Review of Psychotherapy with psychotherapists.

Reviews the book, Psychotherapy with psychotherapists edited by Florence W. Kaslow (see record 1990-98484-000). There has been little written about doing psychotherapy with patients who are themselves psychotherapists, despite the fact that many therapists have been in therapy and some have provided treatment for other therapists. This book presents a good overview of many of the issues involved when therapist treats therapist, although there are no real surprises or conceptual breakthroughs. Regardless of theoretical orientation or preferred treatment modality, several common problem areas emerge having to do with boundaries, confidentiality, pride, competition, and countertransference. There is still a clear need for research, including investigation of the supposed efficacy of treatment as training. More discussion and detailed case examples of treatment from the perspective of the therapist-patients would have been desirable. These relatively minor qualifications notwithstanding, therapists will find much here to stimulate and inform their work with therapist-patients. There are fewer "therapists' therapists" than there are therapist-patients, however, and this suggests an even larger readership: trainees and practicing clinicians in treatment. This book may not only help therapists to be therapists to their patients, but should also help therapists to be patients to their therapists. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Psychotherapy with older adults.

Reviews the book, Psychotherapy with older adults by Bob Knight (see record 1987-97045-000). The techniques of providing psychotherapy to older adults are the main topics of this trenchant text. There are several case examples throughout the book that illustrate the process of psychotherapy with the elderly. Knight has provided a much-needed, readable introduction and how-to instructions on psychotherapeutic service provision to this burgeoning segment of the population. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Psychotherapy and Personality Change.

Reviews the book "Psychotherapy and personality change," edited by Rosalind F. Dymond (see record 1955-04163-000). This is a truly impressive book, if one holds any brief for the value of objective research where psychotherapy is concerned. It is still much too early to hope that discussions of psychotherapy can be aimed at concrete problems involving specific principles. This progress report from the Counseling Center of the University of Chicago should convince anyone that objective research on psychotherapy is possible and may, eventually, pay off with concrete results. It should also convince the fainthearted that research on psychotherapy with real patients who have real problems might best be left to those who have great courage, considerable dedication, and the foresight to equip themselves in advance with a large grant from a foundation. This book is another testimonial to the fact that psychotherapy is rapidly becoming a legitimate field of scientific research as well as an applied art. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Psychotherapy and Personality Change.

Reviews the book, Psychotherapy and Personality Change by Carl R. Rogers and Rosalind F. Dymond (eds.) (1954). This volume, with twelve authors, edited by Carl Rogers and Rosalind Dymond, constitutes essentially a progress report on the large-scale research program in psychotherapy which has been under way at the Counseling Center of the University of Chicago for more than four years. It presents findings to date on outcomes and process of the client-centered or nondirective approach to psychotherapy. The book is divided into four parts, Part I presenting the context and the basic design of the research, Part II describing a series of separate investigations bearing on the various hypotheses, and Part III giving what the authors call an "objective analysis" of the therapy of two single cases, one "successful" and the other "unsuccessful," and attempting to relate each of them to the findings of the major studies reported in Part II. Part IV is called an "Overview" and poses many stiff questions for the future. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Psychotherapy as a human science.

Reviews the book, Psychotherapy as a human science by Daniel Burston and Roger Frie (see record 2006-12980-000). In this book, the authors show how philosophical assumptions pervade therapeutic praxis. "In our view, philosophy is inherent to the very practice of psychotherapy" (p. 2). There is a "common ground that unites the therapists of today with the philosophers of the past" (p. 17). Their effort succeeds brilliantly in reconnecting psychology and philosophy and, by that homecoming, to ground psychotherapy (including contemporary psychoanalysis) as a "human science." The book begins by sketching ideas about truth we inherit from the Greeks, then shows how Descartes and Pascal helped launch the Enlightenment with their thinking about truth and the limits of reason. Kant, Hegel, and Marx broaden the scope to include reason, the unconscious, and the course of history. Kierkegaard and Nietzsche interject angst and authenticity. Dilthey proposes a human science neither scientistic nor irrational. Husserl launches phenomenology as the proper study of experience; Scheler, Jaspers and Heidegger react in their particular ways. Freud and Jung come to loggerheads over the unconscious. Buber, Binswanger, and Boss further develop existential-phenomenological perspectives in terms of human interrelatedness. Confrontation with the other and the limits of reciprocity engage Sartre, Lacan, and Laing. Psychoanalysis grows intersubjectively through the work of Sullivan, Fromm, Merleau-Ponty, Benjamin, and Stolorow. Postmodernism's excess, Frie and Burston conclude, requires acknowledgment of an authentic self answerable for choices in life: '...[W]e are both determined by, and exercise our agency in determining, the communicative contexts in which we exist" (p. 262). Psychotherapy from this existential-phenomenological perspective becomes "a rigorous exploration of our ways of making meaning--both consciously and unconsciously" (p. 263). The book ends, then, with an affirmation of life and a call to action. All these thinkers, all these generations of lives lived, all this seeking of meaning and purpose, explanation and doubt, all this is our human lot, inherited equally. Each of us must choose, consciously or not, what to do about it. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Psychotherapy through clinical role playing.

Reviews the book Psychotherapy through clinical role playing, by David A. Kipper (see record 1986-98559-000). Kipper's book presents a microanalysis of the role of groups and intervention in therapy. So does his presentation of a general role-playing model embedded in group therapy. It is a reminder of roots springing from behavior simulation, the environmental factor and clinical role playing as a subset of behavior simulation. Kipper presents an extended and somewhat drawn-out discussion of the newer and rational processes of psychotherapy through clinical role playing. He is an advocate of clinical role-play therapy as a comprehensive utilization of behavioral simulation as a force for change in therapy. He is persuasive not only in group therapy but also in the application of this technique in individual treatment. Clinical role playing in therapy is both an adjunct and sometimes the main thrust of therapy. We all do it using different nomenclature and even in psychoanalysis without its staging and defined roles. This book calls our attention to a technique that we may take for granted, and as such it is an evocative book well worth reading. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of A perilous calling: The hazards of psychotherapy practice.

Reviews the book, A perilous calling: The hazards of psychotherapy practice by Michael B. Sussman (1994). In this book, the author presents chapters by therapists from various disciplines (e.g., psychology, social work, psychiatry) that examine the "hazards" that lay hidden in the practice of psychotherapy. The author contends that doing psychotherapy "poses significant dangers to clinicians" (p. 1). He believes that there are forces both internal and external to the therapist that may take their toll on the therapist's well-being. Sussman makes the point that while other overtly dangerous professions (e.g., firefighter) warn prospective candidates of the perils of their field, novice psychotherapists are not prepared for what awaits them. Psychotherapists, then, enter the profession unprepared for, if not blind to, possibilities that not only make them less effective in their work, but might actually harm themselves and their families. Sussman sees a real human cost to not preparing clinicians to be aware of, and deal with, these hazards. The book is divided into six parts that range from the therapist's personal development to renewal. Along the way the reader encounters professional, ethical and legal issues, clinical dilemmas, the emotional impact of the work, and the ailments of the therapist. Within each particular area are rather personal, and at times idiosyncratic, chapters from a variety of psychotherapists. There are chapters that deal with AIDS, the Holocaust, body shame, and being a female therapist. Most of the chapters have a distinctly clinical orientation, while a few come across as philosophical discourses. There is one chapter by an expert witness in the Margaret Bean-Bayog case who warns of the dangers of the press on one's career. The wide scope of the chapter topics, at times, gives the book a disjointed feel and the sense that it is trying to tackle too many issues at once. Overall, this book provides a new slant on what is involved in the practice of psychotherapy. It raises some important questions about the field and how we prepare for its impact on our lives, for the practice of psychotherapy surely does affect the practitioner. Sussman and some of the chapter authors make a good case for increasing communication about potential hazards and developing strategies and training methods that will minimize their effects. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Psychotherapy of the disorders of the self: The Masterson approach.

Reviews the book, Psychotherapy of the disorders of the self: The Masterson approach, edited by James F. Masterson and Ralph Klein (see record 1988-98808-000). The senior editor of this text reminds us that the DSM-IIIR is an insufficient guide to appropriate diagnosis of personality disorders. As Masterson indicates, it is highly questionable that the borderline disorders can be distilled to a single "borderline personality disorder" rather than a range of conditions emerging from separation-individuation developmental crises and maternal libidinal unavailability. Masterson assists us in integrating borderline conditions by enabling an understanding of the defenses against abandonment depression that manifest in these patients. Klein, in turn, adds an invaluable dimension to differential diagnosis in his reminder that a diagnostic picture is incomplete when it fails to integrate the current ego functions and impairments and the nuances of the family, along with their developmental and medical history. This volume is well suited not only for the seasoned clinician who has experienced the full impact of character pathology in clinical practice but also for the student whose understanding of personality disorders is often restricted to the limited role provided by our current diagnostic manual. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Psychotherapy after Kohut: A textbook of self psychology.

Reviews the book, Psychotherapy after Kohut: A textbook of self psychology by Ronald R. Lee and J. Colby Martin (see record 1991-98948-000). More than a decade since Kohut's death, the volume of writing in the field of self psychology continues to expand, testifying to the stimulating challenge of his theories not only to mental health professionals in all disciplines but to those in the humanities as well. The latest contribution, Psychotherapy after Kohut: A textbook of self psychology, is a welcome arrival. Each chapter opens with a paragraph outlining teaching goals and closes with a summary and suggested readings for the following chapter. Lee and Martin provide a review of classical Freudian theory, brief excerpts of the classic cases from which it was derived, the principal early controversies, and a new view of Ferenczi's contributions. Lee and Martin provide a thoughtful, carefully reasoned, and comprehensive synthesis of the work of those writers who in their opinion have enhanced and expanded the concepts of self psychology and those who deny the significance of self-psychological concepts for psychoanalysis or psychotherapy or seek to demonstrate that the ideas are not new. Informative and challenging, Psychotherapy after Kohut, with its integration and synthesis of many points of view, is a contribution to the field of textbooks. Readers will find much to inform and strengthen their understanding of psychotherapy after Kohut. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Self and others: Object relations theory in practice.

Reviews the book, Self and others: Object relations theory in practice by N. Gregory Hamilton (see record 1988-97224-000). Hamilton's book, Self and Others, is useful because it attempts to render much of the complexity of understanding object relational approaches more negotiable. Without question, the book is addressed to the beginner or relative beginner (i.e., the person who wishes to get an introduction to object relations). However, because of its elementary focus, the book can be especially valuable for clinicians, residents, and related mental health trainees who are in the process of learning about object relations theory. Too often it seems introductory books on object relations either assume a knowledge the reader does not possess or become so overly mired in discussing the intricacies of theoretical controversy (e.g., Kohut versus Kernberg) that they leave the beginning student of psychoanalysis in a state of bewilderment. Such is not the case with Self and Others. Hamilton's book, while not being without its limitations, does have some interesting features to offer for beginning instruction in object relations theory. The book attempts to show how object relations theory can be applied in practice. Some interesting and instructive definitions, case examples, and discussion are provided, and they all can prove of value to the interested student of object relations theory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Psychotherapy tradecraft: The technique and style of doing therapy.

Reviews the book, Psychotherapy tradecraft: The technique and style of doing therapy by Theodore H. Blau (see record 1988-97142-000). This book begins with an introduction by Blau which defines the concept of "tradecraft" and is followed by eleven chapters divided into three sections. The first section is made up of four chapters concerned with becoming a psychotherapist. The second section of the book includes six chapters about actually conducting therapy. The third section of the book consists of one chapter about the stress of psychotherapy practice and includes a very helpful list of the signs of stress and burnout as well as specific suggestions designed to prevent or reduce stress. The book is certainly well written and well organized. The copies of various office forms, psychotherapy vignettes used to explain various treatment techniques, and specific examples of therapist responses, all provide helpful information for novice therapists. It is very likely that the book is most appropriate for graduate students and inexperienced practitioners. It will probably be of greatest interest to those professionals entering private practice or, who as teachers and supervisors, want to train others to do so. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of From research to clinical practice.

Reviews the book, From research to clinical practice, edited by George Stricker and Robert H. Keisner (1985). The intended audience for this edited volume "will probably be practicing psychotherapists...[with] a minimum knowledge of the research area but a ready familiarity with clinical concepts" (p. xv). In addition, the editors suggest to the chapter authors that a successful chapter should provide new meaning for the term "scientist professional" by providing a feedback loop between research and practice. The authors also state that the theoretical focus of this volume is psychodynamic. The book is divided into four areas each preceded by a brief overview. The following areas are covered: Basic issues, social psychology, developmental psychology, and special topics. Overall, I found the chapters to be informative and well written. I think some practitioners may find this book overly academic in tone and may question whether enough of the chapters are sufficiently relevant to busy, practicing clinicians. This is not a book on spotting golden research nuggets between the covers of the volume. Instead, this book requires careful mining of considerable content in order to find sparkling applications. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Play in child development and psychotherapy: Toward empirically supported practice.

Reviews the book, Play in child development and psychotherapy: Toward empirically supported practice by Sandra Russ (see record 2003-88219-000). Clinical child psychologists have used play as a vehicle for psychotherapy for over 75 years. However, current demands of managed care systems emphasize the need for time limited and empirically supported treatments. Although play techniques are commonly incorporated by psychologists of various theoretical orientations, Sandra Russ points out in this book the disparity between the theoretical role of play in psychotherapy and the actual evidence supporting these techniques. The first four chapters of the book provide literature reviews of the history, theory, and research on pretend play, considering both normative and clinical populations. The next three chapters focus more specifically on the current developments in understanding play from research and practice perspectives. Finally, Russ considers future objectives for researchers and practitioners who seek to expand and enhance the utility of play techniques in child psychotherapy. Russ's book clearly provides a basis for understanding the current state of the child play therapy field while strongly emphasizing the need for additional research. This book may be useful for practitioners who strive to provide empirically supported treatments because it provides theoretical and available research perspectives. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Weight Control: The Behavioural Strategies.

Reviews the book, Weight Control: The Behavioural Strategies by Michael D. LeBow (1981). This book does a more than adequate job in examining behavioural methods currently used in treatment of obesity. The influence of behaviour therapy on weight control is evaluated with realistic appraisals of its values and limitations. As an introduction for the novice therapist this book will be extremely valuable. Even the appendices of weight charts, skin fold measurement procedures, food calories and calorie expenditures may be used by the practitioner. The greatest limitation of the methodology presented and thus of the book itself, however, is the failure to recognize serious problems in behavioural technology (e.g., there is great variability in patients' responses to a behavioural program). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Critical issues in psychotherapy: Translating new ideas into practice.

Reviews the book, Critical issues in psychotherapy: Translating new ideas into practice edited by Brent D. Slife, Richard N. Williams, and Sally H. Barlow (see record 2001-05779-000). Bridging the often enormous gap between theory and practice in psychotherapy, this volume seeks to examine a variety of models of psychotherapy in the light of recent advances in theoretical psychology, philosophy of science, and critical thinking. The book is organized around numerous issues of fundamental importance to contemporary psychotherapy, including chapters addressing the problems of empirically validated therapies, individualism, spirituality, multiculturalism, biological reductionism, managed care, freewill/determinism, eclecticism, feminism, and diagnostics. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Re-envisioning psychology: Moral dimensions of theory and practice.

Reviews the book, Re-envisioning psychology: Moral dimensions of theory and practice by Frank C. Richardson, Blaine J. Fowers, and Charles B. Guignon (see record 1999-02563-000). Not often in the discipline of psychology does a work of genuinely praiseworthy philosophical sophistication come along that also manages to avoid not only being overly narrow in its relevance but also avoids being filled with unintelligible and pseudo-intellectual jargon. This excellent text is an example of one such work. The authors divided their text into three major sections beginning with a careful and ranging analysis of the ethical underpinnings of contemporary psychotherapy, followed by a timely and provocative discussion of individualism, social constructionism, and hermeneutics, and complete the volume with a preliminary exploration of the principle features of an interpretive psychology. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Psychotherapy Relationships That Work: Therapist Contributions and Responsiveness to Patients.

Reviews the book, Psychotherapy Relationships That Work: Therapist Contributions and Responsiveness to Patients edited by John C. Norcross (see record 2003-02805-000). As quoted from the fly leaf, "the work represents the culmination of three years of systematic analysis by the APA's Division of Psychotherapy (29) Task Force on Empirically Supported Therapy Relationships." Clearly, the task force was appointed in part--and acknowledged in the Introduction--as a response to the Society of Clinical Psychology's (12) Task Force on Empirically Validated Therapies (see Chambless & Hollon, 1998), which emphasized techniques in therapy. Norcross, the chair of the Division 29 Task Force and editor of this volume, discusses the inevitable questions regarding the differences between the goals of the two task forces. He views the current work as an extension and enlargement of the "attempt to apply psychological science to the identification and promulgation of effective psychotherapy." The 21 substantive chapters of the book are written by distinguished researchers of the therapeutic process. Fifty-five authors contributed to the volume. The chapters cover a wide-ranging and diverse field of topics including empathy, resistance, feedback, repairing alliance ruptures, countertransference, self-disclosure, religion and spirituality, and cultural diversity. The organization of the contents is of interest, as they are divided into General Elements of the Relationship and Customizing the Relationship to the Individual Patient. The choice of which chapters fit the categories appears somewhat arbitrary and perhaps forced. But the import of the volume is the thoroughness that the authors have brought to their particular topics. The book contains a number of resource gems, such as tables of references on outcome as related to resistance, interpretation, and therapist positive regard. That said, the book is not without some weaknesses. There is a dearth of reports of case studies, and cases that are presented are scattered sparsely throughout the text. The research must necessarily continue in order to provide a better understanding of interpersonal relationships within the context of psychotherapy. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Self-disclosure in psychotherapy.

Reviews the book, Self-disclosure in psychotherapy by Barry A. Farber (see record 2006-11792-000). At one point or another, most therapists have wondered how much their patients are telling them and wrestled with how much they should reveal themselves to their patients. This book aims to provide an integrative and up-to-date review of the literature that has addressed these kinds of questions. By looking at patient, therapist, supervisee, and supervisor self-disclosure, Farber attempts to show both common and unique aspects of self-disclosure across the different parties involved in psychotherapy. Work from historical, clinical, research, and cultural perspectives comes together to provide readers with a multifaceted view of self-disclosure in psychotherapy. This book will be of interest to therapists, researchers, psychotherapy supervisors, and therapists-in-training. Farber's discussion of self-disclosure offers a nuanced perspective on the dilemmas involved in the psychotherapy process. By highlighting the features of self-disclosure across patients, therapists, supervisees, and supervisors, Farber enriches understanding of the phenomenon and encourages empathy for the perspectives of those in other psychotherapy roles. We believe that Farber has successfully synthesized work from various perspectives to create an illuminating review of self-disclosure in psychotherapy. The book condenses a broad range of literature into clearly organized and digestible chapters. The integration of research and theory with clinical vignettes, quotations from books and movies, and popular song lyrics make this work an unusually engaging and accessible read. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Beyond the reflection: The role of the mirror paradigm in clinical practice.

Reviews the book, Beyond the reflection: The role of the mirror paradigm in clinical practice by Paulina Kernberg, Bernadette Buhl-Nielsen, and Lina Normandin (see record 2007-00911-000). This modestly presented volume overflows with insight and new ways of looking at the mirroring experience for children and adolescents. Kernberg and her collaborators present the rich history of the image, metaphor, and pervasive role of the mirror in human experience; they carefully describe the subjective experience of wonder, admiration, and an objective dimension of truth in the mirror paradigm (2006, p. xv). For the psychotherapist, Kernberg's work provides a rich resource; the review of past and current research and theorizing about the mirroring function of mothers and primary caregivers is thorough and up-to-date with the most recent advances in neuroscience, attachment theory, and infant research. From Freud to Lacan, from Winnicott to Stern, and from Schore to Gergely, Kernberg presents a sweeping exposition of the various images of the mirror. This volume is worthwhile if only for its presentation of this body of recent research. But there is so much more to be found here. While this is not the first time that Kernberg has presented us with her work with mirror observation and interviews (Kernberg, 1984, 1987), this volume integrates the research about early mother- child experience, and the mirroring paradigm in the psychoanalytic theories about child development, with the phenomenology of child and adolescent psychotherapy. The clinician will find a useful application of the theory to clinical practice and diagnosis that is hard to find in the literature. Beebe and Lachmann (2002) have accomplished this integration between infant research and adult treatment, but Kernberg's application of her research and the demonstrated correlation between the findings of mirror experience, attachment histories, and clinical experience is a rare and welcome addition to the literature. There are also valuable links made between the findings around mirror experience and children's trauma histories. This reader came away feeling that a tremendous debt is owed to the authors for helping to ground clinical theory and practice in substantial current research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)