Transformations in Therapeutic Practice

In her training of therapists, Virginia Satir sought to change the way her trainees perceived themselves, their clients, and the therapeutic endeavor. The change she sought was a movement from hierarchical models of therapy where clients were diagnosed in terms of paradigms of how they ought to be to an organic model where the therapist attempts to understand the client by entering the client's internal context. Contemporary training in the Satir model attempts to bring about the same change. Research indicates that the trainers are succeeding.     

多元文化的心理咨询与治疗理论刍议

随着西方社会人口比例的改变,以及后现代文化思潮的冲击,西方传统心理咨询与治疗理论的局限性日益凸显。多元文化的咨询与治疗理论(MCT理论)就是在这种条件下产生的,它试图弥补传统咨询与治疗理论忽视文化因素的不足。MCT理论认为,应修正传统理论中的文化偏见,在咨询过程中增强文化敏感性。     

An exploratory study of the perceptions and experiences of further education amongst the young long‐term unemployed

The aim of this study was to explore, in depth, the perceptions and experiences of Further Education (FE) amongst the young long‐term unemployed. Semi‐structured interviews were conducted with 16 long‐term unemployed youths of 18–25 years of age divided into three groups: those with no experience of FE; those having recently dropped out of FE; and those currently studying in FE. Grounded theoretical analysis highlighted the importance of both responses to and institutional aspects of unemployment. The impact of unemployment, poor previous educational experience and perceived irrelevance of FE are key barriers to learning. Those that enter FE may drop out as a result of both material and psychosocial factors. Those that stay on commonly emphasize both social support and personal agency in decision‐making alongside positive evaluations of FE. In conclusion, limitations of the findings, policy and practical recommendations for successful widening of participation in FE amongst this group are considered. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Life-Review Technique in the Treatment of PTSD in Elderly Patients: Rationale and Three Single Case Studies

Persons exposed to traumatic events in childhood and adolescence may suffer from the symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) well into old age. The aim of this paper is to introduce a structured life-review technique for the treatment of elderly PTSD patients. This technique centers on the discussion and evaluation of each consecutive stage of life. The therapist encourages the patient to reminisce on both positive and negative experiences; positive coping experiences are reinforced. A single session on the traumatic event is integrated into the discussion of the stages of life, which are dealt with in chronological order. In the following, 3 case studies (e.g., survivors of the 1945 Dresden bombing) are presented. Psychometric measures (PTSS-10, IES-R) for the case studies are reported. Finally, the potential and limitations of the pilot study and the new approach are discussed.     

Effects of Organizational Level and Gender on Stress in the Workplace

Occupational stress adversely affects productivity, absenteeism, and job turnover, and contributes to health-related problems. The effects of organizational level and gender on the specific sources of occupational stress assessed by the Job Stress Survey (JSS) were evaluated for a heterogeneous sample of 1,791 working adults (860 males, 931 females) employed in 2 industrial companies and a large state university. Significant main or interactive effects of organizational level and/or gender were found for the JSS Item Index, Severity and/or Frequency scores of 29 of the 30 JSS items. Organizational level effects were both more numerous and larger in magnitude than gender effects. Employees at higher organizational levels reported that they experienced stress more often while making critical decisions and dealing with crisis situations than did workers at lower levels, for whom inadequate salary and lack of opportunity for advancement were more stressful. For males, work stress was more strongly related to concerns about their role in the power structure of an organization, whereas female employees reported experiencing more severe stress when there was a conflict between job requirements and family relationships.     

Tomorrow's consumer — the shifting balance of power

What are the prospects for consumerism? Often despised as self‐indulgent, consumers are frequently motivated by altruism and their needs to express their identity, to build relationships, to obtain fulfilment and even to find a substitute for religion. Mass‐customisation is producing fundamental change, revolutionising attitudes to choice, with a key role for agents (human and online) in helping people choose. Consumer power will grow and brands will be under pressure from rising consumer expectations. While retailers fight back with targeted marketing and special offers, brands will need to serve consumer needs as much as suppliers. Online shopping could transform consumer behaviour, driven by cost saving and convenience and spurred on by competition. Will retailers protect their traditional channels or go online because they are afraid not to? ‘Etailing’ will need to create consumer trust, so regulation will be critical, possibly leading to legal responsibilities for quality on Internet service providers (ISPs) and portals and with systems to help new entrants build a track record of reliability, thereby increasing competition, choice and consumer power. Copyright © 2002 Henry Stewart Publications.     

Individual differences in children's understanding of social evaluation concerns

Recent research suggests that children's understanding of self‐presentational behaviour—behaviour designed to shape social evaluation—is a function of both cognitive and motivational variables. Furthermore, the motivational factors involved are likely to reflect individual differences in the salience of concerns about social evaluation. The present research represents a first effort to determine whether measures of such differences are indeed associated with the understanding of self‐presentational behaviour. In a first experiment, a teacher rating measure of self‐monitoring was found to be positively associated with the understanding of self‐presentational motives. In a second experiment, a more narrowly specified self‐report measure of public self‐consciousness was found to have a similar association with the understanding of self‐presentation, with no such association found for private self‐consciousness. These preliminary results make it clear that our formulations of development in social cognition must indeed include a consideration of individual differences in motivational orientations. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Mediation in a sibling context: the relations of older siblings' mediating behaviour and younger siblings' task performance

We investigated the sibling relationship as a context for cognitive development. Forty preschoolers (ages 5–6) and their younger siblings (ages 2–3) were visited at home. Four games were presented to the older siblings and they were asked (a) to estimate how well their younger sibling will perform on each game and (b) to teach the younger sibling how to use the games. The older siblings' mediating behaviours during the teaching session and the younger siblings' performance on the four tasks were coded. The frequency of mediating behaviours—including attention focusing, amplifying affect and providing meaning, fostering a sense of competence, regulating of the learning process, de‐contextualization, and negative feedback in the form of mocking and laughing at errors, predicted the younger siblings' task performance. The older sibling's accurate perception of the younger child's competence was uniquely predictive of task performance. The highest amount of mediation was observed in older‐brother–younger‐brother pairs, in particular the behaviours of negative feedback and amplifying affect. Results contribute to the discussion on the role of siblings as moderators of cognitive development and are discussed in terms of Vygotsky's cultural–historical perspective on apprenticeship. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Collaboration,meaning‐making and therapy: What practitioners can learn from recent developments in qualitative research

Recent developments in qualitative research provide a rich resource of ideas and insights for counsellors and psychotherapists interested in postmodern approaches to theory and practice. The second edition of the landmark Handbook of Qualitative Research (Denzin and Lincoln, 2000) is discussed in terms of its potential value for therapists.     

Is how it is said important? The association between quality of therapist interventions and client processing

This study examined the association between the quality of therapist interventions and client in‐session processing using the York Therapist Process Measure (YTPM; Toukmanian and Armstrong, 1998). The instrument's three dimensions — attunement, tentativeness and meaning exploration — were tested separately for their impact on clients' manner of processing and depth of experiencing. For each of the 20 mild‐moderately depressed clients, treated in short‐term experiential therapy, a high and a low client‐process segment was isolated from a session that was judged by an experienced therapist to manifest the greatest amount of “good therapy moments”. Therapist interventions within these segments were then rated on the YTPM. Results revealed significant differences in the quality of therapist interventions between high and low segments. Attunement and tentativeness were associated significantly with greater complexity in manner of processing, and meaning exploration with greater depth in experiencing. The implications of these findings for psychotherapy research and practice are discussed.