Cognitive, behavioral and systematic intervention strategies,

1. Interventions in Counseling
By
Dr. Satish Raj
Assistant Professor
School of Education
Lovely Professional University Jalandhar, Punjab, India
Email:- satishnurpur@gmail.com
+91 7589110552

2. Counseling techniques
• Person centered and group centered
• Person Centered counselling technique
formerly referred to as Clint-centered
counselling and Rogerian approach
• Developed by Carl R. Rogers
• Stresses client’s responsibility and capability
to identify and cope with the reality
• It is related to an unique problem faced by the
individual

3. Counseling techniques
There are six conditions account for personality
change in the client advocated by Rogers
1. Two people are in psychological contact
2. The client is experiencing a state of anxiety,
distress
3. The therapist is genuine in relating the client
4. The therapist feels or exhibits unconditional
positive regard for the client
5. The therapist exhibits empathetic understanding
of the client’s conditions
6. The therapist succeeds to minimum degree in
communication

4. Counseling techniques
Rogerian theory is optimistic in its view to
humankind.
Clients are seen as good and possessing the
capability of self-understanding, insight,
problem solving, decision making, change and
growth.
Counsellor’s role is of facilitator and reflector.

5. Counseling techniques
Group centered counselling techniques
Basic assumption for this is that humans are
group centered. People are meant to live in
groups and respect each other in group
settings.
Groups are most influenced by how a person
grows, learns, develop behavioural patterns,
coping styles, values, career potentials and
adjustment techniques.

6. Counseling techniques
Assumptions of group centered techniques
Understanding of the influences and dynamics of the
groups can be improved by understanding the
individuals.
Understanding of the organization and utilisation of the
groups can help in teaching and guiding others
Group counselling can be more effective in some
situations
 Special groups can benefit more by providing
counselling that is specially designed for their unique
needs

7. Counseling techniques
Group counselling refers to the group activities
for providing adjustment or developmental
experiences delivered in group settings.
Group counselling focus on assisting
counselees to cope with their day to day
adjustment and developmental concerns.
Behavioural modification, developing personal
relationship skills, values etc which concerned
with the group life.

8. Cognitive interventions
Cognitions are thoughts, beliefs, and internal
images that people have about events in their life.
Cognitive counselling theories focus on mental
processes and their influences on mental health
and behaviour.
Cognitive Therapy aims to change our thought
patterns, the beliefs we may or may not know we
hold, our attitudes, and ultimately our behavior in
order to help us face our difficulties and more
effectively strive towards our goals.

9. Cognitive interventions
Characteristics of the clients to make cognitive
theories successful
1. Clients are average to above average in
intelligence.
2. They have moderate to high levels of functional
distress
3. They are able to identify thoughts and feelings
4. They are not disabled by present problems
5. They are able to willing to complete the tasks
given by the counsellors
6. They can process the information on visual and
auditory level.

10. Cognitive interventions
• The founder of Cognitive Therapy is a
psychiatrist named Aaron Beck
• He realized how strong the link between
thoughts and feelings can be. He altered the
therapy he practiced in order to help his clients
identify, understand, and deal with the
automatic, emotion-filled thoughts that arise
throughout the day.

11. Cognitive interventions
• CT is a process of teaching, coaching, and
reinforcing positive behaviors. CT helps people to
identify cognitive patterns or thoughts and
emotions that are linked with behaviors.”
• Thinking: Different people can think differently
about the same event. The way in which we think
about an event influences how we feel and how
we act.
• A classic example is that when looking at a glass
of water filled halfway, one person will see it half
empty and feel discouraged and the other sees it
half full and feels optimistic.

12. Cognitive interventions
• Cognitive distortions
• Arbitrary Inference: refers to making conclusions
without supporting and relevant evidence.
• Selective abstraction: consists of forming conclusions
based on an isolation detail of an event.
• Overgeneralization
• Personalization
• Labeling and Mislabeling: involve portraying one’s
identity on the basis of imperfections and mistakes
made in the past.
• Polarized Thinking: involve thinking and interpreting
in all-or nothing terms, or categorizing experiences in
extremes.

13. Cognitive interventions
• Techniques of cognitive therapy
• Techniques are an interesting set of exercises
that help modify a person's behavioral patterns.
The behavioral patterns are modified in order
to bring about positive changes in the
personality.

14. Cognitive interventions
1. Cognitive Rehearsals
• In this technique, the patient is asked to recall a
problematic situation of the past.
• The therapist and patient both work together to
find out a solution for the problem or a way in
which the difficult situation, if it occurs in the
future can be sorted out.
• The therapist asks the patient to rehearse positive
thoughts cognitively in order to make appropriate
changes to the latter's thought processes.
• Power of imagination proves to be of great use in
such exercises.

15. Cognitive interventions
2. Validity Testing
• In this techniques the therapist tests validity of
beliefs/thoughts of the patient.
• The patient is allowed to defend his viewpoint
by means of objective evidence.
• The faulty nature or invalidity of the beliefs of
the patient is exposed if he/she is unable to
produce any kind of objective evidence

16. Cognitive interventions
3. Guided Discovery
• The objective or purpose behind using this
technique is that of helping patients by
enabling them to understand their cognitive
distortions.
• Patients are made aware of and assisted by
therapists in understanding how they process
information.

17. Cognitive interventions
4. Modeling
• It is one of the cognitive therapy techniques in
which therapists perform role-playing
exercises aimed at responding in a way that is
helpful to overcome difficult situations.
• The patient makes use of this behavior of the
therapist as a model in order to solve problems
he/she comes across.

18. Cognitive interventions
5. Reinforcement
• The systematic positive reinforcement is one
of the techniques of CBT therapy in which
certain (positive) behavior of a person are
rewarded with positive reinforcement.
• A reinforcement system is established for the
of certain positive behavior.

19. Cognitive interventions
6. Self-instructional coping methods
• The therapist attempts not to completely
change the way you think, but rather teaches
coping methods that equip you to handle
harmful thought processes. One such
therapeutic process is stress inoculation
training.

20. Behavioral interventions
• Behavioral theory is based on the belief that
behavior is learned. Classic conditioning is one
type of behavioral therapy that stems from
early theorist Ivan Pavlov’s research. Pavlov
executed a famous study using dogs, which
focused on the effects of a learned response
(e.g., a dog salivating when hearing a bell)
through a stimulus (e.g., pairing the sound of a
bell with food).

21. Behavioral interventions
• B. F. Skinner developed another behavioral
therapy approach, called operant conditioning.
He believed in the power of rewards to
increase the likelihood of a behavior and
punishments to decrease the occurrence of a
behavior. Behavioral therapists work on
changing unwanted and destructive behaviors
through behavior modification techniques such
as positive or negative reinforcement.

22. Behavioral interventions
• What is behavioral therapy?
• Behavioral therapy is an umbrella term for
types of therapy that treat mental health
disorders.
• This form of therapy seeks to identify and help
change potentially self-destructive or
unhealthy behaviors.
• It functions on the idea that all behaviors are
learned and that unhealthy behaviors can be
changed. The focus of treatment is often on
current problems and how to change them.

23. Behavioral interventions
• Who can benefit from behavioral therapy?
• Behavioral therapy can benefit people with a wide range of
disorders.
• People most commonly seek behavioral therapy to treat:
• Depression
• Anxiety
• Panic disorders
• Anger issues
• Eating disorders
• Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
• Bipolar disorder
• Phobias, including social phobias
• Obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD)
• Self-harm
• Substance abuse

24. Behavioral interventions
• Types of behavioral therapy
• There are a number of different types of
behavioral therapy:
• Cognitive behavioral therapy
• Cognitive behavioral therapy is extremely
popular. It combines behavioral therapy with
cognitive therapy.
• Treatment is centered around how someone’s
thoughts and beliefs influence their actions and
moods. It often focuses on a person’s current
problems and how to solve them. The long-term
goal is to change a person’s thinking and
behavioral patterns to healthier ones.

25. Behavioral interventions
• Play therapy
• Play therapy is commonly used with children.
By watching children play, therapists are able
to gain insight into what a child is
uncomfortable expressing or unable to express.
Children may be able to choose their own toys
and play freely. They might be asked to draw a
picture or use toys to create scenes in a
sandbox. Therapists may teach parents how to
use play to improve communication with their
children.

26. Behavioral interventions
• System desensitization
• System desensitization relies heavily on
classical conditioning. It’s often used to treat
phobias. People are taught to replace a fear
response to a phobia with relaxation responses.
A person is first taught relaxation and
breathing techniques. Once mastered, the
therapist will slowly expose them to their fear
in heightened doses while they practice these
techniques.

27. Behavioral interventions
• Aversion therapy
• Aversion therapy is often used to treat
problems such as substance abuse and
alcoholism. It works by teaching people to
associate a stimulus that’s desirable but
unhealthy with an extremely unpleasant
stimulus. The unpleasant stimulus may be
something that causes discomfort. For
example, a therapist may teach you to
associate alcohol with an unpleasant memory.

28. Systematic Intervention Strategies
• Systems theory, also called systems science, is the
multidisciplinary study of systems to investigate
phenomena from a holistic approach. Systems,
which can be natural or man-made and living or
nonliving, are found in many aspects of human life.
• People who adhere to systems thinking, or the systemic
perspective, believe it is impossible to truly understand
a phenomenon by breaking it up into its basic
components.
• They believe, rather, that a global perspective is
necessary for comprehending the entire phenomenon.

29. Systematic Intervention Strategies
• DEVELOPMENT OF SYSTEMS THEORY
• Systems theory finds some of its roots within the
biological sciences, as some of the founders of its core
concepts, including Ludwig Bertalanffy and
Humberto Maturana, were biologists.
• One of the main perspectives of systems theory is
viewing an individual or group as its own ecosystem
with many moving parts that affect each other.
Principles of systems theory have been applied to the
field of psychology to explore and explain behavioral
patterns.
• This approach was recommended by Gregory Bateson,
Murray Bowen, Anatol Rapoport, W. Ross Ashby, and
many more.

30. Systematic Intervention Strategies
• CONCEPTS OF SYSTEMS THEORY
• A system is characterized by a group of parts
that interact to form a coherent whole.
• Changes in one component of a system will
affect other components as well as the overall
entity. This dynamic makes it possible to
predict what might happen when a system
experiences a known change.

31. Systematic Intervention Strategies
• Systems theory has been applied in the field of
psychology, where it is called systems
psychology. People who view psychology through
the lens of systems theory see individuals as
seeking homeostasis (the tendency towards a
relatively stable equilibrium between interdependent
elements, especially as maintained by physiological
processes) within their systems or groups.
• To create a system that works for all members, the
expectations, needs, desires, and behaviour of
each person within it must be considered. When
issues arise, these are attributed to breakdowns in
systemic interactions rather than deficiency of one
person.

32. Systematic Intervention Strategies
• SYSTEMS THEORY & FAMILY SYSTEMS THERAPY
• In the late 1960s, Dr. Murray Bowen applied systems thinking
to the family unit and developed family systems theory. This
theory views the family as an emotional unit and assumes
individuals cannot be fully understood in isolation. Bowen’s
concept later developed into an effective and widely popular
form of treatment, called family systems therapy.
• In family systems therapy, familial relationships, patterns,
communication, and behaviors are examined within and
beyond the therapy session, allowing the therapist and other
family members to observe how certain behaviors could be
impacting the family. Once these behaviors are recognized and
understood, family members can learn new behaviors that
have benefits for themselves and the rest of their family.

33. Systematic Intervention Strategies
• SYSTEMS THEORY AND SYSTEMIC PSYCHOTHERAPY
• The efficacy of family systems therapy has motivated researchers and
mental health experts to apply its primary principles to other groups of
people. This new approach, called systemic psychotherapy or systemic
therapy, helps groups gain insight into how each member’s role within a
group may affect its functionality. It can be applied to organizations,
communities, or businesses. Systemic psychotherapy has expanded into a
nondirective, multifaceted treatment method currently applied in a variety
of circumstances. Systemic psychotherapy has been found effective in
addressing issues including:
• Anxiety
• Body image issues
• Eating issues
• Depression
• Substance abuse
• Relationship issues

34. Systematic Intervention Strategies
• SYSTEMIC PSYCHOTHERAPY INTERVENTIONS
• Adaptation
• Members of an organization are directly involved in their own therapy to
resolve an issue
• Individual participants can begin transforming their own behaviors to be
more productive
• Effective & productive communication among the members of group
• Dialogue is constructed to build understanding of each unit of group
• Develop healthy self-concept
• Enhanced interactions
• Construction of multigenerational genogram (family diagram)
• Questions based on one’s family
• Go home again
• Focus on Detriangulation- being in contact but emotionally separate.
2 ways one is to resolve anxiety of family situation and not to project
feelings onto others, and second is to avoid becoming a target for others.

35. Geogram
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36. Qualities of an Effective Counsellor
 Positive regard or respect for people.
 Open, non judgmental and high level of
acceptance.
 Caring and empathetic.
 Self‐aware and self‐disciplined.
 Knowledgeable/informed about subject and
awareness of resources available within the
community.
 Culturally sensitive.
 Patient and a good listener.
 Ability to maintain confidentiality.
 Objective and having clarity.

37. Professional Ethics
Ethics are generally defined as a
philosophical discipline that is concerned with
human conduct and moral decision making.
Professional ethics are beliefs about
behaviour and conduct that guide
professional practices such as those between
counselor and client.
It is related with good, bad, right, wrong,
should be etc.

38. Professional Ethics
• Enhancing human development throughout the
life span.
• Honoring diversity and embracing a multicultural
approach in support of the worth, dignity,
potential, and uniqueness of people within their
social and cultural contexts.
• Promoting social justice
• Safeguarding the integrity of the counselor-client
relationship.
• Practicing in a competent and ethical manner.

39. Professional Ethics
• Work hard to create and sustain a relationship with
their clients based on trust.
• Obtain informed consent from clients entering a
counseling relationship.
• Respect a client’s confidentiality and privacy.
• Be conscious of client’s culture, values, and beliefs
• Participate in associations that help improve the
profession
• Evaluation, Assessment, and Interpretation of formal
and informal assessments to guide treatment plans
and intervention selection.