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counseling psychology > Exam 2: Mindfulness based therapy, existential therapy, gestalt therapy > Flashcards

Exam 2: Mindfulness based therapy, existential therapy, gestalt therapy Flashcards

1
Q

mindfulness and acceptance based approaches (4)

A
  • Mindfulness-based stress reduction
  • Mindfulness based cognitive therapy
  • Dialectical behavior therapy
  • Acceptance and commitment therapy
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2
Q

common elements across mindfulness based therapies (4)

A
  • mindfulness originates from Buddhist meditation practices
  • Emphasizes awareness and attentiveness to the present moment
  • Mindfulness therapies are considered third wave of cognitive behavioral therapies ⇒ building off the evolution of behavior therapy and CBT => incorporated into western mental health practices
  • Instead of changing the content of your thoughts (really hard), third wave therapies stress the importance of changing the relationship you have to distress thoughts
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3
Q

mindfulness

A

paying attention to internal (thoughts, feelings, somatic sensations) and external stimuli (sights, sounds, smells) in the present moment ⇒ paying attention to the present without distraction
- Refraining from ruminating about the future

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4
Q

non judgmental awareness

A

observing the present moment without evaluating experiences or saying whether they are good, bad, right, wrong, etc.
- Instead, maintaining an attitude of curiosity and openness and focusing on observing/describing the present moment ⇒ like thoughts flowing down a stream
- Sit calm, thoughts come and go without any judgment on them

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5
Q

acceptance

A

experiencing the present moment without attempting to avoid, escape, or terminate the phenomenon ⇒ thoughts and feeling happening in everyday life
- includes experiencing unwanted or unpleasant internal phenomena ⇒ sensations, thoughts, feelings
- This is not advocating for accepting or tolerating situations where safety is at risk
- Rather common emotions, thoughts, and sensations that happen in everyday life that cannot always be avoided
- Acceptance ≠ approval

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6
Q

how do problems develop in mindfulness based therapies? (2)

A
  1. insufficient attention to the present moment ⇒ keep you from regulating emotions/behaviors in the moment that may cause an automatic reaction
  2. excessive avoidance of experiences
    - Experiential avoidance
    - May reduce distress or discomfort in the short term but may be maladaptive in the long term
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7
Q

how does change occur in mindfulness based therapies?

A

Present focus → more aware of their current emotions and behaviors → self regulate more effectively (choose different behaviors, cope with emotions)
- client learns to focus their awareness on the present as a means of greater self regulation
- Mindfulness and distance tolerance skills

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8
Q

roles of a mindfulness based therapist (1)

A

Active role in teaching and coaching the client in mindfulness techniques

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9
Q

roles of the client in mindfulness based therapies? (1)

A

Active role in learning and practicing mindfulness techniques

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10
Q

5-4-3-2-1 technique

A

start with acknowledging 5 things you can see, 4 things you can touch, 3 things you can hear, 2 thinks you can smell, 1 think you can taste
- Technique that helps clients get connected with their body when they are dissociating

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11
Q

body scan meditation

A

requires the individual to get into a comfortable position ⇒ starting at the toes and slowly making your way up the body

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12
Q

CBT summary (4)

A
  • Identify maladaptive thoughts that contribute to difficult emotions
  • Examine the evidence for and against the thoughts
  • Develop alternative thoughts that are more helpful and or more accurate
  • Focus on changing the content of the thoughts
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13
Q

mindfulness summary (4)

A
  • Notice and identify difficult thoughts and feelings
  • Notice where the feeling is felt in the body
  • Bring an attitude of openness and compassion to learn to accept the existence of difficult thoughts and emotions
  • Focus on changing the relations with the thoughts and or emotions
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14
Q

dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT)

A
  • developed by Dr. Marsha Linehan
  • Originally develop for individuals with borderline personality disorder ⇒ emotional dysregulation is the hallmark
  • Dont respond to traditional treatment or terminate early
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15
Q

dialects

A

the simultaneous existence of two opposite ideas
- In DBT, the balance between acceptance and change
- Acceptance of emotions and thoughts and skills for changing behaviors

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16
Q

DBT session structure

A

weekly group and individual therapy and occurs for 1 year
- Group skills is 2 hours/week and individual is 1x/week
- Available for phone coaching 24/7

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17
Q

emotional regulation components (4)

A
  • Emotional record ⇒ similar to CBT thought record
  • Identifying patterns of destructive behaviors
  • Identifying thoughts that trigger emotional distress
  • Opposite action ⇒ choosing to do the opposite of what your emotion would tell you to do
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18
Q

mindfulness skill components (4)

A
  1. Mindful breathing
  2. Mindful eating
  3. Mindful communication ⇒ apply how we respond to others
    - Setting our intentions, being fully presents, being fully open, and relating to others with compassion
  4. observe/describe emotion ⇒ try to sit with the emotion and really understand it
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19
Q

interpersonal effectiveness

A

Getting needs met from others in a skillful, healthy way and acting in a way that allows you to get what you want, keep relationships, and keep self respect
- dear man acronym
- Describe, express, assert, reinforce, Stay mindful, appear confident, negotiate

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20
Q

distress tolerance

A

skillfully coping with painful, intense, or unpleasant emotions without becoming overwhelmed

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21
Q

components of distress tolerance (3)

A
  • Radical acceptance coping statements
  • Developing methods of distracting self
  • Relaxation and self soothing
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22
Q

acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT)

A

says distress is unavoidable and that we suffer because we are unwilling/unable to tolerate distress
- used mindfulness and cognitive defusion to help people be more willing to experience difficult emotions
- We avoid difficult emotions, making it difficult to lead committed lives

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23
Q

cognitive defusion

A

don’t change the thought, but change your relationship to the thought
Take a step back and look at your thoughts, decide whether they are working and choose how to respond
- Serves To disentangle (de-fuse) you from thoughts that cause you to suffer
- You are not your thoughts and unhelpful thinking patterns

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24
Q

components of ACT (3)

A
  • Your heart deepest desires for how you want to behave as a human being; how you want to treat yourself, others, and world around you
  • Values Vs. Goals
  • Work as an inner compass that can guide you through life, provide motivation, and give a sense of fulfillment
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25
Q

values

A

how you want to behave in this moment and on an ongoing basis

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26
Q

goals

A

outcomes you are aiming for

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27
Q

existential therapy

A

more of a philosophy or a way of thinking about therapy than a particular style of practicing psychology
- Many of the key figures for this theory are philosophers, rather than psychologists
- He who has a why to live can bear with almost any how
- choice and meaning of life

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28
Q

2 overarching beliefs of existential therapy

A
  1. Clients are searching for meaning in their subjective worlds
  2. Humans are in constant state of transition, evolving, and becoming ⇒ due to environment
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29
Q

questions of existential therapy and why we need them

A
  • Who am I
  • What does it all mean
  • How am I going to get to where I want to be in my life
    → without answers to these questions we feel lost and that is a source of distress
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30
Q

victor Frankl

A
  • 1905-1997
    born and educated in vietnam and was a neurologist, philosopher, and author as well as Holocaust survivor
  • Disagreed with Freud on psychoanalytic thinking ⇒ founder of logotherapy which is a type of existential therapy
  • Before the second world war and all but 1 family member died in concentration camps
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31
Q

logotherapy

A

therapy through meaning and focus on finding meaning and purpose
- You still have the power to change things such as your attitude even though it is small
- Personal responsibility and self strength is important

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32
Q

Rolly May

A
  • 1909-1994
    another major figure for bringing existentialism from Europe to the US
    Psychotherapy should be aimed at problems of being, rather than problem solving
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33
Q

main themes of logotherapy (4)

A
  • Life has meaning in all circumstances
  • Will to meaning is central motivation for living
  • We must have freedom to find meaning in everything
  • We must integrate body, mind, and spirit to be fully alive
    → meaning is created by what we engage in
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34
Q

components of existential therapy (4)

A
  • reject deterministic model of traditional psychoanalysis and behaviorism where the individual is determined by unconscious forces or sociocultural conditioning
  • Focuses on choices so even when we cannot determine what we experience, we can choose how we react as well as our actions
  • Reacts against the identification of therapy with a set of techniques and bases practice on an understanding of what it means to be human => Limitations and tragedies vs possibilities and opportunities of human life
  • Believes that every person possess a health core belief ⇒ similar to person centered therapy with humanistic approaches
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35
Q

what does existential therapy propose about the human condition? (6)

A
  • increase capacity for self awareness
  • freedom and responsibility
  • striving for identity and relationship to others
  • searching for meaning
  • anxiety as a condition for living
  • awareness of death and nonbeing
36
Q

increase in capacity for self awareness

A

recognizing limit of life and limited time to do what we want so we choose our actions to create our destiny with opportunity to relate to others
- More turmoil as well as more fulfillment

37
Q

freedom and responsibility

A

people aren’t limited by environmental and social constraints so we can choose how we react to external circumstances

38
Q

striving for identity and relationship to others

A

clients fear they are living lives that are meaningless (aloneness or we alone cannot rely on others to give life meaning)
- Solid relationship with self before strong relationships are built with others

39
Q

searching for meaning

A

others cannot give meaning to us so we should establish our important meanings

40
Q

anxiety as a condition for living

A

it is normal to live in a state of anxiety
- Existential therapy

41
Q

awareness of death and nonbeing

A

death is a basic human condition that gives significance to life

42
Q

how do problems or distress develop in existential therapy? (4)

A
  • freedom
  • death => born alone and die alone
  • meaningless
  • isolation
43
Q

other components of existential distress

A
  • we all need to deal with these throughout our life
  • it is easy to live in a state of inauthenticity ⇒ this can cause distress (Similar to person centered where genuineness is a main role)
  • anxiety is normal and existential but should not be neurotic which interferes with ability to be present
44
Q

how does change occur in existential therapy (2)

A
  1. clients are assisted in identifying and clarifying their assumption about the world
    - Rapport and relationship are key
    - Clients may initially present problems from resulting from external causes but are taught to examine how their role is played in creating their problems
    - Lots of confrontation the therapist may need to challenge the client with
    - Rapport and good relationship is important for this type of confrontation
  2. clients are assisted in more fully examining the source and authority of their present value system
    - Get a better sense of what kind of life they think of as worth living and develop a clearer sense of their internal valuing process
45
Q

action oriented steps in existential therapy (2)

A
  1. clients are assisted in translating what they have learnt into meaningful act
  2. Action happens and departure from psychodynamic thinking
    - can be a time limited approach which mirrors time limitedness of existence
    - requires more goals and ambition because it takes less time and is very structured
46
Q

goals of existential therapy (7)

A
  • Helping clients to accept their freedom and responsibility to act ⇒ self determinism
  • Assisting people in coming to terms with the crisis in their lives
  • Encouraging clients to recognize the ways in which they are not living fully authentic lives
  • Inviting clients to become more honest with themselves
  • Broadening clients awareness of their choices
  • Facilitating the clients search for purpose and meaning in life
  • Assisting clients in developing a deep understanding of themselves and the ways they can effectively communicate with others
47
Q

roles of the existential therapist (4)

A
  • There are no uniform roles
  • To understand the subjective world of the client and help them come to new understanding and options => To find meaning
  • Therapeutic relationship is key
  • Core of the therapeutic relationship
    (Authenticity and Confronts clients honestly)
48
Q

roles of the client in existential therapy (4)

A
  • Responsibility for how they are choosing to be in their world at the present moment
  • Active during the sessions, must decide which fears, guilt feelings, and anxiety they want to explore
  • Confront ultimate concerns, rather than coping with immediate problems
  • Focus is on removing roadblocks to meaningful living
49
Q

therapeutic techniques of existential therapy (4)

A
  • paradoxical intention
  • dereflection
  • socratic questions
  • writing your own eulogy
    → the therapeutic relationship is the most effective and powerful technique because it believes there is no one right way to do therapy ⇒ client/therapist is the most essential and is a foundation for everything
50
Q

paradoxical intention

A

tells you to do the opposite of what your intention is
- Those who have insomnia that may have them try to stay awake so they know what their struggle is

51
Q

dereflection

A

stopping clients form reflecting too much when it

52
Q

socratic questions

A

asking open ended questions to help challenge value systems

53
Q

writing your own eulogy

A

speech for someone who recently died in a term for endearment
- What you accomplished or are remembered by ⇒ helps with reflection

54
Q

strengths of existential therapy (3)

A
  • Humanizes therapy
  • Provides a perspective on basic human conditions
  • Relevant in multicultural contexts
55
Q

weaknesses of existential therapy (4)

A
  • Concepts are abstract and ambiguous
  • Lacks empirical backing
  • Limited applicability: lower functioning and clients concerned about basic needs
  • Highly focused on self determinism and may ignore other factors such as systematic oppression
56
Q

Frederick Perls

A

was a psychoanalyst but then disagreed
- Emphasis how people function in their totality
- Reaction against reductionism and determinism
- Similar to person centered therapy
- we can take responsibilities for ourselves

57
Q

gestalt psychology view of human nature (6)

A
  • Law of similarity
  • Law of pragnanz or good figure
  • Law of proximity
  • Law of continuity
  • Law of closure
  • Law of common region
58
Q

self actualizing tendency

A

the process of being what one is and not a process of striving to become
- The whole is more than a sum of its parts
- Striving to coordinate the various parts into a healthy unified whole

59
Q

major beliefs of gestalt psychology (3)

A
  1. stress individual responsibility and individuality
    - All individuals are actors, not just reactors
    - Anti deterministic
    - Important to differentiate self from others and to connect self and other
  2. believes in the power in the present
    - The past is gone and the future hasn’t arrived yet ⇒ reaction to freud
    - The only thing we can control is what we do right now
  3. promotes direct experiencing
    - People are going to grow in therapy if they experience what they are talking about
    - Not just talk about thoughts or feelings but are expected to bring feelings into the room
60
Q

how do problems develop in gestalt therapy

A
  1. lack of awareness
    - Being unaware of current feelings, thoughts, and behaviors
    - Lack of integration between different parts of the self inhibiting people from self regulation
    - Tendency to avoid
  2. from out inordinate focus on the past and future rather than the present ⇒ unfinished business
    - Interferes with living life in the present
    - Feelings of alienation develop between the self and the objective world
    - Reliving the past or creating the future with maladaptive thoughts
  3. not living in the here and now
61
Q

unfinished business in gestalt psychology

A

unexpressed feelings that interfere with current psychological functioning
- These feelings are associated with distinct memories and fantasies
- Feelings not fully experienced linger in the background and interfere with effective contact
- major source of issues according to this therapy type ⇒ bring emotions/experiences in the room to fully experience them

62
Q

results of unfinished business in gestalt psychology

A
  • Preoccupation
  • distress
  • self defeating behaviors
  • cognitive distortions
63
Q

how do problems develop in gestalt psychology (main and 4)

A

resistance to contact
- introjection
- confluence
- retroflection
- deflection

64
Q

resistance to contact

A

Defenses we develop to prevent us from experiencing the present fully

65
Q

introjection

A

accepting others views without reviewing them

66
Q

confluence

A

weak boundaries between self and the environment

67
Q

retroflection

A

we do to ourselves what we would like to do to someone else
- redirecting thoughts and behaviors we feel towards others ack on to ourselves

68
Q

deflection

A

Redirecting the focus away from a difficult topic or issue
- avoiding of contact or awareness by turning aside ⇒ useful when used with awareness rather than experiencing inappropriate emotions

69
Q

gestalt techniques (5)

A
  • internal dialogue
  • enactment
  • focus
  • rehearsal
  • reversal
    → Attend in a gestalt manner ⇒ not use metaphorical speech and pay attention to clients verbiage and behavior
    → helps the client to know themselves better
70
Q

internal dialogue

A

takes on the role of each aspect of themselves that are in conflict and engage each side in a dialogue ⇒ empty chair

71
Q

enactment

A

the client is asked to put feelings or thoughts into action and draumatizes part of their existence ⇒ finding what their behaviors mean and why they have them (exaggeration)

72
Q

exaggeration

A

asked to exaggerate a feeling, thought, moment to feel it more deeply

73
Q

focus

A

staying with the feeling and continuously focus on their present emotions/awareness

74
Q

rehearsal

A

form of role play where the client goes through a situation practicing a behavior/conversation ⇒ process feelings ahead of time

75
Q

reversal

A

ask the client to play the role of the person they are enacting their behavior on to shift their perspective ⇒ increase emotional awareness

76
Q

roles of the therapist in gestalt therapy (4)

A
  1. Create an atmosphere that promotes growth and self actualization
    - Intentionally and personally involved with clients so they become more aware
  2. Uses immediacy skills regularly
    Identifies patterns, particularly related to avoidance
    - When therapeutic process is stagnant or if there is tension
    - When diversity and trust issues have evolved or interpersonal connection
  3. Uses techniques in the service of increasing client’s awareness ⇒ acting as an observer and remain aware of what is going on in the present with the client
    - Person to person relationship such as in existential therapy
  4. Strives for a person to person relationship
77
Q

roles of the client in gestalt therapy (2)

A
  • Actively engaged in therapy as experts of their own experiences
  • Make interpretations and make meaning out of their experiences
78
Q

strengths of gestalt therapy (5)

A
  • Deemphasizes abstract intellectualization of ones problems
  • Recognizes working with the past as it relates to here and now
  • Emphasizes doing
  • Heightens awareness in a novel way
  • Helps individuals integrate polarities within themselves ⇒ different parts
79
Q

weaknesses of gestalt therapy (4)

A
  • Potential for abuse in therapy
  • Approach may not be useful for clients who have difficulty abstracting and imagining or focusing on emotions
  • Cross cultural relevance ⇒ heavy emphasis on developing separateness from one’s social circle
  • Fewer studies on this approach
80
Q

How does changeoccur in gestalt therapy? (4)

A
  • Awareness
  • Contact
  • Greater choice
  • Outcome (re-owning)
81
Q

Awareness

A

increased awareness of all parts of the self

82
Q

Contact

A

making contact with one’s inner and external world without losing sense of self and individuality
- Being engaged in every possible way and staying present
- Acting authentically in the space

83
Q

Greater choice

A

helping clients assume ownership of their experience, increasing internal coping strategies
- Awareness of their life choices and responsibility

84
Q

Outcome aka reowning

A

identification with all vital functions of the individual, including ideas, emotions, and actions

85
Q

Existential anxiety

A

anxiety that comes from growth or motivation to change

86
Q

Who created ACT?

A

Developed by Dr. Steven Hayes at the University of Nevada in 1982

counseling psychology (10 decks)

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