Assessing students' plans for college.

Based on a contemporary cognitive-psychoanalytic theory (control-mastery theory; J. Weiss, H. Sampson, & Mount Zion Psychotherapy Research Group, 1986), this study proposed that college students have plans for college that consist of conscious and unconscious goals and obstructions to be overcome in meeting those goals. The construct of unconscious guilt was used to mediate the dual goals of autonomy and attachment. The idiographic plan-formulation method was adapted to derive plans for 12 sophomore women. Acceptable interjudge reliabilities and criterion validity were demonstrated, and several themes in the goals and obstructions were illustrated. Students worried more about mothers than about fathers, particularly when they perceived the mother as weak or needy. The potential of the method for generating inferences about unconscious process for normative development is discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Endangered by interpretations: Treatment by attitude of the narcissistically vulnerable patient.

Some narcissistically impaired patients present a particularly difficult therapeutic challenge. They often cannot tolerate interpretations because they view interpretations as humiliating evidence that they are shamefully defective. For these patients, "treatment by attitude" and without significant interpretation may be the only way they can feel safe enough to allow the therapeutic process to unfold. Two cases are discussed. In the 1st case, the usual therapeutic attitude of nonjudgmental acceptance was sufficient. The 2nd case was counterintuitive because the patient needed the therapist to demonstrate a complete lack of worry about the patient for her to make progress. Although the therapist's attitude is part of every treatment, it may be particularly important in the treatment of more severely disordered patients. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The role of unconscious pathogenic beliefs in agoraphobia.

Agoraphobia can severely constrict the life of those who suffer from it. Control-mastery theory is a cognitive psychoanalytic theory that posits that symptoms are caused and maintained by unconscious pathogenic beliefs. Two cases are discussed in detail to support the hypothesis that agoraphobic patients suffer from 2 pathogenic beliefs: The world is a dangerous place that punishes assertiveness and they don't deserve to have a better life. The role of unconscious pathogenic beliefs may serve as a bridge in explaining both the efficacy of cognitive-behavioral therapy as well as the usefulness of longer term psychodynamic treatment in resolving the often significant residual symptoms of these patients. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)