Cognitive Therapy for Delusions, Voices and Paranoia (Wiley Series in Clinical Psychology) - Hardcover

From a carer's point of view, a major problem with delusions is their behavioural and affective consequences - for example, a person who believes he or she is being persecuted may behave aggressively, or be petrified, or refuse to eat food prepared by others. The premise behind cognitive therapy is that the most effective way to weaken these consequences is to weaken the beliefs that support them. This book provides a description of cognitive therapy and its application to delusions and voices. The opening chapters describe the subject matter in detail and establish the theoretical reasons for extending cognitive therapy to these symptoms. This includes a justification for looking at symptoms rather than syndromes, first person accounts of delusions and voices, and analyses of why the cognitive approach is ideally suited to the study and treatment of these two most disabling symptoms. The subsequent chapters detail step-by-step guidelines for the implementation of the approach, and draw heavily on actual cases seen by the authors. The authors cover how to make a cognitive assessment of both voices and delusions and which measures to use.

Psychologists, psychotherapists, psychiatrists and nurses are increasingly involved in treatments which include psychological therapy, and particularly cognitive therapy, for serious mental disorders. The aim of this book is to guide such professionals towards better practice by treating the individual symptoms of delusions, voices and paranoia, rather than by the categorisation of schizophrenia. The authors provide an introduction to their cognitive model and show how therapy depends crucially on the collaborative relationship with the client. While earlier approaches to these distressing symptoms depended on an overall model of schizophrenia which emphasised fundamental discontinuities with normal thought and psychological processes, the authors? approach is supported by substantial research that indicates that delusions, voices and paranoia lie on a continuum of differences in thought and behaviour, and do not arise from fundamentally different psychological processes. This book offers a practical, research-based and essentially hopeful approach to the assessment and treatment of psychotic disorders and also an argument for the development of a person model for treatment, which is based on the person?s enduring psychological vulnerabilities.