Compare and contrast Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and Solution Focused Brief Therapy

This paper will focus on client’s presenting concerns and her biopsysocial system. Reader will explore how Solution Focused Therapy and Harm Reduction Therapy are relevant to client’s problems and why they would be most effective for client. Two intervention models that are relevant to the theories chosen will be outlined and how they relate to the client. An intervention plan that includes goals for the client will be evaluated and measured. Finally, the paper will discuss how the model chosen for intervention will have an impact on the macro level of change.

In this paper, I will discuss the case study of “Ana”. Ana is 24 years old, has lost her job, and worries about becoming homeless. She currently is a single parent due to her husband being deployed in a combat zone overseas for the next eight months. Ana is a first generation immigrant from Guatemala; she comes from a large family. She claims to have a close relationship with her family but has not seen her family for about a year. Her father is a banker and her mother an educator, her three siblings all has graduated college and have professional careers. Ana has completed one year of college, but needed to leave school after her son was born, finding it difficult to manage being a parent, student and a full-time employee as well. While showing signs of being depressed and anxious, she has agreed to eight sessions for treatment. Using this background information in this paper will cover the use of Solution Focused Brief Therapy (SFBT) for the treatment of Ana.

This term paper is about solution-focused therapy and experiential therapy. In solution-focused therapy, the therapy does not emphasize the problem at all; it stresses and highlights the solution. The client is the expert and not the therapist. The experiential approach is often used to facilitate meaningful changes in individuals. SFBT is a short-term goal focused therapeutic approach which directs clients to focus on developing solutions, rather than on dwelling on problems. The theoretical framework, how change occurs, therapeutic techniques, postmodern perspective, the role of the therapist and some clinical examples are given in this term paper.

Client resistance is ever present in the social work profession. As per Goldstein (1995), resistance presents itself in treatment within the client’s conscious or unconscious actions which interfere with therapeutic progress. Assessing the complex dynamic causing a client’s resistant behavior during clinical treatment is a challenging, but an essential task for goal achievement. According to Woods and Hollis (2000), understanding why a client is resistant facilitates reaching common ground with the client, enabling realistic goal setting. The causality of resistance is often discomfort associated with the client not being in a state of readiness, further emphasizing the need for mutual goal setting in order to obtain treatment progression.

Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) is a relatively new form of therapy derived from a combination of cognitive and behaviour interventions, which are constructed on empirical evaluation of communication and cognitions (Hayes, 2004).

“The goal of CBT is to teach clients how to separate the evaluation of their behaviour from the evaluation of themselves and how to accept themselves in spite of imperfections” (Corey, 2009, p. 279). In CBT the clients are expected to change their current behaviour (normally full of automatic thoughts) to a more rational way of thinking. The clinician will challenge the client’s behaviour in order for the client to understand his or her behaviour and get alternatives to change his/her behaviour. When using CBT, the client’s behaviour changes when they are aware of the abnormal behaviour. This approach allows the client to focus on improving his/her wellbeing. This enhances the client’s awareness of an existing issue and that changes are necessary. The client will develop new coping skills to deal with the situation and develop a new way of thinking from negative (automatic thoughts) to positive (more realistic thoughts). Initially the client may not recognise that a problem exists, but through this process will get

My current therapy practicum at Hartgrove Hospital is primarily focused on Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy but as I have been working with clients over the past 6 months, I have experienced some personal and professional discrepancies between the theory of CBT and how I conceptualize clients and my role as a therapist. The hospital emphasizes the teaching of coping skills, which in line with CBT has the client learning new ways of handling their emotions. While I agree that teaching coping skills, cognitive restructuring, etc. are important for many clients, I have consistently felt like something was missing. I have been exposed to Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) briefly in the past during my classes and during a didactic at practicum, but I have not done an in-depth examination of how it differs from CBT and what its theoretical and philosophical bases are. I wanted to take this paper as an opportunity to learn more about a therapy that may fit better with how I work with clients and how I view my role as a therapist.

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is one of the recent contemporary psychological interventions used today. Researched over the past 40 years, and more effectively utilized in the past decade for a diverse range of clinical conditions. The initial industry reaction to (ACT) was free- flowing, both positive and negative. Nevertheless, Hayes (2008) suggested that the negative reactions mainly stemmed from just the misunderstandings of ACT. Hofmann & Asmundson (2008) had much to say about the technical level (ACT), and made comment that it was too similar to cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT).

Acceptance Commitment Therapy is a rather new therapy used to treat a variation of psychological issues ranging from anxiety, PTSD, suicidal tendencies, and more. This treatment has a few components that make it up; Defusion, Acceptance, present moment, observing self, values, and committed action. (Todd, J., & Bohart, A. C. 2006) The components of the therapy’s meanings are not complicated, as Todd and Bohart (2006) continue; defusion is the separation of a thought from the individual’s identity, acceptance requires the participant to accept things about themselves that they were previously pushing away, present moment refers to patients not dwelling in the past or worrying about the future, instead they focus on the here and now, observing

Acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) has a small but growing database of support. One hundred and one heterogeneous outpatients reporting moderate to severe levels of anxiety or depression were randomly assigned to traditional cognitive therapy (CT) or to ACT. To maximize external validity, the authors utilized very minimal exclusion criteria. Participants receiving CT and ACT evidenced large, equivalent improvements in depression, anxiety, functioning difficulties, quality of life, life satisfaction, and clinician-rated functioning. Whereas improvements were equivalent across the two groups, the mechanisms of action appeared to differ. Changes in “observing” and “describing” one’s experiences appeared to mediate outcomes for the CT group

Terms discussed in paper: CBT: Cognitive-behavioural therapy; HEP: Health enhancement program; TAU: Treatment as usual; TRD: Treatment-resistant depression; Mediators: Measurable changes during a treatment; MBCT: Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy;

In addition to the brief, first visit interview a therapist could use an introduction to ACT. ACT stands for Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. It is an empirically based psychosocial intervention (Long, 2015). Although it is considered a therapy, the initial steps to ACT can be used to give a therapist more information about the client. It is important for the therapist to understand what may be important to the patient to begin their sessions together. According to Long (2015), it is a conceptual model that guides the processes of clinical assessment, intervention, and consultation. In other words, it can benefit and aide in the process of diagnosis, treatment, and conversation. This is extremely important because the therapist then

The major differences between the models are suggested in acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT). ACT suggests clients must open up, be present and familiar with self-actualization for therapy to work. The differences propose that only clients who are willing and ready to change will be successful in therapy. Furthermore, it advances that clients who are not tuned into their potential or want to fulfill their talents are unable to succeed.

In SFBT, the therapist checks with the George regularly to see how he is doing in reaching his solutions or goals by asking scaling questions. This technique can be creatively applied to tap on the client’s perception about a wide range of

Acceptance and commitment therapy, formally called comprehensive distancing, helps individuals connect their thoughts, feelings, and emotions with their self-as-context or the self that is experiencing and observing the world. The western philosophy of psychology teaches people that some possess troubled minds while others do not. In ACT, the theory suggests that troubles come within ourselves and arise out of hiccups up in our thought or emotional processes. As a result of these emotional and cognitive disturbances, ACT holds that people thrash against these unpleasant thoughts and feelings. Instead of just accepting them, people create experiential avoidance for themselves, pushing thoughts out of their head or failing to engage in behaviors that make them anxious or depressed.