Counseling & Psychotherapy

Ego Defense Mechanism - Reaction Formation

Actively expressing the opposite impulse when confronted with a threatening impulse. This occurs by developing conscious attitudes and behaviors that are diametrically opposed to disturbing desires, people do not have to face the anxiety that would result if they were to recognize these dimensions of themselves. Individuals may conceal hate with a facade of love, be extremely nice when they harbor negative reactions, or mask cruelty with excessive kindness.

What is Adlerian Therapy? Who are the key figures? Does it differ from psychoanalytic therapy?

Adlerian Therapy is a growth model that stresses assuming responsibility, creating one's own destiny, and finding meaning and goals to create a purposeful life. Key concepts are used in most other therapies. Adlerian therapy differs from psychoanalytic therapy in many respects, but it can broadly be considered an analytic perspective.

What is Family Systems Therapy? Who are the key figures?

Alfred Adler, Murray Bowen, Virginia Satir, Carl Whitaker, Salvador Minuchin, Jay Haley, and Cloe Madanes are all significant figures. This approach stresses the need that in order to change the individual, working with and understanding the family is needed.

What does the unconscious store?

All experiences, memories, and repressed material. Needs and motivations that are inaccessible or out of awareness.

Unconscious processes are at the root of what? What does this mean for "curing" a patient? Is intellectual insight alone enough to resolve a problem?

All forms of neurotic symptoms and behaviors. A cure is based on the uncovering of symptoms, causes of behavior, and the repressed materials that interfere with healthy functioning. Intellectual insight is not enough to resolve issue. Client's need to cling to old patterns must be confronted by working through transference distortions.

What does Freud include in his concept of the life instincts?

All pleasurable acts. He sees the goal of much of life as gaining pleasure and avoiding pain. He also postulates death instincts, which account for the aggressive drive. At times people manifest through their behavior an unconscious wish to die or to hurt themselves or others. Managing this aggressive drive is a major challenge to the human race. In Freud's eyes, both sexual and aggressive drives are powerful determinants of why people act as they do.

Ego Defense Mechanism - Projection

Attributing to others ones own unacceptable desires and impulses. This is a mechanism of self-deception. Lustful, aggressive, or other impulses are seen as being possessed by those people out there, but not by me.

Why is psychoanalytic theory listed first in Corey's book?

Because it has had a profound influence on all the other formal systems of psychotherapy. Some models are basically extensions of it. Others, are extensions of it. Some emerged as a reaction against it.

What is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy? What is rational emotive therapy? Who are the key figures of each?

CBT examines the role of thinking as it relates to influencing behavior. Teaches patients to identify automatic thoughts, challenge them, and modify dysfunctional beliefs that lead to behavioral problems. Key figure is A.T. Beck. Rational emotive behavior therapy is a highly didactic, cognitive, and action-oriented model of therapy that stresses the role of thinking and belief systems as the root of personal problems. Key figure and founder is Albert Ellis.

Ego Defense Mechanism - Denial

Closing ones eyes to the existence of a threatening aspect of reality. Denial of reality is perhaps the simplest of all self-defense mechanisms. It is a way of distorting what the individual thinks, feels, or perceives in a dramatic situation. This mechanism is similar to repression, yet it generally operates at preconscious and conscious levels.

Ego Defense Mechanism - Displacement

Directing energy toward another object or person when the original object or person is inaccessible. Displacement is a way of coping with anxiety that involves discharging impulses by shifting from a threatening object to a safer target. For example, the meek man who feels intimated by his boss comes home and unloads inappropriate hostility onto his children.

Ego Defense Mechanism - Sublimation

Diverting sexual or aggressive energy into other channels. Energy is usually diverted into socially acceptable and sometimes even admirable channels. For example, aggressive impulses can be channeled into athletic activities, so that the person finds a way of expressing aggressive feelings and, as an added bonus, is often praised.

When the ego cannot control anxiety by rational and direct methods, it relies on indirect ones. What are these called?

Ego-defense mechanisms.

What is Feminist Therapy? Key figures?

Feminist therapy grew out of efforts of many women. A few who are Jean Baker Miller, Carolyn Zerbe Enns, Olivia Espin, and Laura Brown. A central concept is the concern for the psychological oppression of women. Focuses on the constraints imposed by the sociopolitical status to which women have been relegated. This approach explores a woman's identity development, self-concept, goals and aspirations, and emotional well-being.

What is the Freudian view of human nature?

Freudian view of human nature is more or less deterministic. Freud believed that our behavior is determined by irrational forces, unconscious motivations, and biological & instinctual drives as these evolve through key psychosexual stages in the first 6 years of life.

What is Gestalt therapy and who are its key figures?

Gestalt therapy is an experiential therapy that stresses awareness & integration. It grew as a reaction against analytic therapy. Focuses on integrating the functioning of body and mind. Also focuses on the here and now. Gestalt therapists tend to take an active role in client-practitioner relationship (as opposed to person-centered therapist).

Ego Defense Mechanism - Regression

Going back to an earlier phase of development when there were fewer demands. In the face of severe stress or extreme challenge, individuals may attempt to cope with their anxiety by clinging to immature and inappropriate behaviors. For example, children who are frightened in school may indulge in infantile behavior such as weeping excessive dependence, thumb sucking, hiding, or clinging to the teacher.

Ego Defense Mechanism - Identification

Identifying with successful causes, organizations, or people in the hope that you will be perceived as worthwhile. Identification can enhance self-worth and protect one from a sense of being a failure. That is part of the developmental process by which children learn gender role behaviors, but it can also be a defensive reaction when used by people who feel basically inferior.

Psychoanalytic therapy is largely based on?

Insight, unconscious motivation, and longer term reconstruction of the personality.

What is central to Freudian approach (aside from the unconscious)? Describe "sexual energy."

Instincts. Freud initially used the term libido to refer to sexual energy, but later broadened it to include the energy of all the life instincts. These instincts serve the purpose of the survival of the individual and the human race; they are oriented toward growth, development, and creativity. Libido then, should be understood as a source of motivation that encompasses sexual energy but goes beyond it.

Ego Defense Mechanism - Repression

Involves threatening or painful thoughts and feelings being excluded from awareness. One of the most important Freudian processes, it is the basis of may other ego defenses and neurotic disorders. Freud though of repression as an involuntary removal of something from consciousness. It is assumed that most of the painful events of the first 5 or 6 years of life are buried, yet these events influence later behavior.

Neurotic Anxiety

Is the fear that the instincts will get out of hand and cause one to do something for which one will be punished.

Under the psychoanalytic approach, anxiety is considered what?

It is essential. Anxiety is a feeling of dread that results from repressed feelings, memories, desires, and experience that emerge to the surface of awareness. It is a state of tensions that motivates us to do something, and it develops out of a conflict among the id, ego, and superego over control of the available psychic energy. Main function of anxiety is to warn against impending danger and prevent fright.

Ego Defense Mechanism - Rationalization

Manufacturing "good" reasons to explain awn a bruised ego. Rationalization helps justify specific behaviors, and it aid in softening the blow connected with disappointments. When people do not get positions they have applied for in their work, they think of logical reasons they did not succeed, and they sometimes attempt to convince themselves that they really did not want the position anyway.

Ego Defense Mechanism - Compensation

Masking perceived weaknesses or developing certain positive traits to make up for limitations. This mechanism can have direct adjustive value, an it can also be an attempt by the person to say " Don't see the ways in which I am inferior, but see me in my accomplishments."

Moral Anxiety

Moral anxiety is the fear of ones own conscience. People with a well developed conscience tend to feel guilty when they do something contrary to there moral code.

Most psychological functioning exists where? Therefore, psychoanalytic theory postulates what?

Out of awareness. Thus, the aim of psychoanalysis is to make the unconscious motive conscious - for only then can an individual exercise choice. Understanding the role of the unconscious is central to grasping the essence of the psychoanalytic model of behavior.

What is Person-centered therapy and who are its key figures?

Person-centered therapy was founded by Carl Rogers. Key figure is also Natalie Rogers. This approach was developed in the 1940's as a non-directive reaction against psychoanalysis. Based on a subjective view of human experiencing, it places faith in and gives responsibility to the client in dealing with problems and concerns. Person-centered therapy places an emphasis on the basic attitudes of the therapist. It maintains that the quality of the client-therapist relationship is the primary determinant of the outcomes of the therapeutic process. Philosophically, this approach assumes that client's have the capacity for self-direction w/o active intervention & direction from the therapist..

Freud's psychoanalytic system is a model of what?

Personality development and approach to psychotherapy.

What are post-modern approaches to therapy? Key figures?

Post modern approaches to therapy challenge the basic assumptions of most of the traditional approaches by centering on the idea that their is no uniform/single truth and that reality is socially constructed through human interaction. There are a number of key figures, but Steve de Shazer and Insoo Kim Berg are the founders of solution-focused therapy. Michael White and Dave Epston are the major figures associated with narrative therapy. Solution-focused, narrative therapy, and social constructionism all maintain that the client is an expert in his or her own life.

What is reality therapy? Who are the key figures?

Reality therapy was founded by William Glasser and another key figure is Robert Wubbolding. This approach is a short-term approach based on choice theory and focuses on the client assuming responsibility in the present. Through the therapeutic process, the client is able to learn more effective ways of meeting her or his needs.

Who is the key figure of psychoanalytic therapy? Describe Psychoanalytic Therapy

Sigmund Freud. Psychoanalytic theory is a theory of personality development, philosophy of human nature, and a method of psychotherapy that focuses on unconscious factors that motivate behavior. Attention is given to the events of the first 6 years of life as determinants of the later development of personality.

Ego Defense Mechanism - Introjection

Taking in and swelling the values and standards of other. Positive forms of introjection include corporation of parental values or the attributes and values of the therapist (assuming that these are not merely uncritically accepted). One negative example is that in concentration camps some of the prisoners dealt with overwhelming anxiety by accepting the values of the enemy through identification with the aggressor.

Describe the role or function of the ID?

The ID is the original system of personality; at birth a person is all ID. The ID is the primary source of psychic energy and the seat of the instincts. It lacks organization and is blind, demanding, and insistent. The ID cannot tolerate tension, and it functions to discharge tension immediately. Ruled by the pleasure principle (which aims to reduce tension, avoid pain, and gain pleasure) - the ID is illogical, amoral, and driven to satisfy instinctual needs. It never matures, and it does not think but only wishes or acts. The ID is largely unconscious/out of awareness.

Describe the role or function of the Superego? Talk about what it includes and what its main concern is. What does it strive for?

The Superego is the judicious branch of personality that includes a person's moral code - with the main concern being whether an action is good, bad, right, or wrong. It represents the ideal rather than the real and strives not for pleasure but for perfection. It represents the traditional values and ideals of society as they are handed down from parents to children. It functions to inhibit the id impulses, to persuade the ego to substitute moralistic goals for realistic ones, and to strive for perfection. The superego, as the internalization of the standards of parents and society, is related to psychological rewards and punishments. The rewards are feelings of pride + self-love, and the punishments are are feelings of guilt and inferiority.

Describe the role or function of the Ego?

The ego has contact with the external world/reality. It governs, controls, and regulates the personality by mediating between the instincts and environment. It controls consciousness and exercises censorship. Ruled by the reality principle, the ego is involved in realistic and logical thinking. Thereby, it formulates plans of actions for satisfying needs. The Ego, as the seat of rationality & intelligence, checks and controls the blind impulses of the ID. Whereas the ID only knows subjective reality, the Ego distinguishes between mental images and things in the external world.

What is the existential approach to therapy? Who are the key figures?

The existential approach to therapy reacts against the tendency to view therapy as a system of well-defined techniques. Instead, this system stresses building therapy on the basic conditions of human existence such as; choice, the freedom & responsibility to shape one's life, and self-determination. It focuses on the quality of the person to person therapeutic relationship. The key figures of Existential therapy are Viktor Frankl, Rollo May, and Irvin Yalom.

Reality Anxiety

The fear of danger from the external world; the level of such anxiety is proportionate to the degree of real threat.

The type of ego-defense mechanisms that are employed depend on what?

The individual's love of development and degree of anxiety. They have two characteristics in common. (1) They either deny or distort reality. (2) They operate on an unconscious level.

In terms of consciousness and the unconscious, what are keys to understanding behavior and problems of personality? Clinical evidence postulating the unconscious includes what?

The unconscious cannot be studied directly, but it is inferred from behavior. Clinical evidence postulating the unconscious includes dreams, which are symbolic representations of unconscious needs, wishes, and conflicts. Slips of the tongue and forgetting, for example, a familiar name. Posthypnotic suggestions. Material derived from free association. Material derived from projective techniques. Symbolic content of psychotic symptoms.

What kinds of anxiety are there?

There is reality anxiety, neurotic anxiety, and moral.

What three psychical systems comprise the structure of personality under the psychoanalytic view? From the orthodox Freudian perspective, what relation does "energy" have to these structures?

These include the ID (biological component), Ego (psychological component), and the Superego (social component). Freud maintained that humans are viewed as energy systems, and that the dynamics of personality consist of the ways in which psychic energy is distributed to each structure (ID, Ego, Superego). Because the energy is limited/capped, one system gains control over the available energy at the expense of the other two systems - giving rise to behavior.

What is the function of ego defense mechanisms?

They attempt to help cope with anxiety and prevent the ego from being overwhelmed. Rather than being pathological, ego defenses are normal behaviors that can have adaptive value provided they do not become a lifestyle that enables the individual to avoid facing reality.

What is Behavior Therapy? Who are the key figures?

This approach applies the principles of learning to the resolution of specific behavioral problems. Results are subject to continual experimentation. The methods of this approach are always in the process of refinement. Puts a premium on becoming behaviorally activated. Key figures include B.F. Skinnner, Arnold Lazarus, and Albert Bandura.

What are general questions or answers to seek that a therapist can ask himself about the client?

What themes in the client's life merit special attention in therapy? What concepts would be useful to you while working on the client's problems? What are the general goals of Stan's therapy? What possible techniques and methods would best meet these goals? What are some characteristics of the relationship between the client and myself? How might the therapist proceed? How might the therapist evaluate the process and treatment outcomes of therapy?