AIM:

The research is to find out where the therapy originated, including the name of the person who first introduced the therapy and a brief history if possible. Provide a short summary of any clinical research or scientific evidence that supports the validity of the therapy. List of conditions the therapy is best suited to treat. A summary of how the therapy works to assist the client. Contras or dangers associated with using the therapy. A bibliography listing the resources used to find the information, including websites and publications.

FINDINGS:

Steven. C Hayes – Born, August 12, 1948
An American clinical psychologist known for devising, a behavior analysis of human language and cognition called relation from work and it’s clinical application to various psychological difficulties.

• _  President American Associate
• _  American Association of Applied and Preventive Psychology
• _  Association of Advancement of Behavior Therapy (now known as the Association of Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies
• _  Association for Contextual Behavioral Science
• _  Secretary and Treasure of the American Psychological Society (now known as the Association for Psychologist Science).
• _  1992 listed as 30th “Highest Impact” Psychologist in the world during 1986-1990 – based on the impact of his writing during that period.
• The Psychologist that developed a widely – used and evidence – based procedure called “Acceptance and Commitment Therapy” which is used in counselling all around the world these days.
• “Acceptance and Commitment Therapy” is an evidence-based therapy that can be used on Stress, Anxiety, Depression, Social Anxiety, Obsessive Compulsive Disorders, Psychosis, Chronic Pain – Fibromyalgia, Childhood Trauma, Substance Abuse and Diabetes.

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is a growing psychotherapy system with strong empirical support. This growth not only proceeds from the robust literature showing its effectiveness but also from its empirical anchorage, the relational frame theory on human language. In a recently formed alliance with similar approaches, ACT is situated within what has been dubbed the third wave of behaviour therapy.

As a contextual behavioural approach, ACT sees emotional and behavioural difficulties as arising from psychological inflexibility: the rigidity avoidance of these experiences, at the expense of one’s chosen values in life
The aim of the intervention is to reverse this rigidity by increasing psychological flexibility, ergo, to create a meaningful life while accepting the inevitable pain and joy that goes with it.

There are six (6) core processes to Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT):

Defusion –

* Sing your thoughts

* Give your mind a name

*Write Thoughts on cards and carry them in your pocket

Acceptance –

* Practice the opposite

* Give difficult feeling a colour, weight, speed, and shape

* Practice dropping the rope

Presence –

* Do a scan of your bodily sensations

* Notice single and multiple attention targets

* Open your focus

Self –

* Rewrite your story

*Notice who is noticing

* Remember I’m not that

Values –

* Write out your values

* Play “I’ve got a secret”

*Do a values card sort

Committed – Action –

* Hook new habits to establish routines

* Share your commitment with a good friend

* Link values to S.M.A.R.T. goals

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy as you can see above is a type of psychotherapy that helps people accept the difficulties that comes with life. It is “NOW” a form of Mindfulness based therapy. It’s all about encouraging people to embrace their thoughts and feels rather than fighting or feeling guilty for them.

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy has had a few clinical trials and has come up as a very useful psychotherapy. Clinical trials against Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) for anxiety disorders, overall improvement was similar between ACT and CBT, indicating that ACT is a highly viable treatment for anxiety disorders. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy has had clinical trails with patients suffering from psychosis and history of trauma, conclusion, offered in a group appears a promising treatment.

Clinical studies suggest that ACT can be effective in improving emotion regulation among individuals with symptom’s of many mental health issues.

CONCLUSIONS:

There are no findings of any dangers associates to Acceptance and Commitment Therapy but as Steve. C. Hayes states on his website

“Sometimes psychological flexibility training leads to major progress, and because people feel they have “solved” the problem that inspired them to try ACT, they stop working on the skills.

That’s a great shame because if you keep practicing the skills and consciously applying them to new domains of your life, you can keep evolving your life in accordance with your chosen values. You have to keep practicing because rigid ways of thinking and acting will always keep sneaking up on us”.

NOTES AND REFERENCES:

aipc.net.au/articles/six-principles-of-acceptance-and-commitment-therapy/ allevents.in/wellington/acceptance-and-commitment-therapy-act-introductory-workshop-nov- 2019/1000055732174434

books.google.com.au/books?hl=en&lr=&id=C1aRDwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PT14&dq=act+therapy&ots= Y-UfQDLkZo&sig=MtJqVxxtvJw2S- auiS8smMjf0nM&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=act%20therapy&f=false

psychologytoday.com/us/therapy-types/acceptance-and-commitment-therapy psycnet.apa.org/record/2012-12071-001 psycnet.apa.org/record/2012-12071-001

researchgate.net/publication/320087357_Acceptance_and_commitment_therapy_for_psychosis_and_trauma _Improvement_in_psychiatric_symptoms_emotion_regulation_and_treatment_compliance_following_a_bri ef_group_intervention

researchgate.net/publication/332019818_Acceptance_and_commitment_therapy_ACT_and_humanistic_psy chotherapy_An_integrative_approximation

researchgate.net/publication/315761695_The_Humanistic_Perspective_in_Psychology

stevenchayes.com/my-act-toolkit/ stevenchayes.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/How-to-Use-_My-ACT-Tool-Kit_.pdf studylib.net/doc/9857807/microsoft-powerpoint—uwe-research-repository

questia.com/library/journal/1G1-105478984/first-second-and-third-force-psychology-serve-as