Essays on Therapeutic Alliance

Serenity Daniels is a 28-year-old single woman with a long history of sexual and emotional abuse since her childhood. She has inflicted deliberate self-harm (DSH) on her body on numerous occasions. During these DSH episodes, Serenity usually cuts her wrists and uses alcohol as a way of numbing the pain. Besides, Serenity has problems with her self-image as she sees herself as “fat and ugly” and unloved. She also has frequent arguments with her co-workers and managers. As such, she does not hold job positions for long. This instability in moods, functioning, and self-image coupled with unstable relationships and ...

Abstract

This paper explores several peer-reviewed journals on already documented research about the relationship between the client and the therapist. Clients require a strong bonding relationship with the therapist before undergoing the actual treatment. . Clients must consider creating a strong alliance with their therapists/clinicians. This helps them to be sure and develops confidence in them. They should start the treatment without having any fear about the clinician involved. This creates a friendly atmosphere for them in attaining good therapy services. This work outlines the basic elements of the therapeutic alliance as a human service. It also further explains why these ...

How does the human conscious and unconscious mind and the external bio-social forces adapt in the process of development? What then is the role and significance of psychoanalysis? Researchers in the field of neuroscience have made great findings on the effect of the biopsychosocial perspective on child development. They have already accentuated on the fact that the interaction of infants with their neurobiological predisposition and interpersonal social and environmental experiences influences the development of the psyche, a concept earlier on stated by Freud in his ‘Project for Scientific Psychology’ (Sasso 2009). The development of consciousness is evidently a complex process ...

Test-Taking Behaviors (Validity)

The observation suggests a slight attempt to impress the other person however easy and continuous conversation. She seems to have very deviant social, political, or religious convictions however is moody, restless and opportunistic. It is visible that she is being defensive and unwilling to acknowledge psychological distress. Vrin and Trin in combination with other scores indicate that the responses may be mostly false and may not be psychopathologic. Clinical Presentation:She reports concern about bodily functioning and seems to be immature, stubborn, and selfish. Feel blue, unhappy, and dysphonic, and due to the frequent psychological changes, is not good at ...

Introduction

According to the American Psychiatric Association (2000), a trauma is a shocking and emotionally overpowering situation that makes an individual experience a threat to psychological or physical integrity of self or others, leading to a reaction of intense fear, horror, and helplessness (Stolorow, 2007). Ver Der Kolk (1996) opines that "traumatized people lead traumatic and traumatizing lives", because they tend to re-victimize themselves, inflict self-injury, and externalize their trauma by victimizing others. The childhood trauma may trigger severe psychological reactions like Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) that may affect the individual by subjecting him or her to severe depression and alcohol or drug dependence ( ...

Childhood abuse can occur as sexual, physical, and emotional abuse, but all forms of abuse can potentially cause anxiety, social function impairment, and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Although female children frequently experience more sexual abuse than male children, a meta-analysis on research papers in 22 countries found that the average prevalence of male sexual abuse is 7.9 percent (as cited in Hopton & Huta, 2012). Between 5 and 10 percent of children experience severe physical abuse, and 50 percent of them experience corporal punishment (Margolin & Vickerman, 2011). However, instances of childhood abuse are rarely reported, so only rough estimates are available. ...

Abstract

Operant conditioning refers to the process of behavior learning in which an individual receives external stimuli that can affect learning outcomes. The term was first used by Skinner, even though Watson and Thorndike already understood the procedures of operant conditioning, with the exception of continuous stimuli that were first applied by Skinner. The five procedures that explain the types of stimuli that can affect human behavior include positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement, positive punishment, negative punishment, and extinction. In practice, operant conditioning is used to teach behavior to children, modify behavior in psychotherapy patients, and eliminate old or introduce new ...

Introduction

The patient whose name was Jack had gone to a local restaurant with his friends at night when he began to exhibit the following symptoms: He was restless; he kept pacing around in spite being urged to do stop doing so by his friends and the staff at the restaurant. His movements around the restaurants were ill co-ordinated. He was agitated and disorientated and insisted that he did not want to be touched. In spite being disorientated, he was cognizant of my arrival. He would make utterances regarding the world and how “screwed up it is.” In between talking about ...