Positive psychotherapy (PPT) is an established psychological intervention initially validated with people experiencing symptoms of depression. PPT is a positive psychology intervention, an academic discipline that has developed somewhat separately from psychotherapy and focuses on amplifying well-being rather than ameliorating deficit. The processes targeted in PPT (e.g., strengths, forgiveness...

Fenton WS: Evolving perspectives on individual psychotherapy for schizophrenia. Schizophrenia Bulletin 2000; 26(1):47–72 Summary: This article provides a history of theory about individual psychotherapy for schizophrenia as well as a literature review of randomized clinical trials that have evaluated individual psychotherapy of schizophrenia. The authors note that the most common treatment for ...

Many studies document the efficacy of psychotherapy for acute syndromes such as depression, but less is known about personality change in patients treated for personality pathology. The Shedler-Westen Assessment Procedure (SWAP-200; Westen & Shedler, 1999a, 1999b) is an assessment tool that measures a broad spectrum of personality constructs and is designed to bridge the gap between the clinica...

Psychotherapy has been shown to be effective, but efforts to prove specific effects by placebo-controlled trials have been practically and conceptually hampered. We propose that adopting open/hidden designs from placebo research would offer a possible way to establish specificity in psychotherapy. Therefore, we tested the effects of providing opposing treatment rationales in an online expressiv...

BACKGROUND Clinical evidence suggests that patients high on psychological strengths profit more from destabilizing psychotherapy, whereas patients low on strengths profit more from stabilizing psychotherapy. This matching hypothesis was tested. METHODS This quasi-experimental study was conducted between 2003 and 2008 in 735 patients with personality disorders from 6 psychotherapy centers in t...

This article revisits the case formulation approach to psychotherapy outcome research, first proposed by Persons (1991). Persons asserted that randomized clinical trials (RCTs) of psychotherapy do not test the theoretical underpinnings of psychotherapy models since these trials standardize rather than individualize patient problems, ignore the link between individualized assessment and treatmen...

Group psychotherapy provides unique opportunities for clinical errors in the selection of patients and composition of therapy groups. This article introduces some of the difficulties and complexities that can be associated with group composition and patient selection errors. Clinical vignettes from psychodynamic/interpersonal psychotherapy groups are used to illustrate three variations of group...

INTRODUCTION An increasing number of adults diagnosed with a high-functioning autism spectrum disorder are diagnosed as being adult, so much the treatment applicable conditions, and possibly the clinical outcome. As a complement to medication and individual psychotherapy, group psychotherapy treatment is a clinical tool that offers significant advantages in the treatment of this syndrome. MET...