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Unconscious Intelligence in Cybernetic Psychology
by Torben HansenThis important book examines how the growing field of cybernetic psychology - the study of the creative complexity of the mind - can be applied to a range of different realms, tapping into the unconscious potential within us all. Cybernetic psychology integrates theories from various schools of thought, bringing them together in one unified theory. First developed and described by Danish author and psychotherapist Ole Vedfelt. It can be used in therapeutic practice, in relation to learning and pedagogics, and as a tool for better leadership. The 15 chapters within this volume apply the theory to these as well as other areas, including ecology, creativity, mindfulness and scientific enquiry itself. Insightful and wide-ranging, the book will appeal to psychotherapists and those working within mental health, as well as students and researchers across Education, Psychology and beyond.
Under the Spell of Freedom: Theory of Religion after Hegel and Nietzsche
by Hans JoasHow do the history of religion and the history of political freedom relate to each other? The variety of views on this subject in philosophy, the humanities and social sciences, and the public is broad and confusing. But the grandiose synthesis in which Hegel brought together Christianity and political freedom is still an enormous source of orientation for many-despite or even because of the influential provocations of Friedrich Nietzsche. As Hans Joas shows in Under the Spell of Freedom, a different view has developed in the religious thinking of the twentieth century based on a conception of history that is more open to the future and on a concept of freedom that is richer than that of Hegel. Using sixteen selected thinkers, Joas deconstructs the grand Hegelian narrative of human history as the self-realization of the idea of freedom, setting as a counterpart the sketches of a theory of the emergence of moral universalism. Further, taking the classical views of Hegel and his emphasis on the role of Protestant Christianity and the extremely negative views about Christianity in the work of the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, Joas elaborates on this new understanding of religion and freedom, which avoids both Eurocentrism and an intellectualist view of religious faith and practice. The result is a forceful plea for a global history of moral universalism. Under the Spell of Freedom is an important step in this direction.
Understanding Adolescents’ Political Agency: Examining How Political Interest Shapes Political Development (Studies in Adolescent Development)
by Håkan StattinThis ground-breaking volume shows that young people largely shape their own political development, and that to understand young people's political development, we must consider their political agency.Håkan Stattin explores the findings of an extensive longitudinal study of the political socialization of young people in Sweden from the ages of 13 to 28, which shows that, contrary to popular belief, it is not parents, peers, teachers or other key adults who are the primary agents in shaping young people's political development; it is their own self-directed political interest. Given that political interest is both an input and an output, the book examines how political interest affects young people's political interactions with their parents, and why young people and their parents perceive these interactions differently. It covers key issues such as the impact of political-interest-triggering events and civil unrest, the role of school and peers, parental involvement and the path from political interest to future political and civic engagement.Launching a new field of research internationally, this volume is essential reading for researchers, students, educators, and policy developers interested in young people's political and civic attitudes, engagement, communication, core values and the emergence of intrinsic political sophistication.
Understanding Adolescents’ Political Agency: Examining How Political Interest Shapes Political Development (Studies in Adolescent Development)
by Håkan StattinThis ground-breaking volume shows that young people largely shape their own political development, and that to understand young people's political development, we must consider their political agency.Håkan Stattin explores the findings of an extensive longitudinal study of the political socialization of young people in Sweden from the ages of 13 to 28, which shows that, contrary to popular belief, it is not parents, peers, teachers or other key adults who are the primary agents in shaping young people's political development; it is their own self-directed political interest. Given that political interest is both an input and an output, the book examines how political interest affects young people's political interactions with their parents, and why young people and their parents perceive these interactions differently. It covers key issues such as the impact of political-interest-triggering events and civil unrest, the role of school and peers, parental involvement and the path from political interest to future political and civic engagement.Launching a new field of research internationally, this volume is essential reading for researchers, students, educators, and policy developers interested in young people's political and civic attitudes, engagement, communication, core values and the emergence of intrinsic political sophistication.
Understanding and Coping with Illness Anxiety (Routledge Focus on Mental Health)
by Phil LaneThis book offers comfort and psychoeducation to readers as well as psychological explanation of concepts to mental health and medical professionals. The importance of understanding how disease, illness, and health affect our emotional and mental wellbeing cannot be understated. The book is divided into four sections: a description of illness anxiety and its diagnostic criteria; coping strategies for managing illness-related anxiety; a section describing how patients heal from Illness Anxiety Disorder; and a section containing practical exercises, meditations, and activities. This book is a relevant resource that will highlight an underrepresented area of psychological literature.
Understanding and Coping with Illness Anxiety (Routledge Focus on Mental Health)
by Phil LaneThis book offers comfort and psychoeducation to readers as well as psychological explanation of concepts to mental health and medical professionals. The importance of understanding how disease, illness, and health affect our emotional and mental wellbeing cannot be understated. The book is divided into four sections: a description of illness anxiety and its diagnostic criteria; coping strategies for managing illness-related anxiety; a section describing how patients heal from Illness Anxiety Disorder; and a section containing practical exercises, meditations, and activities. This book is a relevant resource that will highlight an underrepresented area of psychological literature.
Understanding Contemporary Diet Culture through the Lens of Lacanian Psychoanalytic Theory: Eating the Lack (Explorations in Mental Health)
by Bethany MorrisThis book offers a close analysis of the relationship between diets and identity in modern Western culture through the examination of popular texts including blogs, diet books, and websites. The relationship between consumerism and identity has been explored by scholars for decades now, but less has been said about how food and eating behaviors have been wrapped up in this relationship. Using Lacanian psychoanalytic theory, chapters investigate how diets and eating are used as a means to navigate individuals’ complex, unconscious desires and conflicts, and illustrate how diet and advertising industries use this to capitalize on the anxieties of the modern subject. The text’s psychoanalytic approach offers rare insight into the unconscious desires that dictate individuals’ choices around diets and lifestyle. By situating anxiety as the tension between jouissance and desire, the book promotes further understanding of individuals’ subjective and complex relationships with food. Through an understanding of the subject and symptoms from a psychoanalytic perspective, we can begin to think differently about the ways we come to eating and dieting. This book will be useful for scholars and postgraduate students studying Lacanian psychoanalytic theory, consumer psychology, mental health, the sociology of culture, and social and cultural anthropology.
Understanding Contemporary Diet Culture through the Lens of Lacanian Psychoanalytic Theory: Eating the Lack (Explorations in Mental Health)
by Bethany MorrisThis book offers a close analysis of the relationship between diets and identity in modern Western culture through the examination of popular texts including blogs, diet books, and websites. The relationship between consumerism and identity has been explored by scholars for decades now, but less has been said about how food and eating behaviors have been wrapped up in this relationship. Using Lacanian psychoanalytic theory, chapters investigate how diets and eating are used as a means to navigate individuals’ complex, unconscious desires and conflicts, and illustrate how diet and advertising industries use this to capitalize on the anxieties of the modern subject. The text’s psychoanalytic approach offers rare insight into the unconscious desires that dictate individuals’ choices around diets and lifestyle. By situating anxiety as the tension between jouissance and desire, the book promotes further understanding of individuals’ subjective and complex relationships with food. Through an understanding of the subject and symptoms from a psychoanalytic perspective, we can begin to think differently about the ways we come to eating and dieting. This book will be useful for scholars and postgraduate students studying Lacanian psychoanalytic theory, consumer psychology, mental health, the sociology of culture, and social and cultural anthropology.
Understanding Instructionally Useful Assessment (Student Assessment for Educators)
by Carla Evans Scott MarionUnderstanding Instructionally Useful Assessment offers new insights into how various types of assessments, from the state to the classroom, will differ in their usefulness for supporting instructional decision-making and student learning. In order to most effectively serve students, it is essential that educators avoid conflating the assessment information that teachers use for instructional purposes and the data that leaders and administrators use for evaluative or monitoring purposes. This book provides classroom teachers as well as school and district leaders with a clear conception of what makes assessments—their purpose, design, reporting, and resulting information—useful or not for informing instruction and how they can select assessment tools suited to specific purposes. Each chapter addresses the knowledge and skills that K-12 staff need in order to challenge claims made by policymakers, test vendors, or even other educators that any assessment can be used to inform instruction. Educators will come away better prepared to remove unnecessary or redundant assessments from their systems and to create structures, policies, and processes that best support the instructional usefulness of assessments for student learning.
Understanding Instructionally Useful Assessment (Student Assessment for Educators)
by Carla Evans Scott MarionUnderstanding Instructionally Useful Assessment offers new insights into how various types of assessments, from the state to the classroom, will differ in their usefulness for supporting instructional decision-making and student learning. In order to most effectively serve students, it is essential that educators avoid conflating the assessment information that teachers use for instructional purposes and the data that leaders and administrators use for evaluative or monitoring purposes. This book provides classroom teachers as well as school and district leaders with a clear conception of what makes assessments—their purpose, design, reporting, and resulting information—useful or not for informing instruction and how they can select assessment tools suited to specific purposes. Each chapter addresses the knowledge and skills that K-12 staff need in order to challenge claims made by policymakers, test vendors, or even other educators that any assessment can be used to inform instruction. Educators will come away better prepared to remove unnecessary or redundant assessments from their systems and to create structures, policies, and processes that best support the instructional usefulness of assessments for student learning.
Understanding Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities
by Grace Iarocci Jacob A. Burack Dermot M. BowlerWritten by psychologists engaged in research, teaching, and practice, Understanding Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities encourages a nuanced, contextually informed understanding of the development of individuals with developmental disabilities. This accessible book contextualises developmental disability across the lifespan and within social systems. It will help you understand the complex interaction between genetics, environments, and experiences, in relation to specific conditions such as ADHD, autism, foetal alcohol spectrum conditions, and Down syndrome. It also introduces you to the wide range of real-world applications of developmental disabilities research and to some of the current ethical issues around genetic screening and behavioural intervention. Key learning features include: Learning objectives Focus boxes that deliver additional helpful context Chapter summaries Reflective exercises and questions, to test what you’ve learned Recommended videos This book is ideal for students studying atypical development, developmental neuropsychology, and related subjects. Grace Iarocci is Professor of Psychology and the Director of the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Lab at Simon Fraser University Jacob A. Burack is Professor of School/Applied Child Psychology and Human Development at McGill University, Director of the McGill Youth Study Team, and Scientific Director of the Summit Center for Education, Research, and Training Dermot M. Bowler is Professor of Psychology and a founder member of the Autism Research Group at City, University of London
Understanding Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities
by Grace Iarocci Jacob A. Burack Dermot M. BowlerWritten by psychologists engaged in research, teaching, and practice, Understanding Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities encourages a nuanced, contextually informed understanding of the development of individuals with developmental disabilities. This accessible book contextualises developmental disability across the lifespan and within social systems. It will help you understand the complex interaction between genetics, environments, and experiences, in relation to specific conditions such as ADHD, autism, foetal alcohol spectrum conditions, and Down syndrome. It also introduces you to the wide range of real-world applications of developmental disabilities research and to some of the current ethical issues around genetic screening and behavioural intervention. Key learning features include: Learning objectives Focus boxes that deliver additional helpful context Chapter summaries Reflective exercises and questions, to test what you’ve learned Recommended videos This book is ideal for students studying atypical development, developmental neuropsychology, and related subjects. Grace Iarocci is Professor of Psychology and the Director of the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Lab at Simon Fraser University Jacob A. Burack is Professor of School/Applied Child Psychology and Human Development at McGill University, Director of the McGill Youth Study Team, and Scientific Director of the Summit Center for Education, Research, and Training Dermot M. Bowler is Professor of Psychology and a founder member of the Autism Research Group at City, University of London
Understanding Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities
by Grace Iarocci Jacob A. Burack Dermot M. BowlerWritten by psychologists engaged in research, teaching, and practice, Understanding Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities encourages a nuanced, contextually informed understanding of the development of individuals with developmental disabilities. This accessible book contextualises developmental disability across the lifespan and within social systems. It will help you understand the complex interaction between genetics, environments, and experiences, in relation to specific conditions such as ADHD, autism, foetal alcohol spectrum conditions, and Down syndrome. It also introduces you to the wide range of real-world applications of developmental disabilities research and to some of the current ethical issues around genetic screening and behavioural intervention. Key learning features include: Learning objectives Focus boxes that deliver additional helpful context Chapter summaries Reflective exercises and questions, to test what you’ve learned Recommended videos This book is ideal for students studying atypical development, developmental neuropsychology, and related subjects. Grace Iarocci is Professor of Psychology and the Director of the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Lab at Simon Fraser University Jacob A. Burack is Professor of School/Applied Child Psychology and Human Development at McGill University, Director of the McGill Youth Study Team, and Scientific Director of the Summit Center for Education, Research, and Training Dermot M. Bowler is Professor of Psychology and a founder member of the Autism Research Group at City, University of London
Understanding Mental Health Apps: An Applied Psychosocial Perspective (Palgrave Studies in Cyberpsychology)
by Lewis Goodings Darren Ellis Ian TuckerThis is the first book to look exclusively from at the use of MHapps from an applied psychosocial perspective. Much of the academic literature on MHapps in psychology focuses on the clinical efficacy of using apps (e.g., depression reduction as result of using a certain app) and will typically report on the use of randomised controlled trials (or a similar method) to illustrate the use of apps as a tool for improving a psychological condition. Therefore, the main benefit of this book is that it recognises the impact of apps from a social perspective and will aim to show how everyday forms of distress are embedded in the use of these apps and the broader set of relations that constitute people’s everyday lives. The content of this book will identify how an applied social perspective can offer insight into the power of apps to shape our sense of ourselves and of others. This book will be of use to educators and students in psychology, sociology, health studies, media studies andcultural studies.
Understanding Suicide in the United States: A Social, Biological, And Psychological Perspective
by Meaghan Stacy Jay Schulkin
Understanding Victimology: An Active-Learning Approach
by Shelly Clevenger Jordana N. Navarro Catherine D. Marcum George E. HigginsUnderstanding Victimology: An Active Learning Approach is the only textbook with extensive discussion of both online and offline victimization reinforced by group and individual learning activities. Our textbook offers instructors a variety of active learning exercises – in the book itself and in the authors’ ancillaries – that engage students in the material and shed light on the experiences of marginalized social groups. Through these activities, students become engaged with the material at a higher level of learning. They learn how victimization happens and the challenges people who experience crime face in acquiring assistance from the criminal-legal system at a more intimate level instead of simply reading about it. Students also build their abilities to work with others in a collaborative learning environment, encouraging professional socialization for the future. The chapters in this second edition address gaps in information typically presented in victimology that ignore prevention or intervention, even though these topics are currently at the forefront of the national conversation going on about sexual violence in higher education. New to this edition are added coverage of immigrants and minorities and new chapters on the media and victimization and on victimization across the gender spectrum, as well as an online instructor resource covering UK case studies, legal framework, and social context that broadens the book’s global appeal. Suitable for undergraduate courses in victimology, this book also serves the needs of sociology and women’s studies courses and can be taught university-wide as part of diversity and inclusion initiatives.
Understanding Victimology: An Active-Learning Approach
by Shelly Clevenger Jordana N. Navarro Catherine D. Marcum George E. HigginsUnderstanding Victimology: An Active Learning Approach is the only textbook with extensive discussion of both online and offline victimization reinforced by group and individual learning activities. Our textbook offers instructors a variety of active learning exercises – in the book itself and in the authors’ ancillaries – that engage students in the material and shed light on the experiences of marginalized social groups. Through these activities, students become engaged with the material at a higher level of learning. They learn how victimization happens and the challenges people who experience crime face in acquiring assistance from the criminal-legal system at a more intimate level instead of simply reading about it. Students also build their abilities to work with others in a collaborative learning environment, encouraging professional socialization for the future. The chapters in this second edition address gaps in information typically presented in victimology that ignore prevention or intervention, even though these topics are currently at the forefront of the national conversation going on about sexual violence in higher education. New to this edition are added coverage of immigrants and minorities and new chapters on the media and victimization and on victimization across the gender spectrum, as well as an online instructor resource covering UK case studies, legal framework, and social context that broadens the book’s global appeal. Suitable for undergraduate courses in victimology, this book also serves the needs of sociology and women’s studies courses and can be taught university-wide as part of diversity and inclusion initiatives.
Understanding Violence: The Intertwining of Morality, Religion, Capitalism and Violence: A Philosophical Stance (Studies in Applied Philosophy, Epistemology and Rational Ethics #69)
by Lorenzo MagnaniThis book offers a philosophical account of violence, engaged with both empirical and theoretical debates in disciplines such as cognitive science, sociology, psychiatry, anthropology, political theory, evolutionary biology, and theology. The primary thesis is that violence is intertwined with morality and typically enacted for “moral” reasons. To show this, the book compellingly demonstrates how morality operates to trigger and justify violence and how people, in their violent behaviors, can engage and disengage with discrete moralities. The author’s fundamental account of language, and in particular its normative aspects, is particularly insightful as regards extending the range of what is to be understood as violence beyond the domain of physical harm. By employing concepts such as “coalition enforcement”, “moral bubbles”, “cognitive niches”, “overmoralization”, and “military intelligence”, the book aims to spell out how perpetrators and victims of violence systematically disagree about the very nature of violence. The author’s original claim is that disagreement can be understood naturalistically, described by an account of morality informed by evolutionary perspectives as well. This book helps us come to terms with the fact that we are intrinsically “violent beings”. To acknowledge this condition, and our stupefying capacity to inflict harm, is a responsibility we must face up to: such understanding could ultimately be of help in order to achieve a safer ownership of our destinies, by individuating and reinforcing those cognitive firewalls that would prevent violence from always escalating and overflowing. This second edition is thoroughly revised and integrated with two new chapters to cover new aspects of violence and its understanding, such as the role of looting finance in facilitating violent outcomes and the attack to scientific cognition and human creativity.
Understanding Your Inner Child and Overcoming Addiction: A Recovery Manual and Workbook
by Eddie Capparucci Nathan JonesThis book provides a comprehensive overview of the Inner Child Model™ for treating Addictive Behaviors, a trauma-based approach to the treatment of various addictions including alcohol, drugs, food, gambling, sex, spending, smoking, etc. Research indicates the onset of addiction originates in childhood trauma, inability to process emotional discomfort, and attachment disorders. This book addresses each of these issues to assist individuals in overcoming the drivers of addictive behaviors. But more importantly, provides solutions to help those who struggle to learn to manage their addiction. It contains numerous case studies in which readers will see themselves and their stories throughout the pages and assists readers in generating a comprehensive recovery roadmap that will provide real-world solutions to staying one step ahead of their addiction. While there have been books written about the Inner Child, few focus on how the Inner Child impacts addiction. This unique and interactive therapeutic approach empowers individuals by assisting them in understanding "why" they engage in addictive behaviors. This book is written for anyone struggling with behavioral/substance addiction, their loved ones, and clinicians working in the field of addiction treatment.
Understanding Your Inner Child and Overcoming Addiction: A Recovery Manual and Workbook
by Eddie Capparucci Nathan JonesThis book provides a comprehensive overview of the Inner Child Model™ for treating Addictive Behaviors, a trauma-based approach to the treatment of various addictions including alcohol, drugs, food, gambling, sex, spending, smoking, etc. Research indicates the onset of addiction originates in childhood trauma, inability to process emotional discomfort, and attachment disorders. This book addresses each of these issues to assist individuals in overcoming the drivers of addictive behaviors. But more importantly, provides solutions to help those who struggle to learn to manage their addiction. It contains numerous case studies in which readers will see themselves and their stories throughout the pages and assists readers in generating a comprehensive recovery roadmap that will provide real-world solutions to staying one step ahead of their addiction. While there have been books written about the Inner Child, few focus on how the Inner Child impacts addiction. This unique and interactive therapeutic approach empowers individuals by assisting them in understanding "why" they engage in addictive behaviors. This book is written for anyone struggling with behavioral/substance addiction, their loved ones, and clinicians working in the field of addiction treatment.
Unlearning Shame: How Rejecting Self-Blame Culture Gives Us Real Power
by Devon Price'With the authentic voice I've grown to expect from Devon [...] This book articulates a feeling that has lurked in the dark corners of so many minds and brings it into the light where it can be faced, embraced, understood, and ultimately, healed. Stop doomscrolling and read this book. You'll feel better, I promise.' -Celeste Headlee, journalist and bestselling authorHow many times a day do you feel shame? Struggling to pay the bills; buying a top made in a sweatshop; reading the news and feeling - yet again - a powerlessness to the point of apathy? In today's self-blame culture, it often feels impossible not to carry shame about the choices we make and the values by which we live. When the political is so personal, and the personal is so political, it's easy to feel overwhelmed by the sense that we're not doing enough - maybe, even, that we're not enough. In this bold and transformative manifesto, social psychologist and author of Unmasking Autism Dr Devon Price takes an in-depth look at shame and the role it plays in our lives. Systemic Shame traps us into fighting unwinnable battles and judging others for their failures. But it especially affects those who are already vulnerable because they're carrying shame from a difficult past or a complicated sense of self-esteem. This new, radically positive book shows us that there is no such thing as becoming "good enough" to be deserving of love; that we must claim acceptance for ourselves. Blending the latest social psychology, personal insights and empowering practical exercises, Unlearning Shame is a radical guide to overcoming self-blame and embracing a new culture - one where we take control of the choices we make and the future we create.
Unlocked: The Real Science of Screen Time (and how to spend it better)
by Pete Etchells'A welcome counterpoint to the technopanic that screen time is causing a mental health crisis' Bruce Hood 'A rare mix of trustworthy science, practical advice, and human stories ... I'm going to recommend it to all the parents I know, and keep it handy for reference next time I see a scary headline about how technology is ruining our lives' Timandra HarknessMost of us spend a significant part of the day in front of a screen. Our work and social lives play out through our computers, tablets and phones: on email, social media, video conference calls and gaming servers. But what is all this screen time doing to our health, our sleep, and our relationships?Professor Pete Etchells studies the way we use screens, and how they can affect us. In UNLOCKED, he delves into the real science behind the panic about our alleged device addiction and withering attention spans. Armed with the latest research, he reveals how little we have to fear, and the great deal we have to gain, by establishing a more positive relationship with our screens. That begins with asking ourselves some essential questions about how we use them.Instead of clamouring for us to ditch our devices (before guiltily returning to the same old habits), UNLOCKED is a sustainable, realistic and vital guide to transforming our connection with technology.
Unlocking the Emotional Brain: Memory Reconsolidation and the Psychotherapy of Transformational Change
by Bruce Ecker Robin Ticic Laurel HulleyThis highly influential volume, now in a much-expanded second edition, delivers major advances for psychotherapy, all empirically grounded in memory reconsolidation neuroscience. A great increase of therapeutic effectiveness can be gained, thanks to a clear map of the brain's innate core process of transformational change—a process that does not require use of any particular system or techniques and is therefore remarkably versatile. Twenty-six case examples show the decisive ending of a vast range of major symptoms, including depression, anxiety, panic, shame, self-devaluing, anger, perfectionism, alcohol abuse, sexual aversion, compulsive eating and obesity, paralyzed self-expression, and teen ADHD—all transformed through deeply resolving underlying disturbances such as complex trauma, lifelong oppression by systemic racism and homophobia, childhood sexual molestation, parental narcissistic domination, violent assault trauma, natural disaster trauma, and childhood traumatic aloneness and neglect. This is a transdiagnostic, transtheoretical, lucid understanding of therapeutic action, based, for the first time in the history of the psychotherapy field, on rigorous empirical knowledge of an internal mechanism of change, and it achieves a fundamental unification of the confusingly fragmented psychotherapy field: diverse systems no longer seem to belong to different worlds, because they now form a wonderful repertoire of options for facilitating the same core process of transformational change, as shown in case examples from AEDP, Coherence Therapy, EFT, EMDR, IFS, IPNB, ISTDP, psychedelic-assisted therapy, and SE. It's now clear why therapy systems that differ strikingly in technique and theory can produce the same quality of liberating change. Practitioners who value deep connection with their clients are richly rewarded by the experiential depth that this core process accesses, where no awareness had previously reached, whether sessions are done in person or via online video. It is an embarrassment of riches, because in addition we gain the decisive resolution of several longstanding, polarizing debates regarding the nature of symptom production, the prevalence of attachment issues, the operation of traumatic memory, the functions of the client-therapist relationship, the role of emotional arousal in the process of change, and the relative importance of specific versus non-specific factors.
Unlocking the Emotional Brain: Memory Reconsolidation and the Psychotherapy of Transformational Change
by Bruce Ecker Robin Ticic Laurel HulleyThis highly influential volume, now in a much-expanded second edition, delivers major advances for psychotherapy, all empirically grounded in memory reconsolidation neuroscience. A great increase of therapeutic effectiveness can be gained, thanks to a clear map of the brain's innate core process of transformational change—a process that does not require use of any particular system or techniques and is therefore remarkably versatile. Twenty-six case examples show the decisive ending of a vast range of major symptoms, including depression, anxiety, panic, shame, self-devaluing, anger, perfectionism, alcohol abuse, sexual aversion, compulsive eating and obesity, paralyzed self-expression, and teen ADHD—all transformed through deeply resolving underlying disturbances such as complex trauma, lifelong oppression by systemic racism and homophobia, childhood sexual molestation, parental narcissistic domination, violent assault trauma, natural disaster trauma, and childhood traumatic aloneness and neglect. This is a transdiagnostic, transtheoretical, lucid understanding of therapeutic action, based, for the first time in the history of the psychotherapy field, on rigorous empirical knowledge of an internal mechanism of change, and it achieves a fundamental unification of the confusingly fragmented psychotherapy field: diverse systems no longer seem to belong to different worlds, because they now form a wonderful repertoire of options for facilitating the same core process of transformational change, as shown in case examples from AEDP, Coherence Therapy, EFT, EMDR, IFS, IPNB, ISTDP, psychedelic-assisted therapy, and SE. It's now clear why therapy systems that differ strikingly in technique and theory can produce the same quality of liberating change. Practitioners who value deep connection with their clients are richly rewarded by the experiential depth that this core process accesses, where no awareness had previously reached, whether sessions are done in person or via online video. It is an embarrassment of riches, because in addition we gain the decisive resolution of several longstanding, polarizing debates regarding the nature of symptom production, the prevalence of attachment issues, the operation of traumatic memory, the functions of the client-therapist relationship, the role of emotional arousal in the process of change, and the relative importance of specific versus non-specific factors.
Unlocking the Nature of Human Aggression: A Psychoanalytic and Neuroscientific Approach
by Adrian PerkelUnlocking the Nature of Human Aggression is a neuropsychoanalytic and scientific exploration of aggression and argues for its central role in psychopathology and the genesis of individual symptoms, as well as in broader systemic conflicts and violence. Adrian Perkel creates a unique theoretical approach to the various manifestations we encounter of individual, group, and geo-political aggression and destructiveness. Based on psychoanalytic investigations of this dynamic and Freud’s incomplete exploration of this human drive, this book seeks to understand the science of aggression that Freud himself suggested would be possible with time and scientific development. Perkel investigates the commonplace inversion of the perpetrator and victim narratives, navigating through the complexity of how the aggressive drive, often driven by feelings aimed at homeostatic regulation, challenges the perception of any objective view of who is perpetrator and who victim. He includes his own personal experiences of South African Apartheid, as well as historical and contemporary data such as speeches from historical figures during times of war, including the Second World War and the Ukrainian/Russian conflict. Offering a fresh and innovative insight into the nature of this paradoxical drive in humans, this book integrates the psychology, psychodynamics, and neuroscience of modern research into a coherent exposition of this key aspect of psychic functioning in humans. It is an essential read for analysts in practice and training, psychologists and other mental health professionals, and students looking for a modernised theoretical model of the destructive and aggressive drive of the psyche to facilitate better interventions for individual and couple patients and for interventions at systemic and organisational levels.