The Differing Role of the Therapeutic Relationship in Three Different Approaches to Therapy - Coursework Example

THE DIFFERENT ROLES OF THE THERAPEUTIC RELATIONSHIP IN PSYCHODYNAMIC THERAPY, PERSON-CENTERED THERAPY, AND FAMILY SYSTEMS THERAPY Introduction People often encounter problems and difficulties that affect their general view of life and how they respond to certain situations. This may eventually lead to affecting how they function in various aspects of life, such as family relationship, social interaction, and job performance, among others. It is therefore imperative that individuals address the root causes of their problems in order to develop a healthier pattern of responses to life’s issues and difficulties and live a life with a positive disposition. This paper aims to discuss the differing roles of the therapeutic relationship in three different approaches to therapy; namely, psychodynamic therapy, person-centered therapy, and systemic family therapy. Relevant theoretical concepts are included in the discussion, particularly how they are applied to practice. It also includes reflections on personal understanding of the topic as well as reaction to materials presented in the lectures. The Psychodynamic Therapy The psychodynamic therapy is a mainstream therapy that focuses on aspects of personality and is suited to problems that deal with personalities and current relationships (Holmes 2003). It is based on a multifaceted theory of human interaction and development and embraces all others of analytic nature. The approach undertaken in this therapy is one in which the therapist keeps his own personality out of the picture, which is considered a vital aspect, enabling him to play a “blank canvas” on whom clients can project deep feelings about themselves (ibid). The therapist is able to aid the client in understanding how personal disturbances affect him. The psychodynamic therapy is a long-term therapy that may go on for years since understanding what goes on inside the client takes a long period of time. In this paper, the role of psychodynamic therapy includes the following: √ It benefits individuals who face big issues with their past and who are prepared to accept that these issues have effects on their whole lives. Since psychodynamic therapy is a long-term therapy, the individual, through the help of the therapist, is able to view the things that affect his life and how largely it is affected. He helps in bringing to the surface an individual’s true feelings in order for a full understanding of the individual’s self. It is assumed that once one is aware of what really goes on in his mind; feelings about a painful experience will not come as painful. This is why the psychodynamic therapy’s role is to encourage patients unravel the real feelings playing up in their subconscious since through this unraveling, the client will be able to accept the painful experiences and their corresponding feelings. This would lead to enabling him unload the baggage of emotional disruption and a better understanding of himself. √ Psychodynamic therapy assumes that defences (i.e., denial) are causing more harm than good; thus, unresolved conflict must be put to surface. Psychodynamic therapy is an insight-oriented therapy as it focuses on unconscious processes as they are manifested in a person’s current behavior (Messer and Warren 1995). Its goals include self-realization and understanding of the influences that contribute to the client’s past and present behavior. It basically enables the client to examine unresolved conflicts as well as symptoms transpiring out of past dysfunctional relationships. It uses the assumption that feelings about negative experiences -which are just too unlikely, if not too painful - are compounded in the unconscious mind. Denial, which serves as a defense to protect him, is the usual recourse of an individual about these feelings. The client should then be led toward acceptance of these feelings, however painful. The healing and change process involved in the therapy normally takes a minimum of two years of sessions, since the goal is to change an aspect of an individual’s personality and to integrate key development learning missed by the client due to being stuck in an emotional bout. One of the roles that the therapist takes is an attitude of unconditional acceptance, which is taking the patient in high regard because he (the client) is a person, no matter how bothered he is by his problem. With this, the therapist develops a relationship with the client in a pursuit to help him discover the contents of his unconscious mind. The therapist uses interpretations in order for the client become aware of his unconscious feelings that currently affect his general view of life. It is then a task of the therapist to ascertain how much the client is in touch with his own feelings. The Person-Centered Therapy The person-centered therapy is a counseling approach and psychotherapy that places much of responsibility of the treatment process on the client himself while the therapist takes a non-directive stance. It is also known as client-centered, non-directive or Rogerian therapy (Kahn 1999). The primary goals of the person-centered therapy include an increased self-esteem and greater openness to experience which the therapist intends to develop in a client in a non-directive strategy. Some of the outcomes embodied in this therapy are better understanding of self; closer agreement between the client’s idealized and actual selves; lower levels of defensiveness, insecurity, and guilt; an increased capacity to experience and express feelings at the moment of their occurrence; and a more positive and comfortable relationship with others (Donati, n.d.). It is built on the context that therapy should take place in a supportive and conducive environment formed by a close client-therapist relationship. The general direction of the therapy which impliedly aims to resolve certain conflicts within the client, is determined by the client himself, with the therapist taking a nondirective role who seeks to increase the client’s insight and self-understanding through clarifying questions raised informally (Casement 1985). The person-centered therapy does not follow a certain strict guideline pertaining to length of frequency since the client is the one who decides when to terminate it, which usually occurs when he feels better in coping with life’s difficulties (Clarkson 1995). In this paper, the role of the person-centered therapy includes the following: √ Enabling the client to become aware of his problems and difficulties without the therapist giving directions on resolving them. Self-actualization is an important concept that embodies the person-centered therapy aiming to move forward, grow, and reach the fullest potential of the individual. However, with problems or issues that affect behavior tremendously, this potential for self-actualization is a difficult path since it can be blocked by negative or unrealistic attitudes about oneself. It is thus, the task of the therapist to aid (not direct) the client resolve the barriers that keep him from attaining self-actualization, with the initial duty of guiding him towards self-realization and greater openness to experience. As the concept of actualization focuses on human strengths rather than deficiencies, the therapist intends that the client will in the long run develop a pro-social perspective – behaving in dependable, honest, and constructive ways. √Taking the role of congruence, unconditional positive regard, and empathy in its dealing with the client’s problems or issues. The person-centered therapy possesses the character of congruence – the therapist’s genuineness and openness in relating to the client without having to hide behind a professional façade (Kahn 1999). The therapist basically functions in ways wherein all his feelings are available to him during therapy sessions and essentially shares significant emotional reactions with the client in order for the latter to understand his own. It does not however, mean that with the therapist being open to share his feelings with the client, the focus of the therapy will then be towards the therapist, or a shift towards him may occur. Rather, the therapist encourages the client to reveal his own insights and emotions by being open and unafraid about them. Likewise, the therapist accepts the client with totality for who he is without censoring, evaluating and disproving certain aspects of his persona. This attitude is communicated by a willingness to listen without interrupting, assessing, or giving advice. The non-threatening environment with which the client expresses himself leads to a feeling of wanting to explore and share painful, hostile, or defensive feelings without being bothered by a likely rejection by the therapist (Gilbert and Leahy 2007). Along with this, the therapist takes an accurate empathetic understanding of the clients by trying to appreciate their situation from their point of view, showing sensitivity and emotional understanding of their feelings. In order for the therapy to proceed, empathy is a necessary component which actually constitutes a major portion of the therapeutic work itself (Kensit 2000). An active listening showing careful and perceptive attention to what the client says is a primary way of conveying empathy. The Family Systems Therapy The Family Systems Therapy is a kind of therapy designed for families and couples in intimate relationships, aiming to nurture change and development. It views change in terms of the systems of interaction and communication that occur between family members or couples in intimate relationships. It gives importance to family relationships as a signicfiacnt factor in psychological health. It holds on to a view that regardless of the origin of the difficulty and whether such may be considered an individual or a family problem, involving family situations in resolving a problem is often beneficial. With this view, it is important that families be integrated through direct participation in the therapy sessions (Dattilio 1998). The therapist should then possess a skill to influence conversations in a manner that catalyzes the strengths and support of the wider system (Denborough 2001). The concept of family does not only include immediate family members or others in blood relationship with the client, but also those who may not be related by blood but who have strongly supportive, long term roles and relationships with the client. The family systems therapy involves an advantage of making differences among the ways mutual relations and interaction patterns are perceived by family members, frequently mirroring the habitual ways in which they generally interact with one another. In this paper, the role of the family systems therapy includes the following: √ Focusing on relationship patterns rather than analyzing impulses of the unconscious mind or early childhood trauma of individuals. The family systems therapy emphasizes the interaction systems in which family members interact with one another and uses it in ascertaining how they impact the individuals and how they function as sources of difficulties. In order to accomplish this, the family therapist is one characterized as relational, who is generally more interested in what goes between and among people rather than in them (Rowan and Jacobs 2002). Elucidating the patterns of relationship across family members and generations is often played up by this therapy and seldom does it consider early childhood experiences kept in the unconscious mind in finding out the cause of a difficulty. The therapist may point out certain interaction patterns which family members may not have noticed, and suggest different ways of responding to members. These changes in responses alter the systemic state of the whole system (Sandler 1976). It is then imperative that a therapist (intergenerational, EFT, or experiential) must be interested in individuals, as in systems, to make the therapy successful. √ The role of solving a problem rather than identifying a single cause for a problem. The family systems therapy emphasizes not on a single cause in aiding individuals resolve a problem, but the solution of the problem itself. Focusing on the identification of a single cause can lead to blaming by some members which essentially leads to disruption of the therapy and accumulating more issues and problems, and is hence, not welcoming. Focusing on solving a problem is in congruity with the goal of the therapy to focus on systemic and interaction patterns that govern behaviors of individual members than in the identification of a single cause of it. Reflections on Personal Understanding of, and Reaction to the Materials Presented in the Lectures I believe that the materials presented in the lecture pertaining to the different psychotherapies are sufficient and substantial enough for one to understand. Through the thorough presentations, I may infer that psychotherapies are important components of understanding people’s behavior and personalities alongside with the issues and difficulties that assail them in everyday life. In today’s technological age and economic developments, individuals are generally geared toward satisfying social expectations pertaining to achievement, career success, and financial stability and little is emphasized on systematically diagnosing a person’s behavior and emotional disruptions that lead him to function ineffectively and unproductively in a social sphere. The course has thus, offered a myriad of realization that what goes on inside a person and between him and family members are important factors of his current behavior and valuing and focusing on how to resolve them would contribute so much in how the world can be a better place to live in. Bibliography Casement, P., 1985. On learning from the patient. London: Routledge. Clarkson, P., 1995. The therapeutic relationship: in Psychoanalysis, Counseling Psychology and Psychotherapy. London. Dattilio, F.R. (Ed.), 1998. Case Studies in Couple and Family Therapy: Systemic and Cognitive Perspectives. Guildford Press: New York. Denborough, D., 2001. Family Therapy: Exploring the Fields Past, Present and Possible Futures. Adelaide, South Australia: Dulwich Centre Publications. Donati, Mark, n.d. The role of self in counseling: Introduction to Counseling Psychology. Gilbert, Paul and Leahy, Robert L., 2007. Introduction and overview: basic issues in the therapeutic relationship. The therapeutic relationship in cognitive behavioral psychotherapies. Holmes, J., 2003. The role and relevance of psychoanalysis in contemporary psychiatry.  Psychiatry, Volume 4, Issue 5, Pages 1 - 2. Kahn, Edwin, 1999. A critique of non-directivity in the person-centered approach." Journal of Humanistic Psychology 39, no. 4: 94-110. Kensit, Denise A., 2000. Rogerian theory: a critique of the effectiveness of pure client-centered therapy." Counseling Psychology Quarterly 13, no. 4: 345-351. Messer, Stanley B. and Warren, Seth C., 1995. Models of brief psychodynamic therapy: a comparative approach. Library of Congress. Rowan, J. & Jacobs, M., 2002. The Therapist’s Use of Self. Open University Press. Chapters 1 and 6. Sandler, J., 1976. Countertransference and role responsiveness. International Review of Psychoanalysis, 3: 43-47. Read More