Gestalt

What is true about Gestalt techniques?

- "Exercises" are readymade techniques. - "Experiments" grow out of the interaction between therapist and client. - Clients need to be prepared for their involvement in Gestalt techniques. NOT that Experiments are always carried out during the therapy session, rather than outside it.

Which of the following aspects of a client's use of language would a Gestalt therapist focus on?

- "It" talk - "You" talk - Questions NOT Semantics

Which of the following is not one of the Gestalt group leader's roles?

- Designing experiments for group members - Engaging in self-disclosure - Facilitating contact in the group setting NOT Evoking group catharsis

What's true about Fritz Perls?

- He was the main originator and developer of Gestalt therapy. - He was influenced by psychoanalytic concepts. - He took issue with Freud's theory on a number of grounds. NOT that During his childhood, he was a model student.

What's true about the Gestalt view of the role of confrontation in therapy?

- It is important to confront clients with the ways they are avoiding being fully alive. - Confrontation does not have to be aimed at negative traits. - Confrontation should be a genuine expression of caring. NOT that It is not possible to be both confrontational and gentle with clients.

Who is considered a relational Gestalt therapist?

- Laura Perls - Miriam Polster - ErvingPolster NOT Fritz Perls

According to Gestalt theory, all of the following are true about contact

- contact is necessary for change and growth to occur. - one maintains a sense of individuality as a result of good contact. - contact is made by seeing, hearing, smelling, touching, and moving. NOT that withdrawal after a good contact experience indicates neurosis.

The five different kinds of contact boundary disturbances include

- introjection - projection - retroflection - deflection - confluence

Prerequisites for good contact involves

- zest - creativity. - imagination. NOT projection.

What are Miriam Polster's three stages in her integration sequence?

1. Discovery 2. Accommodation 3. Assimilation

When a client recognizes he or she has a choice describes which stage of Miriam Polster's three-stage integration sequence?

Accommodation

When a client learns how to influence his or her environment describes which stage of Miriam Polster's three stage integration sequence?

Assimilation

Because of his need to be liked, Jose makes careful efforts to get along with everyone and minimize interpersonal conflicts. Which boundary disturbance is Jose exhibiting?

Confluence

__________ grow out of the interaction between client and therapist and emerge within this dialogic process.

Experiments

According to Perls, awareness of and by itself is not sufficient to lead to change; clients must also put their experiences into some type of cognitive framework if change is to happen.

False

Genuine knowledge is the product of what the person understands of the situation of another.

False

Gestalt theory is best considered as a form of psychoanalytic therapy.

False

Gestalt therapy focuses on the cognitive aspects of therapy.

False

Gestalt therapy is designed for individual counseling, and it typically does not work well in groups.

False

Gestaltists typically ask why questions in the attempt to get clients to think about the source of their problems.

False

One of the contributions of Gestalt therapy is the vast empirical research that has been done to validate the specific techniques used.

False

Retroflection involves doing to others what we would like them to do to us.

False

Since Gestalt therapy focuses on the here-and-now, the past is neither explored nor given emphasis.

False

The Gestalt approach to dream work consists of the therapist interpreting the meaning of the symbols in the dream.

False

The Gestalt therapist typically uses diagnosis and interpretation as a basic part of the therapeutic process.

False

The goal of Gestalt therapy is to solve basic problems, to resolve one's polarities, and to help the individual to adjust to his or her environment.

False

Therapy is based upon the successful resolution of the transference relationship.

False

Making the rounds

Gestalt technique that involves asking one person in a group to speak to each of the other group members

When a person experiences an internal conflict (namely a conflict between top dog and underdog), which of the following techniques would be most appropriate?

The internal dialogue exercise

Future projection

This technique takes an anticipated event and brings it into the present moment to act out

A Gestalt therapist pays attention to ways the client uses language.

True

A current trend in Gestalt therapy is toward greater emphasis on the client/therapist relationship rather than on techniques.

True

Although Perls used a highly confrontational approach in dealing with client avoidance and resistance, the confrontational model is not representative of contemporary Gestalt therapy.

True

Blocked energy is a form of defensive behavior.

True

Both contact and withdrawal are necessary and important to healthy functioning.

True

Gestalt group therapists use experiments to encourage clients to move from talking about action to taking action.

True

Gestalt techniques can be considered experiments.

True

Gestalt therapies view a client's avoidance behavior as related to unfinished business.

True

Gestalt therapy is lively and promotes direct experiencing rather than the abstractness of talking about situations.

True

Gestalt therapy makes use of a wide variety of techniques that are designed to increase the client's awareness of his or her present experiencing.

True

In Gestalt terms, awareness refers to our connectedness to our external and internal worlds.

True

In Gestalt therapy, a client's resistance is welcomed and used to deepen their therapeutic work.

True

In the Gestaltist view, unfinished business is best explored in the present.

True

Most of the Gestalt techniques are designed to intensify one's experiencing.

True

Part of success in using Gestalt techniques is contingent upon preparing clients for these techniques.

True

People who rely on retroflection tend to inhibit themselves from taking action out of fear of embarrassment, guilt, and resentment.

True

Since Gestalt therapists believe that questions have a tendency to keep the questioner hidden, safe, and unknown, they often ask clients to change their questions into statements.

True

A critical difference between early Gestalt therapy and relational Gestalt therapy is the:

approach to confrontation.

Often Greta, who struggles to feel good about herself, comes to sessions with slouched posture. In order to help Greta gain a clearer understanding of the inner meaning of her slouched posture, a Gestalt therapist might:

ask Greta to exaggerate her poor posture, which is likely to intensify her feelings attached to it.

The basic goal of Gestalt therapy is:

attaining awareness and contact with the environment.

The paradoxical theory of behavior change suggests:

authentic change occurs more from being who we are than from trying to be who we are not.

Empirical support for Gestalt therapy is:

becoming stronger

Erving Polster believes that storytelling:

can be the heart of the therapeutic process.

Contemporary Gestalt therapists view client resistance as a:

creative adjustment to a situation and something to be respected.

One of the main contributions of the Gestalt approach is its:

emphasis on learning to appreciate and fully experience the present moment.

Gestalt therapy is a form of:

existential therapy.

It is essential that counselors establish a relationship with their clients, so that the clients will:

feel trusting enough to participate in the learning that can result from Gestalt experiments.

Confluence

involves blurring the differentiation between the self and the environment.

The empty chair technique:

is a vehicle for the technique of role reversal.

According to Gestalt theory, people use avoidance in order to:

keep from feeling uncomfortable emotions.

The Gestalt therapist:

pays attention to the client's nonverbal language.

Exercises

preplanned activities that can be used to elicit emotion, produce action, or achieve a specific goal.

A teenage girl is angry with her parents and cuts on her arm. In Gestalt terms, she is most likely engaging in:

retroflection

Mariah tells her therapist, a Gestaltist, that she dreamt she got married to a pit bull and felt uneasy about telling her parents that she married a dog. When her parents discovered their son-in-law was a pit bull, they disowned her and suddenly became dogs themselves. In response to this dream, Mariah's therapist:

should assist her client in reliving the dream as though it was happening in the now and have her become each part of the dream.

In Gestalt theory, the experiment is:

tailored to fit the client's unique needs and presented in an invitational manner.

A contribution of this therapeutic approach is:

the exciting way in which the past is dealt with in a lively manner by bringing relevant aspects into the present.

In Gestalt therapy, the relationship between client and counselor is seen as:

the heart of therapy.

Field theory asserts that:

the organism must be seen in its environment, or in its context, as part of the constantly changing field.

A Gestalt technique that is most useful when a person attempts to deny an aspect of his or her personality (such as tenderness) is:

the reversal exercise.

According to the Gestalt perspective, if people do not remember their dreams:

they may be refusing to face what is wrong with their lives.