Positive Approach Flashcards
What is the positive approach?
What is the positive approach:
Introduced towards the end of the 20th Century.
Focuses on the positive aspects of human nature and argues that people should aim to enhance their lives, making them more meaningful and to increase levels of happiness to achieve greater fulfilment.
Believes there needs to be a shift of focus from ‘mental illness’ to how people can flourish.
Argues that psychology has places too much emphasis on what can be fixed and should try to focus on what can be developed.
Assumption One- Acknowledgement of Free Will: Comparison to other approaches Example (Diener and Seligman) Link to us knowing we have free will Everyday example of how free will can help us lead a good life.
This approach assumes humans are in charge of their own emotions and have free will to change how they direct their emotions.
Focus upon our own strengths and virtues in order to enhance our lives and less focus should be given on negativity.
Self Determinist and this helps us live a better life.
Comparison to other approaches:
Biological states neurotransmitters and evolution determines our behaviour.
Behaviourist states that conditioning determines our behaviour.
Positive gives us the hope that we can change our perspective with free will, thus making it better.
Example (Diener and Seligman):
Compared Individuals who were happy, unhappy and average.
One of the investigated factors was the influence of social relationships, then compares the amount of time each person invested in their relationships with family and friends.
Those that had stronger social relationships are happier generally.
Found a negative correlation between depression and levels of happiness.
Link to us knowing we have free will:
Individuals that made the choice to spend more time in their social relationships (thus focusing on the positive things) made them happier.
Everyday example of how free will can help us lead a good life:
If a person is unhappy with their job, they should use their free will to decide to focus upon the positive aspects (such as relationships with colleagues or how they will spend the money they are earning).
This helps us focus on living a better life.
Assumption Two- Authenticity of Goodness and Excellence Contribution to this assumption Seligman Application to therapy
Authenticity of goodness and excellence
Contribution to this assumption:
- Feelings of happiness and goodness are just as natural as feelings of anxiety and stress. Psychologists need to assign the positive states of mind equal attention.
- Psychology as a discipline, has focused on disorders and negative states of mind. The primary goal of this approach is to change this philosophy and practice.
- Celebrating the good things in life instead of magnifying the worst.
Seligman:
- According to Seligman- the belief that traits such as Virtue and Happiness are ‘less authentic’ than anxiety and stress has been an obstacle in psychological research.
- Seligman believes we have inherent traits which he calls ‘Signature Strengths’ such as kindness, generosity and humour. We need to nurture those traits to transform our lives.
Application to therapy:
Assumption Three- Focus on 'The Good Life' Three desirable lives Three elements contributing to the good life Other Info
Three desirable lives: (Seligman 2003)
The Pleasant Life- Happiness comes from pursuing positive emotions in relation to the past, present and future.
The Good Life- Happiness comes from pursuing activities that positively absorb and engage us.
The Meaningful Life- Happiness comes from a deep sense of fulfilment by living for a purpose much greater than ones self.
Three elements contributing to the good life:
- Positive Connections to Others- allows us to love, trust and develop spiritual connections with self of others.
- Positive Individual Traits- Personal qualities (integrity, morality, creativity).
- Life Regulation Qualities- Qualities that we need to develop, regulate and monitor and control our behaviour in order to accomplish our goals.
Other Info:
Assumed that individuals should focus on living the good life.
Behaviour will be driven by motivation to want to live the good life.
A person that uses all three routes to happiness leads to ‘The Full Life’ which research has suggested that those who lead this life have much greater life satisfaction.
What is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness has its roots in Buddhism. It teaches people to control their own mind by paying more attention and increasing awareness of their present thoughts.
This is the opposite of our normal mental habits where we are often too focused on the past or the future.
THERAPY:
Application of Positive Assumptions:
Authenticity of goodness and excellence
Link to Mindfulness (incl Eg)
Assumed that feelings of goodness and excellence are as natural as feelings of anxiety or stress. We can achieve greater life satisfaction by developing our signature strengths.
Link to Mindfulness: (incl Eg)
Mindfulness places focus upon goodness.
Aims to develop a persons positive characteristics and enhance core virtues such as gratitude and flexibility.
We become more grateful for the little things around us and the things people do for us.
Eg. Being too focused on other things to thank the person for opening the door for you.
THERAPY:
Application of Positive Assumptions:
Acknowledgement of Free Will
Link to Mindfulness (incl Eg)
Assumes we have free will to control our own thoughts and emotions. We can choose to use our own strengths and virtues to enhance our lives.
Link to Mindfulness (incl Eg):
Involves becoming consciously aware of present thoughts and feelings.
Encourages people to control their thoughts and feelings to be more productive and minimise negativity.
THERAPY:
Application of Positive Assumptions:
Focus on the Good Life
Link to Mindfulness
Places focus upon striving to live the good life.
Link to Mindfulness:
Individual Traits- Aims to develop the positive traits of an individual such as optimism and kindness.
Positive connections to others- Focuses upon gratitude and compassion, contributing to positive social connections.
Life Regulation qualities- Self regulation is necessary in order to control thoughts and emotions. Guides the individuals to living the good life.
THERAPY: Main components of Mindfulness: Gaining Control of Thoughts: What our mind is focused upon (incl Eg) What Mindfulness teaches us to focus on Purpose of gaining control of thoughts Reflection rather than a reaction
What our mind is focused upon (incl Eg):
Minds are too focused on the past or too busy worrying about the future.
Eg. We often find ourselves thinking about a distressing situation that happened the day before and questioning what we would do differently.
What Mindfulness teaches us to focus on:
Trains us to focus on our present thoughts, emotions and feelings.
Focus on the present, to be aware of all incoming thoughts and feelings but to also accept them
Purpose of gaining control of thoughts:
Gain greater awareness of unhelpful or negative thoughts, that can often dominate us, in order to gain control of them and spend less time dealing with them.
Reflection rather than a reaction:
Reaction- Negative automatic thinking leading to anxiety/depression.
Reflection- A type of thinking associated with deep thought, aimed at achieving a better understanding.
Making sense of an experience, standing back and repetition.
THERAPY: Main components of Mindfulness: Sitting Meditation Effectiveness: (incl Eg) How guided instruction works What meditation does Mindful Breathing
Meditation is central to effective mindfulness.
Sitting Meditation removes an individual from their daily interactions with life, so that its easier to focus on the mind. Eg. Away from Technology
How guided instruction works:
Client sitting in a comfortable position, spine straight and asking them to direct attention to their breathing. They will be encouraged to pay attention to their body sensations, thoughts and emotions.
What meditation does:
It teaches the client that thoughts, feelings and emotions come and go. This helps the individual learn to not react in an automatic way to their thoughts.
Mindful Breathing:
Settle into a comfortable and balanced sitting position on the floor in a quiet room.
Keep your spine straight and close your eyes.
Bring awareness to your body sensations and movements.
Maintain awareness as you breathe in and out.
Allow breath to flow without trying to chance or control it.
Notice the sensations with every movement.
As soon as you notice your mind wandering, bring back your awareness to the movement of your abdomen.
Repeat.
THERAPY: Main components of Mindfulness: Informal Practice of Mindfulness: What it is Examples of Informal Practice Benefits
What it is:
The opposite of multi-tasking.
Involves making the conscious decision to focus on one single task by paying more attention to your surroundings.
Examples of Informal Practice:
The Shower- Pay attention to your body sensations as the water hits your skin. Focus on the sounds you can hear like the water falling.
Walking down a rural path- Focus on the feeling of the ground you’re walking on and the sound of your feet hitting the ground. Also, the feeling and sound of the wind passing through you and shaping around your body.
Eating- Focus on the texture, taste, smell, warmth of the food you are eating.
Benefits:
Easily incorporated into daily life to give us a break from our normal thought process.
Can be used by anyone at any time.
THERAPY: Evaluation: Effectiveness: Research Evidence: Teasdale et al. Reibel et al . Farb et al.
Teasdale et al.: (2000)
Evaluated the effectiveness of MBCT among 145 recurrently depressed patients. Patients were randomly allocated to receive treatment as usual and 8 classes of MBCT with relapse to major depression. Was assessed over 60 weeks.
MBCT provided the greatest help to those who has only 2 episodes of depression in the past but substantially reduced the risk of relapse in those who have has 3 or more eps.
Reibel et al .:
Reported that MBSR decreased levels of anxiety and depression in 136 patients who participated in an 8 week mindfulness programme. (Involving 20 mins of meditation per day). (However no control group).
Farb et al.:
Conducted similar research to that of Reibel but compared results to a control group.
Treatment group reported less anxiety, depression and distress compared to the control group. (However, subjective and cannot be measured).
THERAPY:
Evaluation: Effectiveness:
One Strength of Mindfulness
One Weakness of Mindfulness
Strength-
Integration with other therapies:
Techniques in mindfulness are becoming more used within other therapies such as CBT (Cognitive Behaviour Therapy).
Offers a new and alternative approach to therapy.
Where CBT attempts to change the type of thoughts, mindfulness encourages us to be accepting the way we think and it has proven to be effective.
Weakness-
Key Limitation:
DIFFICULT TO MEASURE.
Difficult to operationalise being mindful and those that struggle to become more mindful may actually perceive themselves as being mindful
Difficult to assess the benefits of a subjective therapy.
Research often relies on self-reports too.
THERAPY:
Evaluation: Effectiveness:
Ethical Issues:
Avoids Psychological Harm
Avoids Psychological Harm:
Unlike other therapies, Mindfulness doesn’t involve dragging up the past as a means of offering an explanation for present behaviour.- avoids client anxiety.
Encourages acceptance of their thoughts.
THERAPY:
Evaluation: Effectiveness:
Ethical Issues:
Valid Consent and Right to Withdraw
Valid Consent and Right to Withdraw:
You cannot go through this therapy without giving valid consent as it involves using your own free will to practice mindfulness.
It is easy to withdraw, through not attending any more sessions or just stopping doing your own informal practice of mindfulness.
