suffering. This chapter presents ways in which therapy—both psychological
and biological—can help troubled people cope with life.Objectives
After completing this chapter, you will be able to- define therapy;
- distinguish between psychologically based therapies and biologically based ther-
apies; - specify some principal features of psychoanalysis;
- describe key aspects of client-centered therapy;
- identify central concepts associated with behavior therapy;
- explain the basic assumption underlying cognitive-behavior therapy;
- state the value of group therapy;
- list basic kinds of psychiatric drugs.
Mental disorders are far from hopeless conditions. Gone are the days when
mental patients were written off as outcasts and lost members of the human race.
Today there are treatments. The treatments have varying degrees of effectiveness.
Sometimes a given treatment provides dramatic relief. More often, a particular
patient will recover slowly, and treatment becomes a prolonged process.
Treatment for mental disorders is given in the form of various kinds of ther-
apy. Therapyconsists of procedures that aim to either cure sick people or allevi-
ate their suffering. The term is applied to general medicine as well as to clinical
psychology and psychiatry. In the mental health field there are two basic cate-
gories of therapy: psychologically based therapies and biologically based therapies.
Psychologically based therapiesbegin with the assumption that mental disor-
ders are caused by emotional conflicts, maladaptive learning, cognitive errors, or
similar behavioral processes. These therapies recognize that the suffering individ-
ual may be free of organic pathology, that there is often nothing objectively wrong
with the brain and nervous system.
Psychotherapyis the general term applied to any kind of psychologically
based therapy. A presentation of various kinds of psychotherapy constitutes a prin-
cipal portion of this chapter. The literal meaning of the term psychotherapyis
“healing of the mind” or “healing of the self.”
Biologically based therapiesbegin with the assumption that mental dis-232 PSYCHOLOGY