Arguably all effective therapies share common factors which contribute to positive outcomes, but to date no single specific factor has been found to be causally related to recovery processes in psychotherapy (Cuijpers et al., 2019). This assignment urges you to consider factors common to all or at least related therapies, and therapy specific factors that might account for positive outcomes.
Cuijpers, P., Reijnders, M., & Huibers, M. J. H. (2019). The Role of Common Factors in Psychotherapy Outcomes.
Annual Review of Clinical Psychology, 15(1), 207-231. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-clinpsy-050718-095424
Learning Outcomes
• demonstrate a critical understanding of how common or nonspecific factors such as therapeutic rapport and alliance contribute to positive outcomes in mental health practice
• critically describe the underpinning assumptions, theory and practice of mindfulness and cognitive behaviour therapy.
• compare and contrast common therapeutic models, approaches and schools of psychotherapy
The Task
Consider a broad problem area which is treated with psychotherapy and consider two schools of psychotherapy / approaches to treat that problem (CBT, DBT, Schema Therapy, or ACT).
In a brief essay address the following:
• How each therapy formulates or explain the problem and how it accounts for the change process.
• Describe the specific techniques and processes employed in each approach. • Describe what the two approaches may have in common to address the problem.
• Consider what is unique to each approach, what is distinctive and consider whether it matters.
If choosing a different problem or combination than the following please be sure to first discuss this with your learning facilitator:. CBT and DBT for Borderline Personality Disorder; or Schema Therapy or CBT and ACT for Major Depression.