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The different branches of psychology entail different forms of treatment. Psychological treatments, also known as psychological therapies, are different types of therapies. A person works with a qualified therapist to understand and find solutions to their thinking, behaviour, and problems to improve their quality of life. What are the different types of treatment?
Different types of therapies can take various forms, some of which include:
Individual sessions
As a couple or with members of the person’s family
In a group of people who have the same difficulties.
Some of these therapies are brief and last only a short time, while others involve working with others over a longer period. The length of time a person is treated depends on the nature of the problem they face and the type of therapy proposed. We will now discuss the different types of treatments and some for specific mental illnesses.
A person undergoing therapy, www.freepik.com/vectors/therapy, therapy vector created by storyset
Picture of group therapy, www.freepik.com/vectors/counseling, counselling vector created by pch.vector
More and more talk therapies are available for the treatment of depression in the form of individual one-to-one sessions or group therapies. E-learning in the form of self-help applications is another option.
CBT is based on the premise that the way we think and act affects the way we feel; in essence, cognition and behaviour influence our emotions. CBT is one of the most effective methods for treating depression and has been shown to be successful in a number of populations, including children, adolescents, adults, and older adults.
In CBT, one works with a trained professional to understand the thinking patterns that contribute to unhealthy behaviours, increasing the likelihood that one will experience depressive symptoms or even making it more difficult for the person to get better if they do experience them.The focus is on changing one's thoughts and behaviours by encouraging them to think rationally about any situation that makes them feel different. Doing so helps change previously negative feelings into more realistic and positive ones.
IPT focuses on problems in personal relationships and the skills needed to overcome them. It relies on the idea that problems in relationships, whether with family, friends, or romantic partners, significantly impact depressive symptoms and contribute to them.Recognising the patterns in your relationships that make you more vulnerable to these symptoms can help you improve your current relationships, mend past relationships, and also find ways to build new relationships.
MBCT is usually conducted in groups and incorporates cognitive behavioural therapy and mindfulness techniques. Patients learn mindfulness techniques such as meditation that they can practise at home. They also learn to accept any thoughts within them and recognise that thoughts do not determine who they are.MBCT helps stop thoughts wandering into the past or the future. How can MBCT help with depressive symptoms? By encouraging one to notice feelings of sadness and negative thoughts early, one can deal with the warning signs sooner and more effectively.
Depending on the severity of symptoms, different types of treatment may be suggested for people diagnosed with schizophrenia. Most of these suggestions involve a combination of medications and talk therapies, some of which include:
In family therapy, family members are all in the same room, with everyone working together to communicate effectively and reduce daily stressors. Family therapy aims to educate family members about schizophrenia, improve communication between the patient and family members, and teach them more effective coping strategies.By actively participating in therapy, family members learn how to care for their ill relatives and learn techniques to ensure they can maintain their lives at the same time.
Family therapy takes place in three steps:
A therapist will identify strengths, weaknesses, and problematic behaviours through discussion and observation in the preliminary analysis.
Information transfer – the therapist educates the patient and family about the disease, including the causes, the influence of medications, the advantages and disadvantages of medication only, therapy only, or a combination of both. Essentially, this phase involves the therapist passing on all the important information before the therapeutic process begins.
Communication skills training – the family learns to listen, express their emotions, and discuss concerns empathetically. The therapist will offer solutions specific to the family's needs and concerns to help reduce anger and guilt and help anticipate problems.
Token economies do not treat schizophrenia but manage it. They rely on operant conditioning, which encourages desirable behaviours through selective reinforcement.
When someone makes an effort to dress (which they would not normally do), they are rewarded with a coloured token that they can exchange for secondary reinforcers such as candy, chocolate, etc.
Doing so helps with coping because it reinforces the desired behaviour and thus maintains it, rather than the opposite.
However, it is crucial to understand that just because desirable behaviour is rewarded, it does not mean undesirable behaviour is punished. This method reduces negative symptoms and helps patients and their caregivers see themselves in a more positive light. Their ability to perform the desired behaviour is noticed and encouraged.
In schizophrenia, patients learn to recognise examples of their delusional thinking, which helps them accept help to avoid acting on those thoughts. Again, this does not necessarily make the symptoms disappear, but it is an effective way to manage them.False beliefs and expectations form the basis of problems for people who have schizophrenia. These include general beliefs, self-image, beliefs about what others think, expectations about others' behaviour, and one's coping mechanisms. The assessment follows, in which the patient has to describe their delusions, think about their relationships, and say what they hope to get out of therapy.At this point, it is important to note the importance of forming a therapeutic alliance requires honesty, patience, and acceptance. The therapist must also accept the patient's delusions are real to them, and they must be willing to work with them to develop solutions and coping strategies.
Once this alliance forms, the therapist will provide the patient with ABCs:
Answering these questions leads to the normalisation stage. The therapist helps the patient understand it is normal to have negative thoughts and feelings in certain situations and that there is no reason to feel stress or shame with regard to these.
A logical discussion follows in which the person can identify where their thoughts are going wrong and why they arose in the first place. The therapist will first work on recognising negative thoughts when they arise and then encourage the person to challenge and reframe them. This is done by encouraging the person to find logical reasons for the problems that are troubling them, and then allowing them to develop an alternative to their previous abnormal behaviour through coping strategies.
As the name implies, this form of treatment teaches individuals to develop effective coping strategies for their particular symptoms and use them. These strategies reduce the frequency, intensity and duration of psychotic symptoms and alleviate the associated distress.
Two components to successfully achieving this exist:
Education and rapport training, where the therapist and the sufferer work together to improve the effectiveness of their own coping strategies and identify new strategies that may benefit the sufferer.
Symptom targeting – the therapist and the sufferer tackle one symptom at a time, allowing them to develop strategies specific to the symptoms experienced rather than generalised. The strategies are practised in the session, and help is offered if there are difficulties. Once this is accomplished, the individual is sent home with tasks to practise using that specific strategy. They have to record it – what they did and how it worked – so that the therapist can review it in the next session.
The most common psychological treatments offered for phobias are exposure therapy and CBT, which we will discuss below.
Exposure therapy begins with the patient making a list of their phobias. The therapist then teaches the patient general relaxation techniques to use when exposed to unimaginable stress, i.e., when they encounter a phobia. The phobias are then addressed starting from the top down with the phobia that causes the most stress.
Suppose a person has a fear of elevators. In that case, they might start by imagining being in an elevator, then looking at pictures of elevators, then going near an elevator, then standing in an elevator, and so on, until they can finally ride in a crowded elevator.
People with phobias tend to develop thought patterns around the phobia that are not necessarily based in reality. When confronted with the phobia, they tend to catastrophise, i.e., imagine the worst that can happen, which only reinforces the fear you are experiencing.
CBT helps patients identify their unhelpful thoughts and replace them with more accurate ones. There are several ways to do this:
When one encounters a phobia, they should remind themselves it is just a phobia.
They should recall that the episode will soon be over
It is the thoughts that reinforce the fear.
The patient should replace the thoughts with those developed in CBT sessions with the therapist.
Techniques such as meditation, deep breathing, and progressive muscle relaxation can help reduce the stress they feel in a particular situation. A therapist should introduce these techniques first, and then the patient should practice them for maximum relief. This practice can help when the patient is faced with a phobia when they may not be able to contact their therapist immediately.
Mindfulness techniques can help when face-to-face with a phobia, www.freepik.com/vectors/flat-illustration, flat illustration vector created by freepik
Psychological treatments include various forms of talk therapy where a patient works with a qualified therapist to understand their thinking and behaviour, understand their problems and find solutions to them to improve their quality of life.
Therapy can take three different forms: individual, couple/family and group.
The most common forms of therapy are: acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), cognitive analytic therapy (CAT), cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), dialectical behavioural therapy (DBT), family therapy, group therapy, and mindfulness.
CBT, interpersonal therapy (IPT), behavioural therapy, and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy treat depression.
Treatment for schizophrenia depends on how severe the symptoms are, but the common talk therapies suggested are family therapy, token economics, CBT, and coping strategy enhancement (CSE).
Phobias are treated with exposure therapy (the most common), CBT, and mindfulness training.
The common psychological treatments used are:
The purpose of psychological treatment is to understand the thinking, behaviour, and problems and come up with solutions, thereby improving your quality of life.
Psychological treatments are different forms of talking therapies wherein an individual works with a qualified therapist to learn techniques that would help them relieve any distressing symptoms experienced.
An example of psychological therapy is cognitive behavioural therapy, which aims to change negative thought patterns into more helpful ones.
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