Contemporary Counseling Models

Behavior Therapy

Cognitive Behavioral Approach Key figures: B. F. Skinner, and Albert Bandura. 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. The mindfulness and acceptance-based approaches are rapidly gaining popularity. *paying increased attention to cognitive factors as an important determinant of behavior

Person-centered Therapy

Experimental and Relationship-Oriented Therapies Founder: Carl Rogers Key figure: Natalie Rogers. This approach was developed during the 1940s as a nondirective 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. *basic attitudes of the therapist; assumed that clients have the capacity for self-direction without active intervention and direction on the therapist's part

Choice Theory/Reality Therapy

Experimental and Relationship-Oriented Therapies Founder: William Glasser Key figure: Robert Wubbolding. This short-term approach is 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.

Cognitive Behavior Therapy

Experimental and Relationship-Oriented Therapies Founders: Albert Ellis and A. T. Beck Albert Ellis founded rational emotive behavior therapy, a highly didactic, cognitive, action-oriented model of therapy. A. T. Beck founded cognitive therapy, which gives a primary role to thinking as it influences behavior. Judith Beck continues to develop CBT; Christine Padesky has developed strengths-based CBT; and Donald Meichenbaum, who helped develop cognitive behavior therapy, has made significant contributions to resilience as a factor in coping with trauma. *learning how to challenge inaccurate beliefs and automatic thoughts that lead to behavioral problems; help people modify their inaccurate and self-defeating assumptions and to develop new patterns of acting

Gestalt Therapy

Experimental and Relationship-Oriented Therapies Founders: Fritz and Laura Perls. Key figures: Miriam and Erving Polster. An experiential therapy stressing awareness and integration; it grew as a reaction against analytic therapy. It integrates the functioning of body and mind and places emphasis on the therapeutic relationship. *help clients gain awareness of what they are experiencing in the present; emotion as a route to bringing about change, and kn a sense, they can be considered emotion-focused therapies

Existential Therapy

Experimental and Relationship-Oriented Therapies Key figures: Viktor Frankl, Rollo May, and Irvin Yalom. Reacting against the tendency to view therapy as a system of well-defined techniques, this model stresses building therapy on the basic conditions of human existence, such as choice, the freedom and responsibility to shape one's life, and self-determination. It focuses on the quality of the person-to-person therapeutic relationship. *what it means to be fully human; freedom and responsibility, anxiety, guilt, awareness of being finite, creating meaning in the world, and shaping one's future by making active choices

Adlerian Therapy

Psychodynamic Approach Founder: Alfred Adler Made Popular: Rudolf Dreikurs This 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 current therapies. *meanings, goals, purposeful behavior, conscious action, belonging, and social interest

Psychoanalytic Theory

Psychodynamic Approach Founder: Sigmund Freud A theory of personality development, a philosophy of human nature, and a method of psychotherapy that focuses on the unconscious factors that motivate behavior. Attention is given to the events of the first six years of life as determinants of the later development of personality. *insight, unconscious motivation, and reconstruction of the personality

Feminist Therapy

Systems and Postmodern Approach Founders: Jean Baker Miller, Carolyn Zerbe Enns, Oliva Espin, and Laura Brown. A central concept is the concern for the psychological oppression of women. Focusing on the constraints imposed by the sociopolitical status to which women have been relegated, this approach explores women's identity development, self-concept, goals and aspirations, and emotional well-being.

Family Systems Therapy

Systems and Postmodern Approach Founders: Murray Bowen and Virginia Satir. This systemic approach is based on the assumption that the key to changing the individual is understanding and working with the family.

Postmodern Approaches

Systems and Postmodern Approach Founders: Steve de Shazer and Insoo Kim Berg of solution-focused brief therapy. Key figures: Michael White and David Epston of narrative therapy. Social constructionism, solution-focused brief therapy, and narrative therapy all assume that there is no single truth; rather, it is believed that reality is socially constructed through human interaction. These approaches maintain that the client is an expert in his or her own life. *social constructionism, solution-focused brief therapy, and narrative therapy; no single truth and that reality is socially constructed through human interaction