I review the Common Factors Model, the Empirically Validated Therapy Model, and the Recovery Model of therapeutic change and effectiveness. In general, psychotherapy appears to be effective and common factors account for more of the variance than do specific techniques. However, in some areas, particularly in the treatment of anxiety disorders,…

This study had two objectives. The first objective was to evaluate how well sex and sex-role orientation predicted receptivity to psychotherapy. The second objective was to evaluate whether exposure to gender-congruent therapy videos influenced participants' receptivity to psychotherapy. Participants were randomly assigned to three conditions: (1)…

Concern about the effects of counseling on ethnic minority clients has been repeatedly raised. Before embarking on a formal course of multicultural counseling sensitivity for counseling center staff, baseline client outcome data were sought as a method for evaluating the effects of this intervention. Archival data from a university counseling…

Introduction: Child-centered play therapy is a well recognized and research-supported form of child psychotherapy. Methods: Fifteen children in the age range of 5-11 years (eight girls and seven boys) with somatoform disorder were administered 25 sessions of non directive play therapy. Parents received 3 reflective counseling sessions. Children…

Few questions in psychotherapy are of greater importance than the relationship among practitioners, researchers, and managed care. The present and future roles of psychotherapy are covered here. Despite ample evidence that psychotherapy does work, its effectiveness continues to be questioned. When psychotherapy research emerged some 50 years ago,…

This document reviews outcome studies on the long- and short-term treatment of depression and critiques the methodologies used in these studies. Twenty-four studies comparing length of treatment and outcome of psychotherapy are included in the review. The majority of the studies reviewed involved individual adult outpatients as subjects. The terms…

This paper suggests that in an increasingly multicultural world, cultural competence requires that racism, power, oppression, and privilege be fully acknowledged and addressed to maximize the effectiveness of clinical interventions. Psychotherapists must learn to appropriately address racial or cultural differences in the therapy room. In order to…

Author describes the Perls perversion, the ego-centered attitude that people should live up to one's expectations and satisfy one's whims, which causes interpersonal friction. RET helps people counteract this perversion by sensitizing them to their internalized irrational belief system, disputing it, and trying to behave rationally. Commentary by…

Although some psychotherapists have adopted aspects of mentoring in their style of therapy, there is little research on behavior change resulting from effective mentoring relationships. To investigate and evaluate the extent to which psychotherapists use mentoring and judge it to be effective with young adult clients, 110 psychotherapists and 90…

Incest is an issue that generates strong emotional reactions in psychotherapists as well as laypeople. Clinicians may not be immune to the tendancy to overreact by predicting poor outcomes for incest victims or by denying its importance altogether. To assess the effect of incest on the evaluations of female clients by therapists, 124 clinicians…

This paper introduces and defines photography, presents an overview of its applications, and shows how photographs can be used adjunctively as both artifacts and metaphors. Examples are given to demonstrate the usefulness of pictures in gathering information about a client's world, taking a history, formulating a diagnosis, and creating…

The Vanderbilt Negative Indicators Scale (VNIS), an instrument designed to quantify characteristics of the patient, the therapist, and their interactions, was developed as part of an investigation of negative effects in psychotherapy by the Vanderbilt Psychotherapy Research Team. Revision of the original 25-item scale has proceeded in two major…

Five myths permeate the counseling and psychotherapy literature. Two of these myths concern the absolute and differential effects of counseling and psychotherapy. Contrary to the conclusions of Smith and Glass's (1977) meta-analysis, it has not been established that aggregated counseling and psychotherapy schools are effective at all, much less…

Chicanos are bilingual-bicultural people; thus, they need to be treated as such. The counselor cannot ignore these cultural traits. Therefore, two culturally relevant counseling models have been developed. The Bilingual-Bicultural Counseling Model, designed for college students, has a behavioristic base and therapeutic intervention strategies that…

Analyzed process of change in "best" sessions of Emotionally Focused Marital Therapy (EFT). Rated client performance in therapy on depth of experiencing and quality of interpersonal interactions. Noted occurrences of particular change events arising from theoretical principles of EFT. Confirmed that higher levels of experiencing and more…