PSYC 110 Lecture Notes - Lecture 16: Interpersonal Psychotherapy, Psychological Repression, Waking Life
Chapter 16: Therapy and Treatment
Psychotherapy
●Psychotherapy- a psychological intervention designed to help people resolve emotional,
behavioral, and interpersonal problems and improve the quality of their lives
●Over 500 “brands” of psychotherapy
●20% of Americans have received psychotherapy at some point in their lives
●Females are more likely to seek treatment than males
●Caucasians more likely than other ethnic groups
●But research shows that therapy can benefit all gender and ethnic groups equally
Who Practices Psychotherapy?
●Clinical psychologists, psychiatrists, counselors, and social workers are the main mental
health professionals
●But people with non-advanced degrees also often offer psychological services
(paraprofessionals)
○Social services agencies, crisis intervention centers
Paraprofessionals
●Often obtain agency-specific training and attend workshops that enhance their education
●Little to no difference in effectiveness between trained therapists who have a degree and
those who don't
●But, professionals know how to operate within the system and choose more effective
treatments
Effective Therapists
●Warm and direct
●Establish a positive working relationship
●Tend not to contradict clients
●Select important topics to focus on in session
●Math treatment to needs of clients
Insight Therapies
●Psychotherapies where the goal is to expand awareness or insight
●Encompases psychodinamic, humanistic, and group arrochaches
Psychodynamic Therapy
●Share the following approaches and beliefs with Freud’s psychoanalysis:
1. Causes of abnormal behaviors stem from traumatic or adverse childhood experiences
2. Analyze certain things, including avoided thoughts and feelings, wishes and fantasies,
and significant past events
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3. When clients achieve insight into unconscious material, the causes and significance of
symptoms become evident
●This insight then often causes symptoms to disappear
Psychoanalysis
●Developed by Freud, one of the first forms of therapy
●Goal is to decrease guilt and frustration and make the unconscious conscious
●Try to bring to awareness previously repressed impulses, conflicts, and memories
Psychoanalytic Approaches
1. Free association
○Say whatever comes to mind
2. Interpretation
○Explanations of the unconscious bases of dreams, emotions, and behaviors
3. Dream analysis
○Interpret the relation of the dream to waking life and the dream’s symbolic
significance
4. Resistance
○Client tries to avoid further confrontation as they become more aware of
unconscious and often feared aspects of themselves
5. Transference
○Clients project intense, unrealistic feelings from their past onto the therapist
6. Working through
○Process problems only after insight (awareness) has been gained. Once they bring
certain things to the surface they are then able to work through/ deal with them
Neo-Freudian Tradition [Psychodynamic Therapy]
●More concerned with conscious aspects of the client's functioning
●Emphasize the impact of cultural and interpersonal influences on behavior
●Emphasize individuation- integrate the opposing aspects of someone's personality and
integrates them into a harmonious whole self
●More optimistic, emphasize needs for power, love, status (not just sex and aggression as
Freudian tradition)
●Sullivans influence on interpersonal therapy- type of psychodynamic therapy
○Emphasize relationship between client and therapist
○Therapist's role is participant observer
○Short term treatment (12-18 sessions) originally developed for depression
○Also effective at treatment of substance abuse and eating disorders
Psychodynamic Therapies
●Research, however, shows that insight is not necessary to relieve distress
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Psychotherapy- a psychological intervention designed to help people resolve emotional, behavioral, and interpersonal problems and improve the quality of their lives. 20% of americans have received psychotherapy at some point in their lives. Females are more likely to seek treatment than males. Caucasians more likely than other ethnic groups. But research shows that therapy can benefit all gender and ethnic groups equally. Clinical psychologists, psychiatrists, counselors, and social workers are the main mental health professionals. But people with non-advanced degrees also often offer psychological services (paraprofessionals) Often obtain agency-specific training and attend workshops that enhance their education. Little to no difference in effectiveness between trained therapists who have a degree and those who don"t. But, professionals know how to operate within the system and choose more effective treatments. Select important topics to focus on in session. Psychotherapies where the goal is to expand awareness or insight. This insight then often causes symptoms to disappear.
