Persistent Disorders and Treatments

This assignment will require you to select a psychological disorder and pair it with a form of psychotherapy that has demonstrable success. You will also create a therapy session transcript that shows successful application of therapeutic communication skills. In your work as a mental health provider, you will be called upon to identify, interpret, and successfully apply evidence-based therapies. The transcript exercise provides you the opportunity to demonstrate competence in applying basic therapeutic communication skills you learned and practiced in Units 3 and 4, and at least one technique of the approach you selected to assist your fictional client. This assignment also provides practice in matching therapies to client concerns—which will you will do again in Unit 10—while at the same time incorporating theories of multicultural therapies.

INSTRUCTIONS

For this 9–12 page assignment, you will choose a psychological disorder from the following DSM-5 categories:

• Depressive disorders, anxiety disorders, trauma and stress related disorders, OR
• Substance-related and addictive disorders.

You will then choose an approach to psychotherapy that has a proven track record. You will also create a therapy session transcript. In that imaginary session, you will explain to the client the type of therapy you would like to use (See 10.1 Informed Consent to Therapy, and 4.02, Discussing the Limits of Confidentiality in the Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct. Link in the Resources) as well as demonstrating the therapeutic communication skills of reflection (thoughts and affect), empathic statements, and open-ended questions.

The first 5–6 pages of the paper should describe the client’s demography and presenting concern; it should then provide an academically-based reason for your choice of therapeutic approach to use with the client. The final 3–4 pages will be the transcript of a fictional client.

EXAMPLE OF IDENTIFICATION OF SKILL SET WITHIN TRANSCRIPT [EXCERPT OF MIDDLE OF A SESSION]

Therapist: Hi, how are things going today? [open-ended question]

Client: Everyone hates me.

Therapist: Can you tell me more….who is “everyone”? [open-ended question]

Client: My dad is always on my butt to mow the yard, my mom yells at me about my bedroom. She wants it to look like no one sleeps there, and none of my friends are talking to me at school.

Therapist: I want to make sure I understand correctly, right now your friends are not being so friendly, and your mom and dad are mostly interested in their house and yard. [paraphrase]

Client: EXACTLY! Did they have me just so I could provide free labor?

Therapist: Feeling used can weaken the best of relationships. [empathic statement] Can you tell me when you noticed that your friends stopped talking to you? [open ended question, clarifying question]

To successfully complete this assignment, you must meet the following requirements:

• Written communication: Written communication is grammatically correct and free of errors that detract from the overall message. Writing should be consistent with graduate level scholarship.
• APA formatting: Title page, main body, references should be formatted according to APA (6th Edition) style and formatting.
• Number of resources: Minimum of 6–7 resources.
• Length of paper: 9–12 typed double-spaced pages to include 3–4 page session transcript, title page, and references. No abstract or table of contents is required. Do not exceed 12 pages for the entire project, title page through reference page.
• Font: Times New Roman, 12 pt