SIQR’s cognitive components point back to the Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy (REBT) of Albert Ellis; the cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) of Aaron Beck, Arthur Freeman and Donald Meichenbaum; the cognitive appraisal therapy (CAT) of Richard Wessler, Sheena Hankin and Jonathan Stern; the multi-modal therapy (MMT) of Arnold Lazarus; the values clarification techniques of Sidney Simon; and the schematherapy (ST) methods of Jeffrey Young. Cognitive theoretical (belief system and value system) influences include the work of Noam Chomsky, Richard Lazarus, Alfred Adler (in Lundin, and in Mosac), Sigmund Freud and Anna Freud (specifically on defense mechanisms), Alfred Korsybski (on lingual symbolism), Julian Rotter (on locus of control), James Flavell (on metacognition), and Martin Seligman and Bernard Weiner (on attribution theory).

SIQR developer Rodger Garrett’s writing about cognitive therapy appears to most deeply rooted in Wessler’s, Hankin’s and Stern’s CAT. In his writing, Garrett often repeats the theme of core beliefs, values, idea(l)s, assumptions, convictions and attitudes influencing affective states (e.g.: anxiety, anger, depression, mania) that combine with the core schemata to influence perceptions, appraisals, interpretations, evaluations, assessments, analyses of, and attributions of meaning to, events in the environment (see Garrett online).

The therapy’s neurophysiological components are grounded in the work of Neil Carlson, Louis Cozolino, M. DeBellis, M. Driessen, R. Duman, Michael Gazzaniga, C. Heim, Paul Huttenlocher, Alfred Kaszniak, J. Kaufman, Joseph LeDoux, Jaak Panksepp, Mark Rosenzweig, Alan Schore, Daniel Seigel, Francine Shapiro, Otfried Spreen, M. Stein, Bessel Van der Kolk, E. Vermetten, Douglas Watt and other brain mapping and function researchers using computer-aided tomography, magnetic resonance imaging, proton emission tomography, small partial emission tomography and other brain scanning techniques.

Garrett’s interpretation of the sum total of millennial era brain mapping and functional research is similar to Shapiro’s with regard to her bi-lateral EMDR therapy: That specific methods can be used to link the affective memories of trauma stored largely in one brain hemisphere with the symbolic language processing centers in the opposite hemisphere (see Shapiro, 2001).

Adapted from the Wikipedia article Self-talk Identification, Questioning & Revision (SIQR), under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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Psychotherapy involves a formal relationship between professional and client—usually an individual, couple, family, or small group—that employs a set of procedures intended to form a therapeutic alliance, explore the nature of psychological problems, and encourage new ways of thinking, feeling, or behaving.

Clinicians have a wide range of individual interventions to draw from, often guided by their training—for example, a cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) clinician might use worksheets to record distressing cognitions, a psychoanalyst might encourage free association, while a psychologist trained in Gestalt techniques might focus on immediate interactions between client and therapist. Clinical psychologists generally seek to base their work on research evidence and outcome studies as well as on trained clinical judgment. Although there are literally dozens of recognized therapeutic orientations, their differences can often be categorized on two dimensions: insight vs. action and in-session vs. out-session.

*Insight – emphasis is on gaining greater understanding of the motivations underlying one’s thoughts and feelings (e.g. psychodynamic therapy)

*Action – focus is on making changes in how one thinks and acts (e.g. solution focused therapy, cognitive behavioral therapy)

*In-session – interventions center on the here-and-now interaction between client and therapist (e.g. humanistic therapy, Gestalt therapy)

*Out-session – a large portion of therapeutic work is intended to happen outside of session (e.g. bibliotherapy, rational emotive behavior therapy)

The methods used are also different in regards to the population being served as well as the context and nature of the problem. Therapy will look very different between, say, a traumatized child, a depressed but high-functioning adult, a group of people recovering from substance dependence, and a ward of the state suffering from terrifying delusions. Other elements that play a critical role in the process of psychotherapy include the environment, culture, age, cognitive functioning, motivation, and duration (i.e. brief or long-term therapy).

Four main schools

The field is dominated in terms of training and practice by essentially four major schools of practice: psychodynamic, humanistic, behavioral/cognitive behavioral, and systems or family therapy.

Psychodynamic

The psychodynamic perspective developed out of the psychoanalysis of Sigmund Freud. The core object of psychoanalysis is to make the unconscious conscious—to make the client aware of his or her own primal drives (namely those relating to sex and aggression) and the various defenses used to keep them in check. The essential tools of the psychoanalytic process are the use of free association and an examination of the client’s transference towards the therapist, defined as the tendency to take unconscious thoughts or emotions about a significant person (e.g. a parent) and “transfer” them onto another person. Major variations on Freudian psychoanalysis practiced today include self psychology, ego psychology, and object relations theory. These general orientations now fall under the umbrella term ”psychodynamic psychology”, with common themes including examination of transference and defenses, an appreciation of the power of the unconscious, and a focus on how early developments in childhood have shaped the client’s current psychological state.

Humanistic

Humanistic psychology was developed in the 1950s in reaction to both behaviorism and psychoanalysis, largely due to the person-centered therapy of Carl Rogers (often referred to as Rogerian Therapy) and existential psychology developed by Victor Frankl and Rollo May. Rogers believed that a client needed only three things from a clinician to experience therapeutic improvement—congruence, unconditional positive regard, and empathetic understanding. By using phenomenology, intersubjectivity and first-person categories, the humanistic approach seeks to get a glimpse of the whole person and not just the fragmented parts of the personality. This aspect of holism links up with another common aim of humanistic practice in clinical psychology, which is to seek an integration of the whole person, also called ”self-actualization”. According to humanistic thinking, each individual person already has inbuilt potentials and resources that might help them to build a stronger personality and self-concept. The mission of the humanistic psychologist is to help the individual employ these resources via the therapeutic relationship.

Behavioral and Cognitive behavioral

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) developed from the combination of cognitive therapy and rational emotive behavior therapy, both of which grew out of cognitive psychology and behaviorism. CBT is based on the theory that how we think (cognition), how we feel (emotion), and how we act (behavior) are related and interact together in complex ways. In this perspective, certain dysfunctional ways of interpreting and appraising the world (often through ”schemas” or ”beliefs”) can contribute to emotional distress or result in behavioral problems. The object of many cognitive behavioral therapies is to discover and identify the biased, dysfunctional ways of relating or reacting and through different methodologies help clients transcend these in ways that will lead to increased well-being. There are many techniques used, such as systematic desensitization, socratic questioning, and keeping a cognition observation log. Modified approaches that fall into the category of CBT have also developed, including dialectic behavior therapy and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy.

Behavior therapy is a rich tradition. It is well researched with a strong evidence base. Its roots are in behaviorism. In behavior therapy, environmental events predict the way we think and feel. Our behavior sets up conditions for the environment to feedback back on it. Sometimes the feedback leads the behavior to increase- reinforcement and sometimes the behavior descreases- punishment. Oftentimes behavior therapists are called applied behavior analysis. They have studied many areas from developmental disabilities to depression and anxiety disorders. In the area of mental health and addictions a recent article looked at APA’s list for well established and promising practices and found a considerable number of them based on the principles of operant and respondent conditioning. Multiple assessment techniques have come from this approach including functional analysis, which has found a strong focus in the school system. In addition, multiple intervention programs have come from this tradition including community reinforcement approach for treating addictions, Acceptance and commitment therapy, functional analytic psychotherapy, including dialectic behavior therapy and Behavioral activation. In addition, specific techniques such as contingency management and exposure therapy have come from this tradition.

Systems or family therapy

Systems or family therapy works with couples and families, and emphasizes family relationships as an important factor in psychological health. The central focus tends to be on interpersonal dynamics, especially in terms of how change in one person will affect the entire system. Therapy is therefore conducted with as many significant members of the “system” as possible. Goals can include improving communication, establishing healthy roles, creating alternative narratives, and addressing problematic behaviors. Contributors include John Gottman, Jay Haley, Sue Johnson, and Virginia Satir.

Other major therapeutic orientations

There exist dozens of recognized schools or orientations of psychotherapy—the list below represents a few influential orientations not given above. Although they all have some typical set of techniques practitioners employ, they are generally better known for providing a framework of theory and philosophy that guides a therapist in his or her working with a client.

*Existential – Existential psychotherapy postulates that people are largely free to choose who we are and how we interpret and interact with the world. It intends to help the client find deeper meaning in life and to accept responsibility for living. As such, it addresses fundamental issues of life, such as death, aloneness, and freedom. The therapist emphasizes the client’s ability to be self-aware, freely make choices in the present, establish personal identity and social relationships, create meaning, and cope with the natural anxiety of living. Important writers in existential therapy include Rollo May, Victor Frankl, James Bugental, and Irvin Yalom.

One influential therapy that came out of Existential therapy is Gestalt therapy, primarily founded by Fritz Perls in the 1950s. It is well-known for techniques designed to increase various kinds of self-awareness—the best-known perhaps being the “empty chair technique”—which are generally intended to explore resistance to “authentic contact”, resolve internal conflicts, and help the client complete “unfinished business”.

*Postmodern – Postmodern psychology says that the experience of reality is a subjective construction built upon language, social context, and history, with no essential truths. Since “mental illness” and “mental health” are not recognized as objective, definable realities, the postmodern psychologist instead sees the goal of therapy strictly as something constructed by the client and therapist. Forms of postmodern psychotherapy include narrative therapy, solution-focused therapy, and coherence therapy.

*Transpersonal – The transpersonal perspective places a stronger focus on the spiritual facet of human experience. It is not a set of techniques so much as a willingness to help a client explore spirituality and/or transcendent states of consciousness. It also is concerned with helping clients achieve their highest potential. Important writers in this area include Ken Wilber, Abraham Maslow, Stanislav Grof, John Welwood, David Brazier and Roberto Assagioli.

Other perspectives

*Multiculturalism – Although the theoretical foundations of psychology are rooted in European culture, there is a growing recognition that there exist profound differences between various ethnic and social groups and that systems of psychotherapy need to take those differences into greater consideration. Further, the generations following immigrant migration will have some combination of two or more cultures—with aspects coming from the parents and from the surrounding society—and this process of acculturation can play a strong role in therapy (and might itself be the presenting problem). Culture influences ideas about change, help-seeking, locus of control, authority, and the importance of the individual versus the group, all of which can potentially clash with certain givens in mainstream psychotherapeutic theory and practice. As such, there is a growing movement to integrate knowledge of various cultural groups in order to inform therapeutic practice in a more culturally sensitive and effective way.

*Feminism – Feminist therapy is an orientation arising from the disparity between the origin of most psychological theories (which have male authors) and the majority of people seeking counseling being female. It focuses on societal, cultural, and political causes and solutions to issues faced in the counseling process. It openly encourages the client to participate in the world in a more social and political way.

*Positive psychology – Positive psychology is the scientific study of human happiness and well-being, which started to gain momentum in 1998 due to the call of Martin Seligman, then president of the APA. The history of psychology shows that the field has been primarily dedicated to addressing mental illness rather than mental wellness. Applied positive psychology’s main focus, therefore, is to increase one’s positive experience of life and ability to flourish by promoting such things as optimism about the future, a sense of flow in the present, and personal traits like courage, perseverance, and altruism. There is now preliminary empirical evidence to show that by promoting Seligman’s three components of happiness—positive emotion (the pleasant life), engagement (the engaged life), and meaning (the meaningful life)—positive therapy can decrease clinical depression.

Integration

In the last couple of decades, there has been a growing movement to integrate the various therapeutic approaches, especially with an increased understanding of cultural, gender, spiritual, and sexual-orientation issues. Clinical psychologists are beginning to look at the various strengths and weaknesses of each orientation while also working with related fields, such as neuroscience, genetics, evolutionary biology, and psychopharmacology. The result is a growing practice of eclecticism, with psychologists learning various systems and the most efficacious methods of therapy with the intent to provide the best solution for any given problem.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article Clinical psychology, under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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Matthew Speltz of the University of Washington School of Medicine states that the roots of attachment therapy are traceable to psychologist Robert Zaslow and his “Z-process” in the 1970s. Zaslow attempted to force attachment in those suffering from autism by creating rage while holding them against their will. He believed this would lead to a breakdown in their defense mechanisms, making them more receptive to others. Zaslow thought attachment arose when an infant experienced feelings of pain, fear and rage, and then made eye contact with the carer who relieved those feelings. If an infant did not experience this cycle of events by having his fear and rage relieved, the infant would not form an attachment and would not make eye contact with other people. Zaslow believed that creating pain and rage and combining them with eye contact would cause attachment to occur, long after the normal age for such developments. Holding therapies derive from these “rage-reduction” techniques applied by Zaslow. The holding is not used for safety purposes but is initiated for the purpose of provoking strong negative emotions such as fear and anger. The child’s release typically depends upon his or her compliance with the therapist’s clinical agenda or goals. In 1971, Zaslow surrendered his California psychology license following an injury to a patient during rage-reduction therapy. Zaslow’s ideas on the use of the Z-process and holding for autism have been dispelled by research on the

genetic/biologic causes of autism.

Zaslow and his “Z-process”, a physically rough version of holding therapy, influenced Foster Cline (known as the “father of attachment therapy”) and associates at his clinic in Evergreen A key tenet of Zaslow’s approach was the notion of “breaking through” a child’s defenses—based on the model of ego defenses borrowed from psychoanalytic theory, which critics state has been misapplied. The “breaking through” metaphor was then applied to children whose attachments were thought to be impaired. The clinic, originally called the Youth Behavior Program, was subsequently renamed the Attachment Center at Evergreen.

In 1983, ethologist Nikolas Tinbergen published a book recommending the use of holding therapy by parents as a treatment or “cure” for autistic children. Tinbergen based his ideas on his methods of observational study of birds. Parents were advised to hold their autistic children despite resistance and to endeavor to maintain eye contact and share emotions. Tinbergen believed that autism related to a failure in the bond between mother and child caused by “traumatic influences” and that enforced holding and eye contact could establish such a relationship and rescue the child from autism. Tinbergen’s interpretations of autism were without scientific rigor and were contrary to the then growing acceptance that autism had a genetic cause. Despite the lack of a sound theoretical or scientific base, holding therapy as a treatment for autism is still practiced in some parts of the world, notably Europe.

Speltz cites child psychiatrist Martha Welch and her 1988 book, ”Holding Time”, as the next significant development. Like Zaslow and Tinbergen, Welch recommended holding therapy as a treatment for autism. Like Tinbergen, Welch believed autism was caused by the failure of the attachment relationship between mother and child. Mothers were instructed to hold their defiant child, provoking anger and rage, until such time as the child ceased to resist, at which point a bonding process was believed to begin.

Foster Cline and associates at the Attachment Center at Evergreen, Colorado began to promote the use of the same or similar holding techniques with adopted, maltreated children who were said to have an “attachment disorder”. This was replicated elsewhere such as at “The Center” in the Pacific Northwest. A number of other clinics arose in Evergreen, Colorado, set up by those involved in or trained at the Attachment Center at Evergreen (renamed the Institute for Attachment and Development in about 2002). These included one set up by Connell Watkins, formerly an associate of Foster Cline at the Attachment Center and its clinical director. Watkins was one of the therapists convicted in the Candace Newmaker case in 2001 in which a child was asphyxiated during a rebirthing process in the course of a two-week attachment therapy “intensive”. Foster Cline gave up his license and moved to another state following an investigation of a separate attachment therapy related incident.

In addition to the notion of “breaking through” defence mechanisms, other metaphors were adopted by practitioners relating to the supposed effects of early deprivation, abuse or neglect on the child’s ability to form relationships. These included the idea of the child’s development being “frozen” and treatment being required to “unfreeze” development. Practitioners of holding therapy also added some components of Bowlby’s attachment theory and the therapy came to be known as attachment therapy. Language from attachment theory is used but descriptions of the practices contain ideas and techniques based on misapplied metaphors deriving from Zaslow and psychoanalysis, not attachment theory. According to Prior and Glaser “there is no empirical evidence to support Zaslow’s theory. The concept of suppressed rage has, nevertheless, continued to be a central focus explaining the children’s behavior.”

Cline’s privately-published work ”Hope for high risk and rage filled children” also cites family therapist and hypnotherapist Milton Erickson as a source, and reprints parts of a case of Erickson’s published in 1961. The report describes the case of a divorced mother with a non-compliant son. Erickson advised the mother to sit on the child for hours at a time and to feed him only on cold oatmeal while she and a daughter ate appetizing food. The child did increase in compliance, and Erickson noted, with apparent approval, that he trembled when his mother looked at him. Cline commented, with respect to this and other cases, that in his opinion all bonds were trauma bonds. According to Cline, it illustrates the three essential components of 1) taking control, 2) the child’s expression of rage; and, 3) relaxation and the development of bonding.

In addition, proponents believed that holding induced age regression, enabling a child to make up for physical affection missed earlier in life. Regression is key to the holding therapy approach. In attachment therapy, breaking down the child’s resistance by confrontational techniques is thought to reduce the child to an infantile state, thus making the child receptive to forming attachment by the application of early parenting behaviors such as bottle feeding, cradling, rocking and eye contact. Some, but by no means all, attachment therapists have used rebirthing techniques to aid regression. The roots of the form of rebirthing used within attachment therapy lie in primal therapy (sometimes known as primal scream therapy), another therapy based on beliefs in very early trauma and the transformational nature of age regression. Bowlby explicitly rejected the notion of regression stating “present knowledge of infant and child development requires that a theory of developmental pathways should replace theories that invoke specific phases of development in which it is held a person may become fixated and/or to which he may regress.”

According to O’Connor and Nilsen, although other aspects of treatment are applied, the holding component has attracted most attention because proponents believe it is an essential ingredient. They also considered the lack of available and suitable interventions from mainstream professionals as essential to the popularization of holding therapy as an attachment therapy.

In 2003, an issue of ”Attachment & Human Development” was devoted to the subject of attachment therapy with articles by well-known experts in the field of attachment. Attachment researchers and authors condemned it as empirically unfounded, theoretically flawed and clinically unethical. It has also been described as potentially abusive and a pseudoscientific intervention, not based on attachment theory or research, that has resulted in tragic outcomes for children including at least six documented child fatalities. In 2006, the American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children (APSAC) Task Force reported on the subjects of attachment therapy, reactive attachment disorder, and attachment problems and laid down guidelines for the future diagnosis and treatment of attachment disorders. The APSAC Task Force was largely critical of Attachment Therapy’s theoretical base, practices, claims to an evidence base, non-specific symptoms lists published on the internet, claims that traditional treatments do not work and dire predictions for the future of children who do not receive attachment therapy. “Although focused primarily on specific attachment therapy techniques, the controversy also extends to the theories, diagnoses, diagnostic practices, beliefs, and social group norms supporting these techniques, and to the patient recruitment and advertising practices used by their proponents.” In 2007, Scott Lilienfeld included holding therapy as one of the potentially harmful therapies (PHT’s) at level 1 in his ”Psychological Science” review. Describing it as “unfortunately” referred to as “attachment therapy”, Mary Dozier and Michael Rutter consider it critical to differentiate it from treatments derived from attachment theory. A mistaken association between attachment therapy and attachment theory may have resulted in a relatively unenthusiastic view towards the latter among some practitioners despite its relatively profound lines of research in the field of socioemotional development.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article Attachment therapy, under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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Amnesia (from Greek ‘) is a condition in which memory is disturbed or lost. Memory in this context refers either to stored memories or to the process of committing something to memory. The causes of amnesia have traditionally been divided into the “organic” or the “functional”. Organic causes include damage to the brain, through physical injury, neurological disease or the use of certain (generally sedative) drugs. Functional causes are psychological factors, such as mental disorder, post-traumatic stress or, in psychoanalytic terms, defense mechanisms. Amnesia may also appear as spontaneous episodes, in the case of transient global amnesia.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article Amnesia, under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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We all have defense mechanisms and different ways that we try to subconsciously protect ourselves from perceived harm in our daily lives. Our defenses are the natural way that we try to keep ourselves from being hurt. These defenses simply spring into action long before we can have a conscious thought about it from our subconscious mind. This can make it much harder for us to conquer our fears.

Some routine ways we enact our defenses are: getting angry at someone, not saying what we really feel, avoiding uncomfortable conversations or situations, or maybe even crying to get out of a confrontation with someone. These are just a few examples of emotional defenses that can help us avoid going into areas of our feelings where we feel too vulnerable or afraid.

So does that mean we are at the mercy of the defensive reactions we have? No, we don’t have to be. There are several things we can do to better understand what is occuring at a subconscious level in our lives. Some might ask why is this so important? It is important for our personal growth to understand when and why we are triggered by life circumstances. This allows us to learn about ourselves so that we can make more positive choices based on love rather than fear. If we don’t understand, we can spend our entire lives simply acting and reacting to life rather than living it.

Here are some ways to begin to understand your defensive reactions so you can make different choices.

Try to be aware of resistance in your life

Resistance is when things take on a sluggish fe

Be aware of your thoughts

Negative thoughts can be hard to pinpoint sometimes but if we pay attention to resistance, that gives us the opportunity to look at what we were thinking. Can you figure out where you have fear? Can you challenge that fear and make a courageous choice in your life? It may all sound difficult but if you try this in your life more you will be amazed at how much power you really have to transform a negative moment into a positive one.

Listen to your body

We all hold stress in our body in different ways. Where do you hold yours? The way our bodies feel is an important tool in increasing our life awareness. How do your shoulders feel? Does your stomach feel tight? Do you feel tingly all over. Our bodies can tell us alot of information about what is going on in our emotional realm. Learn to listen to these subtle cues given to you physically about resistance.

Realize you always have a choice

We often believe that once we become aware of something – what’s done is done. This is not true. We ALWAYS have a choice of what we do next. Just because we have a certain reaction doesn’t mean we are done, we can come at the situation in a different way. We can shift or replace our original assumption or reaction. We can try to reconcile how we are feeling about the person we had the reaction with. Making more positive choices even after the initial reaction can also lessen our resistance.

Our defenses are an important part of our lives. It is not realistic to think that we will remove all resistance or defensiveness while living. After all, we are here to learn and grow. Taking a look at our defensive reactions can allow us to move to greater awareness of what gets us caught in victimization or blame, rather than expansion or growth. All our emotions of anger, blame, guilt or hate can have a powerful negative effect on our lives whether they are directed at ourselve or others.

If we have deeper issues that need looked at, looking at defenses can help us find what we most need to know about ourselves and what we can do to release behaviors that cause resistance to achieving happiness in our lives.

cjmartes

Author Bio

About the Author:
CJ Martes is an international healer, author and creator of Akashic Field TherapySM (AFT), an integral method of Soul Clearing that helps individuals identify and then remove subconscious negative patterns and beliefs at the mental, physical and spiritual level. Trained in Vibrational Healing and advanced Soul Clearing and inspired by Quantum Theories and Spiral Dynamics, her work blends Behavioral and Integral Psychology, Vibrational Medicine, and cutting-edge Western science to produce amazing results.

An accomplished writer and teacher, CJ has lectured and trained students throughout all over the United States. Using her healing gifts and AFT method to assist others in creating clarity of mind, body and spirit. She has touched the lives of thousands of clients both in the U.S. and in over ten different countries.

She can be contacted by visiting her website: http://www.cjmartes.com or by calling (816) 841-4890.

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