Message in a Bottle

Abstract

This qualitative study explores the meanings of taking antidepressant medications as well as their impact above and beyond their psychopharmacological action. The data were collected from face-to-face, audiotaped interviews with eleven people who took antidepressant medication and were engaged in psychotherapy with a non-physician therapist. My analysis yielded themes that clustered around five categories: (a) stigma and antistigma, (b) dependency, (c) biology and depression, (d) choice, control, power, and social systems, and (e) antidepressants and psychotherapy. Implications for practice and training are discussed.     

Paternal domination: Its influence on child guidance results 1

Acknowledging the limitations of adhering to one particular theoretical orientation in helping clients with multiple issues, psychotherapy integration in treatment becomes a prominent trend in clinical practice. However, we have few guidelines for an integrated case formulation. Also, there have been some concerns that available treatment options limit and even pre-determine how clinicians understand and formulate cases. In order to address these concerns, this article first critically reviews the psychotherapy integration movement and highlights social work contributions to this movement. Next, using a clinical case example, we illustrate an integrated case formulation in clinical social work practice, which comprehensively assesses a client-in-context from psychodynamic, behavioral, and cognitive approaches. We also delineate how social workers can directly link this integrated assessment to selecting the integrated treatment options to custom-fit with the idiosyncratic needs of the client. This formulation is then truly client-centered. Thus, formulating a case is developing a theory of a client.     

Interpreting the Countertransference Erection

Abstract

This essay examines the interrelationship between internal experience of therapists and that of their clients in the conduct of psychotherapy. The position taken is that of relational theory, and clinical case material is used to illustrate the discussion.     

The Third Time Was the Charm

Abstract

A therapist's three experiences as a recipient of psychotherapy have led her to appreciate the ways in which one therapy informs another. She examines what may be learned from a less than successful therapy. She reflects on several lessons she has learned from her own therapieslessons that have shaped her as a clinician. In particular, she notes that when the therapist and patient are remarkably similar in their values and strengths, the therapist needs to take great care that key issues are not glossed over or mishandled.     

Psychotherapy with Alcoholic Patients

Abstract

This paper demonstrates how use of the empathic mode in outpatient psychotherapy helped an alcoholic patient reduce his denial of the severity of his illness. Both the general psychoanalytic literature and, in particular, the self psychology literature concerning treatment of alcoholics is reviewed and evaluated. This paper also examines in depth how the empathic mode functions to promote selfobject transferences, which facilitate internalization processes that may lead to a reduction in the alcoholic patient's need to rigidly maintain his denial of the illness. The complexity of the relationship between alcoholism self-help groups and the professional psychotherapy community is also explored.     

Abstracts of theses: Smith college School for social work 1945

Abstract

This paper examines various psychoanalytic conceptions of trauma, including ideas associated with classical psychoanalytic theory, object‐relations theory, self‐psychology and continuous construction theory. Clinical issues germane to the psychotherapy of children are then discussed and a clinical vignette presented. The vignette focuses upon the psychotherapy of a 10‐year‐old boy, with particular attention given to the narrative discourse that evolved in the course of the boy's therapy. The evolution of the child's narrative is illustrated through the use of transcribed material derived from different phases of the boy's treatment.     

Resistance and anxiety as factors in the discontinuance of child guidance treatment 1

In this article, the authors provide background on evidence-based practice and then summarize the evidence base for short-term and long-term psychodynamic psychotherapies. The research included conforms to the hierarchy of evidence promoted by the evidence-based practice movement. Experimental research on psychodynamic psychotherapy reveals these therapies have generally moderate to large effect sizes for depressive disorders, anxiety disorders, personality disorders, eating disorders, somatic disorders, some substance abuse disorders, and some mixed disorders. There is a clear evidence base supporting psychodynamic psychotherapy as effective in treating several mental health disorders. Additional outcome research on psychodynamic psychotherapies, using varied outcome measures, should be funded and completed.     

The Psychotherapeutic Dimensions of Clinical Case Management with a Combat Veteran

This article addresses the overlapping dimensions of clinical case management and psychotherapy. The theoretical framework that is used as the basis of analysis is drawn from the work of D. W. and Clare Winnicott. Kanter has more than adequately demonstrated that these two authors were extremely knowledgeable about clinical case management and psychotherapy. The conclusion of the paper agrees with D. W. Winnicott (1961 Winnicott, D. W. 1961. “Varieties of psychotherapy.”. In Home is where we start from: Essays by a psychoanalyst, Edited by: Winnicott, C, Shepherd, R and Davis, M. 101–111. New York: Norton.  [Google Scholar]) who defined clinical case management as a variety of psychotherapy. The shared psychotherapeutic dimensions of clinical case management are identified as a focus on human development, the importance of the facilitating/holding environment and issues related to transference and countertransference.     

Commentary on the paper by Ino and Glicken, “treating Asian American clients in crisis: A collectivist approach.”

Abstract

This was written in response to the article by Ino and Glicken titled “Treating Asian American Clients in Crisis: A Collectivist Approach.” Their paper presented six cases using the concept of a Collective Self in treating these clients in crisis situations. This commentary will elaborate on some of the significant differences between the Eastern cultures that have given rise to a Collective Self and the more individuated sense of Self that emerged in the West. Likewise, briefly discussed are the differing nature of the transference, countertransference, confidentiality and nature of the problem/solution.     

Embodied viewing and Degas’s Little Dancer Aged Fourteen: a multi-disciplinary experiment in eye-tracking and motion capture

ABSTRACT

This paper presents a cross-disciplinary project based on an experiment in eye-tracking and motion capture (Sainsbury’s Centre for Visual Arts), which aimed to study viewers’ movements around an iconic sculpture: Edgar Degas’s Little Dancer Aged Fourteen. The experiment studies how viewers respond to this three-dimensional artwork not only by looking at it but also through their own bodily reactions to it, such as by unconsciously mimicking a represented attitude or gesture. We compared two groups of viewers: classically trained dancers and non-dancers. Our hypothesis was that the skills and embodied experiences of the dancers would alter the ways in which they engage bodily with the work compared to the non-dancers. Our underlying research question was: how are vision and the body interlinked in esthetic and kinesthetic experience? This paper does not give results, which are forthcoming. It focuses on methodology and provides a commentary on the design and development of the interdisciplinary collaboration behind the project. It explores an interdisciplinary collaboration that bridges the humanities and experimental sciences and asks how being confronted with unfamiliar methodologies forces researchers in a given field to critically self-examine the limits and presuppositions of their practices.     

Wearing Two Hats: Clinical and Ethical Implications of Combining Individual and Group Treatment

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this qualitative case discussion is to reflect on the practice of combined therapy where the group worker and the individual clinician are the same person. The authors find that in the complexity of today's practice environment this phenomenon may not be simply a matter of clinician, or even client choice, but may exist as a required component of program service offerings. Often, an ad hoc or haphazard approach to the combined treatment modality can submerge the worker into clinical and ethical quagmires potentially damaging to client and the group. This article examines how the judicious use of combined individual and group approaches can offer a viable model of intervention across varied theoretical domains and practice settings. Vignettes and practice examples are used to illustrate the discussion.     

Court processes and orders for positive outcomes

ABSTRACT

This commentary is an excerpt of the presentation made by the author at SSR-NAI conference on Innovative Approaches in the Rehabilitation of Offenders. The commentary sets out the key differences between traditional court processes and orders, and those that are aimed at rehabilitation and problem-solving. It describes two initiatives that the Courts in Singapore have implemented over the past few years to help spur, steer and support change in offenders: post-sentencing judicial monitoring and our pre-sentencing protocol for selected offenders and offences.     

Factors affecting the constancy of the intelligence quotients of problem children 1

Abstract

This theoretical study is based on the premise that the dynamics of metaphor, the joining of two disparate entities in a single relational field to produce a new concept, represent a prototype of change. Literature is reviewed as it applies to certain relationships between metaphor and psychotherapy. As both metaphor and psychotherapy are rooted in language, language is viewed both as it informs the self and as it is used as a tool of psychotherapy. Psychoanalytic theory of language development is presented as are theories of how language, specifically metaphor, might be integrated and influence the change process.     

Surprise,surprise: the New Zealand general election of 2017

ABSTRACT

This article analyses the 2017 general election in New Zealand and draws out some of its implications. The final outcome was a surprise, and its implications momentous. Events strengthened Labour under a new leader and weakened the Green and New Zealand First parties, making it possible for Labour to become a viable coalition formateur. Comparing campaign public polling results, at least some of the polls were ‘wrong’, but all added to the excitement and uncertainty. Coupled with a new Labour Party leader, that uncertainty and excitement had mobilising effects that affected the young, but not the old. Finally, this article analyses the changes to the party system, nation-wide, and in the Māori electorates, assessing the degree of two-party dominance, and draws out implications for debates about the threshold for representation.     

The disaster relief and social work after the Wenchuan earthquake in Mainland China

ABSTRACT

This paper mainly focuses on the development of disaster social work in Mainland China and the intervention of social work in disaster relief. Before the Wenchuan earthquake and in the initial stage of post-earthquake, disaster social work was mainly based on individual psychotherapy; from the earthquake to the year of 2012 in which post-earthquake recovery and reconstruction was completed, the disaster relief began to emphasise community building and integration, while the basic framework for disaster social work was also established. Social workers begin to explore the new mode of developmental and localised disaster social work. By combining with the practical experiences from disaster social work, this paper tries to highlight the dilemmas confronting disaster relief in Mainland China and put forward some corresponding countermeasures and suggestions, which could improve the future disaster relief system in Mainland China.     

Disappointment without prior expectation: a unifying perspective on decision under risk

The central idea of Disappointment theory is that an individual forms an expectation about a risky alternative, and may experience disappointment if the outcome eventually obtained falls short of the expectation. We abandon the hypothesis of a well-defined prior expectation: disappointment feelings may arise from comparing the outcome received with anyof the gamble’s outcomes that the individual failed to get. This leads to a new, general form of Disappointment model. It encompasses Rank Dependent Utility with an explicit one-parameter probability transformation, and Risk-Value models with a generic risk measure including Variance, providing a unifying behavioral foundation for these models. JEL Classification D80 . D81     

The Process of Change in Complicated Grief Group Therapy for Bereaved Dementia Caregivers: An Evaluation Using the Meaning of Loss Codebook

ABSTRACT

Caring for a person with dementia has adverse health and mental health effects that, for 9–25% of caregivers, persist as complicated grief (CG). For bereaved dementia caregivers unable to satisfactorily grieve, specialized Complicated Grief Group Therapy (CGGT) can restore healthy grief. We investigated therapeutic change in CGGT participants, using an adapted version of the Gillies’ Meaning of Loss Codebook. Participants demonstrated positive gains in 16 thematic areas, notably in moving on with life, summoning pleasant memories, and ascribing bad memories to disease rather than decedent. Meaning transitioned from negative to positive interpretations of the death over the course of treatment.     

Engaging the public in policy development: The national bioethics advisory commission report on research involving persons with mental disorders that may affect decisionmaking capacity

U.S. bioethics commissions have used a variety of methods to involve the public. All share a common requirement: as federal advisory committees they are required to comply with the Federal Advisory Committee Act, the federal law established during the Nixon administration which provides the public with an assurance that groups established by the government to advise the government should be publicly accountable. This paper will describe some of the ways the National Bioethics Advisory Commission (NBAC) sought to involve the public in its report on Research Involving Persons with Mental Disorders that May Affect Decisionmaking Capacity.     

Angry girls: Behavior control by girls in latency 1

Abstract

Diagnostic, etiological, and treatment factors which contribute to the understanding of borderline personality disorder are examined from an empirical perspective. Studies of the disorder over the last decade show that there is considerable confusion as to the salient diagnostic and etiological factors which are relevant for predicting treatment type, duration, and outcome. This paper presents a review of studies which have addressed the multiple diagnostic features and early life developmental experiences of the disorder. In addition, three models of treatment currently being investigated for their effects with borderline patients are summarized. Specific emphasis is placed on the clinical implications of the research findings.