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Objectives:

At the end of the session, the students are expected to:

1. Gain knowledge and insights on the major forms of psychotherapy;

2. Elucidate the ethical standards in the use psychotherapy;
3. Evaluate the strengths and limitations of each given therapy; and
4. Appreciate the significance of psychotherapy in the prevention and treatment of psychological

disorders.

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A. Definition of Psychotherapy
Psychotherapy is a form of therapy in which a
trained professional uses methods based on psychological
theories to help a person with psychological problems. The
term psychological methods can refer to almost any kind of
human interaction (such as talking) that is based on a
psychological theory of the problem, but it does not include
medical treatment methods such as medication.

B. Ethical Standards for Psychotherapy

Psychotherapy is considered to be ethical only under the
following circumstances:

1. The goals of treatment must be carefully considered with

the client. These goals should be in the best interest of the
client and society and they must be fully understood by the
client.
2. The choices for alternative treatment methods should be
carefully considered.
3. The therapist must only treat problems that she or he is
qualified to treat.
4. The effectiveness of treatment must be evaluated in some
way. The best way of doing this is to use meaningful
measures of the problem and progress in treating it.
5. The rules and laws regarding the confidentiality of all
information obtained about the client during treatment must
be fully explained to the client.
6. The therapist must not use the power of the intense
relationship with the client to exploit the client in sexual or
other ways.

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7. The therapist must treat human beings with dignity and

must understand and respect differences based on gender,
ethnicity, sexual orientation, and other sociocultural factors.

C. Types of Psychotherapy

1. Psychoanalysis

Psychoanalysis is the approach to psychotherapy

founded by Sigmund Freud. It is based on Freud’s belief
that the root of all psychological problems is unconscious
conflicts among the id, ego, and superego.

1.1. Techniques of Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy

 Free association – A tool used by Freud in which
the patient is encouraged to talk about whatever comes to
mind, allowing contents of the unconscious mind to slip
past the censorship of the ego.
 Dream interpretation – A method developed by
Freud in which the symbols of the manifest content of
dreams that are recalled by the patient are interpreted to
reveal their latent content.
 Interpretation of resistance – Any form of patient
opposition to the process of psychoanalysis.
 Interpretation of Transference - The phenomenon
in psychoanalysis in which the patient comes to feel and act
toward the therapist in ways that resemble how he or she
feels and acts toward other significant adults.
 Catharsis – The release of emotional energy related
to unconscious conflicts.

2. Interpersonal Psychotherapy for Depression

Interpersonal Psychotherapy is a form of

psychological therapy, based on the theories of neo-
Freudian Harry Stack Sullivan that focuses on the accurate
identification and communication of feelings and the
improvement of current social relationships. Interpersonal

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therapy was developed to treat depression. Interpersonal

therapists believe that there are four kinds of problems that
cause depression:

2.1 Grief over the loss of an important relationship through

the breakup of relationship, a divorce, or a death of a loved
one.
2.2 Conflicts with people who are significant to us.
2.3 Life events that are stressful or that create threats to our
self-esteem.
2.4 Lack of social skills for establishing healthy
interpersonal relationships.

Seven goals to treat depression:

1. Help the individual feel that the therapist

understands her or his feelings and considers them to be
important
2. Help the individual understand how his or her
feelings are related to what is going to his or her life
particularly to his or her current social relationships.
3. Help the individual learn to express his or her
feelings to other persons in constructive ways.
4. Identify relationships that are too unhealthy to fix,
end them appropriately, and move on to healthier
relationships with others.
5. Help the individual develop a sense of mastery of
the new roles that are created by life events such as dating
again after divorce or entering a new occupation.
6. Improve the individuals’ skills for creating healthy
new relationships and maintaining them.
7. Help the individual develop an optimistic focus on
current opportunities for change instead of on the past.

3. Humanistic Psychotherapy

The humanistic school of taught, like the

psychoanalytic school believes that the primarily goal of
therapy is to bring feelings of which the individual is
unaware into conscious awareness.

1. Client-centered Psychotherapy – Carl Rogers’

approach to humanistic psychotherapy in which the
therapists provide an atmosphere that encourages clients to
discover feelings of which they were unaware.

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4. Cognitive Behavior Therapy

In this therapy, the therapist helps the client unlearn

of usual ways of behaving by learning more adaptive ways
of behaving and changing maladaptive cognitions.

4.1 Cognitive Restructuring – a CBT method in

which faulty cognitions, maladaptive beliefs, expectations,
and ways of thinking are changed by pointing out there
irrationality.

 Selective Abstraction
 Overgeneralization
 Arbitrary Inference
 Magnification or minimization
 Personalization
 Absolutistic Thinking

5. Group and Family Therapy

Psychotherapy conducted in groups, typically of

four to eight clients at a time. Group therapy is cost-
effective and is believed to offer therapeutic experiences
that cannot be obtained in individual therapy (Clarke and
others, 2001; Piper and others, 2007; Yalom, 1995 in Lahey
2012).

Family therapy is an approach to psychotherapy that

emphasizes an understanding of the roles of each of the
members of the family system, usually conducted with all
members of the family present.

Reference:

Lahey, B. (2012). Psychology: An Introduction. 11 th Ed.

NY: Mc Graw Hill.

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