TITLES AND ABSTRACTS
Working in forensic services in a person-centered way
Gillian Proctor Abstract In this article, I describe how I attempted to work in a person-centered way in a forensic setting as a Clinical Psychologist in the UK. For five years, I worked within a National Health Service mental health trust in the forensic services section. The three main clinical activities in my job were: clinical assessment, risk assessment and therapy. My greatest challenge was managing the ethical compromises I had to make, with little support, in order to try and help my clients within a fundamentally disempowering system. In this paper I reflect on these compromises and how far it is possible to work from a person-centered theoretical and ethical framework within a forensic system. The Integration of Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapy into the Three-Phase-Model for the Treatment of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Peter Schwarwächter
Abstract Focusing is a suitable method for the treatment of adults suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Most theorists regard the general three-phase-model for the treatment of PTSD, proposed by Janet and Herman, amongst others, as a general standard model. In the literature, no description of the integration of focusing-oriented psychotherapy within the three-phase-model for the treatment of PTSD can be found. This article is meant to fill the gap. It starts by describing PTSD and is followed by a description of the three-phase-model. A definition of focusing follows and its six phases are then presented. A description of the specific six-phase-model of focusing within the general three-phase-model for the treatment of PTSD is offered and is illustrated by case transcriptions. The article ends with a brief discussion. The Inter-Experiential Field: Perceptions and metaperceptions in Person-Centered and Experiential PsychotherapyMick Cooper
Abstract How can we understand the complex nexus of interpersonal relationships from a phenomenological, experiential standpoint? Drawing on theory and research from R. D. Laing’s interpersonal phenomenology, social psychology, and Interpersonal Psychotherapy, this paper examines the disjunctions that may arise in people’s perceptions of each other, and the highly destructive consequences that such disjunctions can have. It explores the questions of how people perceive, and misperceive, other people’s experiences; how people perceive, and misperceive, others’ perceptions of their experiences (‘metaperceptions’); and the implications that such an analysis has for the practice of person-centered and experiential psychotherapy and counseling. Process-Differentiation by Space Differentiation in Experiential Psychotherapy Frans Depestele
Abstract Upon coming into therapy the client first creates with the therapist a relationship space, within which then the reflection space develops. Reflecting on a felt sense occurs in the focusing space, and explicating it in the symbolization space. When new ideas pop up after the session, experiencing symbolizes itself in the self-symbolization space. The spaces imply each other, and can be organized in a scheme. We can differentiate distinct manners of problematic being, e.g. by the way the client enters each consecutive space. The client's manners of being are differentiated not so much on the macro-level (e.g. depressive or obsessional functioning) but on the micro-level, e.g. by self-criticism and rationalizing which interrupt to the person’s experiencing. In doing so we also can refine the necessary therapist responses; for example, how the therapist can respond to the rationalizing client so that this opens a way to the client’s experiential level. Carl Rogers and Eugene Gendlin on the Bodily Felt Sense: What they share and where they differ Akira IkemiAbstract Client-Centered Therapy developed by Carl Rogers and Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapy developed by Eugene Gendlin share much, and yet they differ in many ways. This paper discusses the bodily felt sense as a significant phenomenon in both Rogers’ and Gendlin’s theories. Through an examination of their theories, the author suggests that it may have been Rogers who first made rudimentary observations of bodily felt senses, or sensory and visceral experiences, and their significance in therapy. Rogers also made some observations regarding the experiential process, before Eugene Gendlin, although Rogers made no explicit attempt to facilitate that process. Different theoretical paradigms used by Rogers and Gendlin to understand the bodily felt sense are discussed. Moreover, the paper suggests that later, Rogers seems to have assimilated parts of Gendlin’s experiential theory, signifying a general understanding between them, that is, the experiential process happens in a certain manner of relationship characterized by empathy and acceptance. |