Mental health articles
OF mental health care and mentally ill
November, 2012
Kelly’s personal construct therapy
Kelly (1955): personal construct therapy.This theory has led to the formulation of therapies which can be seen as broadly cognitive in their approach, although Kelly is regarded by some as a humanistic psychologist because of his emphasis on the importance of experience and individuality. According to Kelly, our view of the world and of ourselves […]
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Meichenbaum’s self-instructional training
Meichenbaum’s self-instructional training (1976) This approach suggests that behaviour change can be brought about if clients are encouraged to change the instructions they give themselves, in the form of ‘self-talk’, to more adaptive versions. These internal dialogues are externalised during therapy and discussed, then coping strategies are developed to deal with them. These strategies include […]
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Ellis: Rational-emotive therapy
Ellis (1962, 1991): Rational-emotive therapy.Another type of cognitive restructuring stems from the work of Ellis, who argued that people who suffer from mental disorders have irrational beliefs which lead to inappropriate emotions such as depression and guilt. If they develop instead a dispute system to challenge these beliefs, they will no longer suffer such emotional […]
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What is Aversion therapy?
Aversion therapy, on the other hand, is used to increase the level of fear associated with carrying out unwanted behaviours, such as those occurring in substance abuse (which includes alcoholism, tobacco smoking and the use of psychoactive drugs) and sexual deviance. Alcoholism, for example, may be treated by administering an emetic (a drug that induces […]
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What is Behaviour therapies?
Behaviour therapies are based on classical conditioning. Four main approaches will be discussed here: systematic desensitisation; aversion therapy and covert sensitisation; exposure therapy (implosion and flooding); and positive conditioning. Systematic desensitisation is based on the finding of Watson and Rayner (1920) that they could classically condition fear of a pet rat in an infant they […]
Tags: behaviour, behaviour therapies, therapies
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Maintenance of behaviour disorders
As the two-factor model implies, once maladaptive behaviour has been learnt it will be maintained only if the right conditions exist. Therefore treatment must be preceded by functional analysis to establish which conditions are responsible for maintaining the behaviour in question— including stimuli, prompts and reinforcers. To assist with this, the STAR system can be […]
Tags: behaviour, behaviour disorders, disorders
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Formation of behaviour disorders
Behavioural therapies are based on the assumption that mental disorders are maladaptive behaviours which have resulted from faulty learning. The case of Little Albert, given in Chapter 1, provides an example of the way that phobias may be learnt. The solution is therefore to unlearn the behaviours. Learning occurs through either association (classical conditioning) or […]
Tags: behaviour, behaviour disorders, disorders
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Psychodynamic group therapies
Both Jung and Adler (particularly the latter) accepted the importance of working with patients in groups. Suitable patients are those who are able and motivated to work within the group process. This means that they must have a certain amount of ego strength in order to cope with the interaction and the emotion generated. Free […]
Tags: group therapies.therapies, psychodynamic
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Psychoanalytically oriented psychotherapies
These aim to use a briefer, more focused form of psychoanalysis which hopefully deals with the presenting problem (the problem which causes the client to seek help) more quickly than classical psychoanalysis. Nowadays, this type of therapy is far more common than psychoanalysis and is available on the NHS, (for example, Strupp (1993) used a […]
Tags: psychotherapy
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What is Play therapy
This is based on work by Anna Freud (1952) and Melanie Klein. The idea is to allow earlier feelings and conflicts to emerge in children by using play as a means of communication. Play, as a method of uncensored communication, replaces the techniques of dream analysis and free association used with adults. Toys, such as […]
Tags: play therapy, therapy
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