Therapies
Walking through the maze of therapies
The world of mental health can be quite daunting. Apart from the various taboos that people might have about it, one can get lost at trying to understand what the different professions and ways of working are. Indeed, most of these either have the prefix ‘psych’ or have the term ‘therapist’ as part of their name. (as you can see, our name contains some ‘long words’ already).
We have therefore compiled a glossary of the various professions that the Psychology and Psychotherapy Network can put you in contact with.
All of the professionals mentioned below are trained in what can generally be called the talking therapies. The psychiatrist’s main training, though, is medical. All therapists are expected, and usually legally bound, to respect patient privacy and client confidentiality.
The following definitions are taken from professional bodies websites or from Wikipedia. If you wish to know more, it might be useful to visit those.
Clinical Psychology
Clinical psychology is a training that enables the clinician in the evaluation, diagnosis, and treatment of emotional, behavioural and mental health problems. Training prepares clinical psychologists to work with adults and with children and adolescents either individually, as part of and involving the family unit, and/or in a group setting. Clinical psychologists tend to specialise in the work with specific groups of clients such as general mental health with adults or children, learning disability, trauma, older adults, forensic psychology. They also conduct cognitive, academic, and personality testing. In most cases, clinical psychologist will have undergone a further training in one of the main modalities of treatment (such as cognitive behavioural therapy, family therapy, psychoanalytic therapy or other)
Cognitive behaviour therapy
Cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT) describes a number of therapies that all have a similar approach to solving problems, which can range from sleeping difficulties or relationship problems, to drug and alcohol abuse or anxiety and depression. CBT works by changing people’s attitudes and their behaviour. The therapies focus on the thoughts, images, beliefs and attitudes that we hold (our cognitive processes) and how this relates to the way we behave, as a way of dealing with emotional problems.
CBT tends to be short, taking three to six months for most emotional problems. Clients attend a session a week, each session lasting either 50 minutes or an hour. During this time, the client and therapist are working together to understand what the problems are and to develop a new strategy for tackling them. CBT introduces them to a set of principles that they can apply whenever they need to, and which will stand them in good stead throughout their lives.
CBT is a combination of psychotherapy and behavioural therapy. Psychotherapy emphasises the importance of the personal meaning we place on things and how thinking patterns begin in childhood. Behavioural therapy pays close attention to the relationship between our problems, our behaviour and our thoughts.
This form of therapy is often associated with clinical psychologists but other professions such as mental health nursing sometimes specialise in this.
Counselling
Counselling is based on the assumption that an individual (client), seeking help in the resolution of a problem he (or she) is experiencing, can enter into a relationship with another individual (counsellor) who is sufficiently accepting and permissive to allow the client to freely express emotions and feelings. This will enable the client to come to terms with negative feelings, which may have caused emotional problems, and develop inner resources. The objective is for the client to become able to perceive himself as a person, with the power and freedom to change. Counselling is often used as a generic term that includes different ways of working depending on the particular training and experience of the counsellor.
Creative therapies
Expressive therapy, also known as creative arts therapy, is the intentional use of the creative arts as a form of therapy. Unlike traditional art expression, the process of creation is emphasized rather than the final aesthetic product. Expressive therapy works under the assumption that through use of imagination and the various forms of creative expression, humans can heal. Most forms of creative expression have an equivalent therapeutic discipline:
- Art therapy - The use of painting, drawing, sculpture and other forms of art as therapy.
- Dance therapy - The use of kinesthetic expression as therapy.
- Drama therapy - The use of theater tools and improvisation as therapy. Includes psychodrama
- Music therapy - The use of listening, playing and personalizing music as therapy.
- Play therapy - The use of playing with toys, observing play as therapy.
Usually, being an expressive therapist is a masters level clinician, often coupled with other certification. In common, all expressive therapists share the belief that it is through creative expression and the tapping of the imagination a person can examine the body, feelings, emotions and his or her thought process.
Expressive therapists work with a wide variety of populations in a wide variety of environments. They have worked in areas such as medical illness, grief, educational and behavioral problems and emotional issues.
Family and couple therapy
Family therapy, also referred to as couple and family therapy and family systems therapy, is a branch of psychotherapy that works with families and couples to nurture change and development. It tends to view these in terms of the systems of interaction between family members. It emphasizes family relationships as an important factor in psychological health. As such, family problems have been seen to arise as a result of interactions in the family system, rather than to be focused on individual members.
Family therapists may focus more on how patterns of interaction maintain the problem rather than trying to identify the cause, as this can be experienced as blaming by some families. It assumes that the family as a whole is larger than the sum of its parts.
Family therapists practitioners come from a range of professional backgrounds such as psychology, nursing, psychotherapy, social work and counselling and have done further training in family therapy.
Psychiatry
Psychiatry is a branch of medicine dealing with the prevention, assessment, diagnosis, treatment, and rehabilitation of the mind and mental illness. Its primary goal is the relief of mental suffering associated with symptoms of disorder and improvement of mental well-being. This may be based in hospitals or in the community and patients may be voluntary or involuntary. Psychiatry adopts a medical approach but may take into account biological, psychological, and social/cultural perspectives. Treatment by medication in conjunction with various forms of psychotherapy may be undertaken and has proved most effective in successful treatment.
Psychiatrist also train in the main psychotherapies which they can deliver. In other cases they might refer the patient on to another mental health professional.
Psychiatrists specialise in various areas of the work depending on the particular population they work with such as adults or children and adolescents, forensic, older people. Some specialise even further into the work with specific diagnostic group e.g. eating disorders.
Psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis is the most intensive form of the talking therapies. The name that most people will know is that of Sigmund Freud who has developed the theory that underpins this therapy. Since Freud, others have continued to develop the theories such as Winnicott, Klein, Bion, to name but these. Patients attend five fifty minute sessions weekly, usually for several years, working with their psychoanalyst to examine and to explore unconscious conflicts of feeling, emotion and phantasy that are at the root of their symptoms and the problems that are troubling them.
Psychoanalytic theory suggests that it is by no means only genetic and constitutional factors that make up the personality. Other central influences include that of the early relationships with parents, of the development of sexuality, of love and hate. Those are explored within the context of the relationship between the patient and the psychoanalyst. Psychoanalysts work with adults and some have a further training in the work with children and adolescents.
Psychoanalytic psychotherapist
Many clinicians have now adopted the name of psychotherapist although, in general, the title of ‘psychotherapist’ is used to stand for ‘psychoanalytic psychotherapist’. Their training is based on the same theoretical foundations as that of the psychoanalysts although their work is less intensive and they will see patients between one and three times a week. They usually offer long-term therapy, which enables to look at issues in depth. Trainings are either geared to the work with adults or to the work with children and adolescents. (in the later case, they would call themselves ‘child and adolescent psychotherapists’).