Treating Psychological Disorders • Psychotherapy • Treatment using psychological techniques • Biomedical therapy • Medications and biological treatment Psychoanalysis Therapy • Achieve healthier, less anxious by releasing energy they had previously devoted to the id-ego-superego conflicts • Resistance: Mental blocks (e.g., mind goes blank) • Interpretation: Illuminates the underlying feeling and conflicts you are avoiding • Transferring: Feelings may then get transferred to other individuals Psychodynamic Therapy • Try to help people understand their current symptoms by focusing on important relationships including childhood experiences and therapist-client relationship Humanistic Therapies • Person-centered (non-directive): Client leads the discussion, the therapist listens without judging, interpreting, and refrains from directing the client to toward certain insights • Active listening: Therapist echoes, restates, and seeks clarification of what the person expresses Behavior Therapies • Counterconditioning • Exposure Therapy: Repeatedly exposing them to stimuli that trigger unwanted reactions • Systematic Desensitization: Used to treat specific phobias, focuses on repeatedly relaxing while faced with anxiety-provoking stimuli • Virtual reality exposure therapy • Aversive conditioning: Creates a negative (aversive) response to a harmful stimulus • Operant conditioning: Reinforcers to modify behavior Cognitive Therapies • Thinking makes our feelings • Between an event and our response lies the mind Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) • Combined approach of integrative therapy aims to not only alter the way you thinking, but also the way people act • • • • • Anxiety Depression Bipolar Eating disorders OCD • Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) helps change suicidal behavior patterns • Make peace between acceptance and change Group and Family Therapy • Group interaction, family therapy: assumes that no person is an island • We live and grow in interaction with each other Does therapy work? Effectiveness of Psychotherapy • Meta-analysis of 475 psychotherapy outcome studies Which Psychotherapies Work Best? • Cognitive and cognitive-behavioral therapies • Anxiety, PTSD, insomnia, depression • Behavioral conditioning therapies • Bed-wetting, specific phones, compulsions, marital difficulties and sexual dysfunctions • Psychodynamic therapies • Depression and anxiety • Nondirective (person-centered) counseling • Mild to moderate depression Which Psychotherapies Work Best? • Evidence-based practice: Scientifically supported therapy endorsed by the APA • Hope for demoralized people • A new perspective • An empathetic, trusting, caring relationship Who Should Seek Psychotherapy? • Feelings of hopelessness • Deep and lasting depression • Self-destructive behavior, such as substance abuse • Disruptive fears • Sudden mood shifts • Thoughts of suicide • Compulsive rituals • Hearing voices Biomedical Therapies Psychopharmacology • Antipsychotic drugs • Calm hallucinations, dampen responsiveness to hallucinations • Schizophrenia • Antianxiety drugs • Depress central nervous system • Anxiety • Antidepressant drugs • Increase availability of neurotransmitters (for norepinephrine and serotonin) • Depression, Anxiety, ONCD, PTSD Electroconvulsive Therapy • Manipulates brain waves through electrical shock Psychosurgery • Surgery that removes or destroys brain tissue • Lobotomy: cutting the nerves connection the frontal lobes with emotion-controlling centers of the inner brain