Prior to beginning therapy, 88 children (ages 6-12) participated in either a therapy preparation interview or a social history interview that was irrelevant to therapy. It was found that prepared clients were less likely to terminate therapy prematurely. (Author)

H. J. Eyseneck comments on the relation between A-B status of therapists and success of treatment in the first article. The second article contains a reply by Leonard E. James. (HMV)

Both volunteer and nonvolunteer subjects were randomly assigned to one of two conditions. In the choice condition, subjects were led to believe that they had a choice, and in the second condition subjects were denied the choice of treatment. Volunteer subjects who were given a choice significantly valued the treatment more. (Author)

Interpersonal feedback is an important component of most group therapy approaches. This review identifies feedback as a multidimensional rather than a unidimensional construct. The literature is reviewed in terms of acceptance of feedback, effects of receiving feedback, willingness to deliver feedback, and therapeutic effects of delivering…

Presents a provisional list of 11 good moments in psychotherapeutic sessions, that is, when clients manifest therapeutic process, movement, improvement, progress, or change. Lines of research inquiry are opened up by the proposed list. (Author/BL)

Developed and tested the Shoplifter Offenders Program (SOP) which uses the principles of Ellis' rational-emotive therapy (RET) as the conceptual foundation for the intensive, 8-hour, psychoeducational group counseling experience with adult first offender shoplifters (N=94). Results showed a recidivism rate of approximately one percent. (LLL)

Presents a brief statement of essential conditions for psychotherapeutic change: (a) a helping relationship patterned after the parent-child relationship; (b) the creation of a power base from which the therapist influences the client through common psychological techniques; and (c) a client who has the capacity to profit from the experience.…

The MMPI was used to derive personality measures. Therapist and patient ratings of the therapy relationship served as the dependent variables. Therapy outcomes were found to be positively related to therapist's level of anxiety and negatively related to therapist's level of repressiveness. Patients' levels of anxiety and repressiveness were both…

This article summarizes the theory of early recollections in a way that suggests its adaptation to current practice in counseling and psychotherapy. (Author)

Outlines tenets of multimodal therapy (MMT) and argues for its cost-effective yet comprehensive value as a brief psychotherapy model. Describes MMT as an integrated, seven-modality model of personality and provides clinical examples of its use. Argues that MMT approach will be an important future alternative to more expensive, time-consuming, and…

Uses case vignettes to explore poetry as phenomenological access point to the world of the abused child, serving a threefold function: (1) a window into the child's world; (2) a way to track the abused child's progress along the recovery process; and (3) a tool for transforming abused children's worlds, by allowing them to find their own unique…

Describes a poetry group developed for older adults with functional mental health problems, based at a day hospital in the United Kingdom. Evaluates the group's effectiveness using both quantitative pre and post measures and qualitative feedback. Finds that all group members enjoyed the group, and that its benefits seemed to lie on a continuum…

Thirty-one community-residing older adults age 60 or over either received 16 sessions of individual cognitive psychotherapy (Beck, Rush, Shaw, & Emery, 1979) or read Feeling Good (Burns, 1980) for bibliotherapy. Posttreatment comparisons with the delayed-treatment control indicated that both treatments were superior to a delayed-treatment control.…

Randomized trial evidence and expert guidelines are mixed regarding the value of combined pharmacotherapy and psychotherapy as initial treatment for depression. This study describes long-term results of a randomized trial (N = 393) evaluating telephone-based cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) plus care management for primary care patients…