Psychology 101: Introductory Psychology

 

 

For Thursday's class (there was a typo on the written handout referring to Nov 30 as "Tuesday") (November 30--the LAST LECTURE; the lecture on Tuesday Dec 5 is CANCELLED), you will see two films on psychotherapy. I chose these films so that you would get a glimpse into the process of therapy. Both of these films involve actual therapy sessions (the participants are not actors; they are "real people" and the issues they discuss are their own). The best way to view these films is to empathize with the participants and realize that these are real therapy sessions.

 

Please arrive for the Thursday Nov 30 lecture (NOT Tuesday) at 8:20 because the combined length of the two films is slightly over 80 minutes.

 

I strongly recommend that you read this "lecture guide" and the corresponding pages in the Myers book before you see the films. By doing so, you will be better prepared to anticipate and understand the therapy sessions, and thus, you will get much more out of the films.

 

Journey Into Self

 

This is a remarkable film (it won an Academy Award for Best Documentary) of a group led by Carl Rogers, the founder of the humanistic technique known as person-centered therapy (also known as client-centered therapy). As you will see, Rogers does not play an active role in the group; rather, he reflects in an empathetic way the feelings and thoughts of the members of the group. His theoretical ideas about therapy are discussed in the Myers book on pp. 689-690, although the film that you will see is of a group session in which the therapist is even less active than he/she would be in an individual therapy session. (Myers discusses group therapy on pages 697-698.)

 

Note: this film is a 45-minute condensation of a very long encounter group session. Because of this, the outpouring of emotion that you see at times may feel a bit out of place and too swift.

 

These questions are designed to focus your attention on certain aspects of the film, to help you think about the encounter group after you see the film:

 

1.      How did Roz (the Eurasian woman) respond to the comment that she was like a China Doll (or words to that effect)? What was the group's response to Roz's comments?

 

2.      Follow how Jerry (the man who says at the beginning that he has no friends and doesn't need them) changes through the course of the group session. What happened in the group that led to those changes?

 

3.      Carlene (the "Negro" woman--this was filmed in the early 60's) says that there is something that prevents her from opening up to others. What is that? Reflect on your own life: are there aspects of yourself or your life that prevent you from opening up to others?

 

4.      What are the aspects of the encounter group that help its individuals explore their own issues? What do you think of Rogers' assertion at the end that the group experience is an "irreversible process"?

 

 

Don Meichenbaum's "Approaches to Psychotherapy"

 

Don Meichenbaum, who is a member of UW's Psychology Department (now retired as a distinguished emeritus professor), is a very well-known therapist. Don is one of the founders of Cognitive-Behavioral Modification (CBM). CBM attempts to integrate two seemingly disparate approaches to therapy: (1) the clinical concerns of psychodynamic (e.g., Freudian) theory and Cognitive Therapy, and (2) the technology of Behavior Therapy. Myers discusses the psychoanalytic perspective on pages 596-609 (and psychodynamic therapies on pages 686-689), behavioral therapy on pages 690-694, and cognitive therapy on pages 694-697.

 

According to CBM, behavior is a reflection of several processes:

 

1.      The thoughts and beliefs that people have, particularly how they appraise events in their lives (that is, how they interpret events that happen in their lives--they ask themselves "why" did this event happen?). These are all cognitions.

 

2.      The feelings and images they have about their behavior.

 

The goal of the therapist in CBM is to help the client become aware of:

 

1.      Each of these processes

 

2.      The patterns of behavior that the client seems to emit constantly across different situations.

 

3.      The reactions that these behaviors seem to elicit from other people.

 

In a sense, the therapist is helping the client pay attention to other people's reactions as evidence for understanding the client's contribution to his/her own problems as a starting point for getting the client to summon the courage to seek alternative ways of behaving.

 

Think of the therapist as a "co-detective"--one who is helping the client search for clues to how the client may be contributing to his/her own problems through the way the client thinks about life events (how he/she interprets the causes of events), how the client feels about life events, and how the client behaves. By identifying clues, particularly those that are to be found in other people's reactions to the client, the client is taking the first step toward changing thoughts, feelings, or behaviors that may be contributing to the client's problems.

 

This film is part of a three-part series in which the same client, Richard, has a session with three distinguished psychotherapists: Don Meichenbaum (CBM), Hans Strupp (Psychodynamic Therapy), and Aaron Beck (Cognitive Therapy).

 

Here are some questions to think about:

 

1.      What techniques does Don use to get Richard to think about other people's reactions to Richard's behavior?

 

2.      What does Don do to support Richard in his pain?

 

3.      Note that Don tries to elicit both the cognitions and the feelings (affect) from Richard. How does he do this? What effect does it have? Why is this important?