mentalization-based treatment

Examples of mentalization-based treatment in the following topics:

• Defining Psychology

  • This field ultimately aims to benefit society, partly through its focus on better understanding of mental health and mental illness.
  • The resulting knowledge is then applied to various spheres of human activity, including the problems of individuals' daily lives and the treatment of mental illness.
  • Clinical psychology focuses on the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders and mental illness.
  • Psychologists working in a clinical capacity (such as therapists or counselors) work with clients who are struggling with mental illness to assess, diagnose, and implement various forms of therapeutic treatment.
  • Much of this treatment is based on clinical research.

• Classifying Abnormal Behavior: The DSM

  • The first version of the DSM was created in response to the large-scale involvement of psychiatrists in the treatment, processing, and assessment of World War II soldiers.
  • One of the strengths of the DSM is its use in researching and developing evidence-based treatments.
  • As studies get published, mental-health service providers learn how to incorporate the most evidence-based treatments into their practice.
  • Providers must often use the DSM in order to get coverage for their clients from insurance companies, which require certain DSM diagnoses for treatment.
  • It claims to collect them together based on statistical or clinical patterns.

• Introduction to Psychotherapy

  • Psychotherapy is defined by the interaction or treatment between a trained professional and a client, patient, family, couple, or group.
  • In the Western tradition, by the 19th century a mental-treatment movement (then referred to as "moral treatment") developed based on certain therapeutic methods.
  • Psychoanalysis is based on overcoming the desires and negative influences of the unconscious mind.
  • Psychotherapists employ a range of techniques based on experiential relationship-building, dialogue, communication, and behavior change that are designed to improve the mental health of a client or patient, or to improve group relationships (such as in a family).
  • Some dismiss psychotherapy altogether in favor of biomedical treatments.

• Goals of Psychology

  • The overarching goal of psychology is to understand the behavior, mental functions, and emotional processes of human beings.
  • The overarching goal of psychology is to understand the behavior, mental functions, and emotional processes of human beings.
  • Psychologists usually work in one of three fields – basic research, mental health, or applied psychology.
  • Clinical psychology focuses on the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders, with much of this practice based on research.
  • Neuropsychology studies the brain involvement in mental processes.

• Body-Oriented Psychotherapies

  • Body-oriented psychotherapies focus on the importance of working with the body in the treatment of mental health issues.
  • Psychotherapists employ a range of techniques based on experiential relationship-building, dialogue, communication, and behavior change that are designed to improve the mental health of a client or to improve family or group relationships (such as in a family).
  • Body-oriented therapies are based on the principles of somatic psychology, which was founded by Wilhelm Reich in the 1930s.
  • EMDR is commonly used in the treatment of psychological trauma, particularly post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and complex PTSD (C-PTSD).
  • Hatha yoga has been studied as an intervention for many mental health conditions, including stress and depression.

• Influences of Culture and Gender in Psychotherapy

  • Cultural and gender norms significantly shape how mental illness as well as therapy and various other treatment methods are perceived.
  • For example, a counselor whose treatment focuses on individual decision-making may be ineffective at helping a Chinese client with a collectivist approach (or more group-based approach) to problem-solving (Sue, 2004).
  • Therapists who use multicultural therapy work with clients to obtain and integrate information about their cultural patterns into a unique treatment approach based on their particular situation.
  • This approach also examines how certain ethnicities in the United States are less likely to access mental health services than their White middle-class American counterparts.
  • Barriers to treatment include lack of insurance, transportation, and time; cultural views that mental illness is a stigma; fears about treatment; and language barriers.

• Introduction to Biomedical Therapies

  • The mind and body are viewed as connected; poor physical health leads to poor mental health, and vice versa.
  • "Pharmacotherapy" refers to the use of medications in biomedical treatment.
  • Another biologically based treatment that continues to be used, although infrequently, is electroconvulsive therapy (ECT; formerly known by the unscientific name "electroshock therapy").
  • Psychosurgery, also called neurosurgery for mental disorder (NMD), is the neurosurgical treatment of mental illness.
  • These studies may compare outcomes of treatment with multiple medications.

• Feeding Disorders

  • Feeding disorders are a type of eating disorder that prevents the consumption of certain foods, often based on color, texture, or other factors.
  • When the disorder occurs concurrently with another medical or mental condition, the disturbance must exceed what is normally caused by that condition.
  • Some children with ARFID benefit from a four stage in-home treatment program based on the principles of systematic desensitization.
  • The four stages of the treatment include record, reward, relax, and review:
  • Children with feeding disorders may refuse to eat certain foods based on color, texture, temperature, or other factors.

• Decision Making

  • Heuristics are simple rules of thumb that people often use to form judgments and make decisions; think of them as mental shortcuts.
  • This is called the base-rate fallacy, and it is the cause of many negative stereotypes based on outward appearance.
  • It remains when the subjects are offered money as an incentive to be accurate, or when they are explicitly told not to base their judgment on the anchor.
  • Treatment A was predicted to result in 400 deaths, whereas Treatment B had a 33% chance that no one would die but a 66% chance that everyone would die.
  • Negative framing: "Treatment A will let 400 people die; Treatment B has a 33% chance of no one dying and a 66% chance of everyone dying."

• Defining "Normal" and "Abnormal"

  • This internalization contributes to feelings of shame and usually leads to poorer treatment outcomes.
  • Refusal to receive treatment.
  • An individual's fear of stigmatization and alienation may lead them to refuse treatment altogether.
  • By causing people to not seek out treatment, society's stigma of mental illness leads to fewer diagnoses and fewer people getting help.
  • The National Alliance on Mental Illness aims to reduce societal stigma and shaming of various mental illnesses.