially social cultural traditional approaches to family healing are also used. The st approach that incorporates the dynamics of the indigenous African world view and western based family therapies.
Sampaio, F. (2019). A intervenção psicoterapêutica em enfermagem: Sistematização e impacto nos sintomas de ansiedade. Preleção apresentada no Seminário de Enfermagem de Saúde Mental da NursID Week 2019, Porto (Portugal).
Argentina owns an authentic psychotherapeutic culture, being psychoanalysis its most spread expression, particularly in public-managed universities. Nevertheless, Argentina lacks of a system to provide appropriate and continuous education for psychotherapists. Thus, psychologists' abilities have been repeatedly described as biased and deficitary. Adopting a socio-professional historiographic framework, this study presents an historical overview and analysis of the development of the heterogeneous psychotherapeutic spheres in Argentina during the twentieth century, aiming to grasp and retrospectively explain the field's present state. Argentinian psychotherapy is first described, from around 1900, when psychiatrists and physicians inaugurated and dominated the field, up to 1930, when psychoanalysis, re-flexology and existentialism coexisted as clinical perspectives. The period between 1940 and 1970, characterized by psychoanalysis' institutionalization, is then analyzed. The arrival of psychoanalysis at the newly created psychology careers, the professional disputes started by such arrival and the consequent hegemonization of the theory and its therapeutic outlook are emphasized. The period from 1970 onwards is detailed, describing institutional and professional developments. The development of systemic, cognitive and integrative approaches is detailed. Finally, contemporary challenges of the psychotherapy in Argentina are discussed, emphasizing the necessity of a deep debate based on historical and empirical evidence.
The adolescent experience of death of a family member can lead to depression and suicidal tendencies. The article explores this experience of the researcher as a teenager. In the qualitative research framework, the autobiographical poems are used as data. The artistic ways of processing the lived experiences and the subsequent emotions have become a vital part of qualitative research.
Sampaio, F. (2018). Intervenção Psicoterapêutica em Enfermagem. Preleção apresentada na abertura do X Mestrado em Enfermagem de Saúde Mental, Escola Superior de Enfermagem de Coimbra (Portugal).
Introduction:
The long-term effectiveness of psychological interventions for the treatment of subthreshold depression and the prevention of depression is unclear and effects vary among subgroups of patients, indicating that not all patients profit from such interventions. Randomised clinical trials are mostly underpowered to examine adequately subgroups and moderator effects. The aim of the present study is, therefore, to examine the short-term and long-term as well as moderator effects of psychological interventions compared with control groups in adults with subthreshold depression on depressive symptom severity, treatment response, remission, symptom deterioration, quality of life, anxiety and the prevention of major depressive disorder (MDD) onsets on individual patient level and study level using an individual patient data meta-analysis approach.
Methods and analysis:
Systematic searches in PubMed, PsycINFO, Embase and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials were conducted. We will use the following types of outcome criteria: (A) onset of major depression; (B) time to major depression onset; (C) observer-reported and self-reported depressive symptom severity; (D) response; (E) remission; (F) symptom deterioration; (G) quality of life, (H) anxiety; and (I) suicidal thoughts and behaviours. Multilevel models with participants nested within studies will be used. Missing data will be handled using a joint modelling approach to multiple imputation. A number of sensitivity analyses will be conducted in order test the robustness of our findings.
Ethics and dissemination:
The investigators of the primary trials have obtained ethical approval for the data used in the present study and for sharing the data, if this was necessary, according to local requirements and was not covered from the initial ethic assessment.This study will summarise the available evidence on the short-term and long-term effectiveness of preventive psychological interventions for the treatment of subthreshold depression and prevention of MDD onset. Identification of subgroups of patients in which those interventions are most effective will guide the development of evidence-based personalised interventions for patients with subthreshold depression.
Prospero registration number:
CRD42017058585.
ResearchGate has not been able to resolve any references for this publication.