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ABSTRACT Objective: The present case study explored the temperament and charecterological nature of dependent personality disorder, and Cognitive Behavior therapy with emphasis of childhood schemas as psychological intervention strategy in this endeavor.
Research Design: Case study Place and Duration of Study: Islamabad, Pakistan.
Sample and Method: Ms A.,26 years old female, a university student who suffered from an enduring pattern of traits that comprised the characteristics formally identified as "dependent personality disorder". She also exhibited anxiety states while encountering some challenging situation in general. Ms A was provided with structured preplanned psychotherapy sessions of Cognitive Behavior Therapy with special emphasis on identifying and restructuring of schema constructs. Pre and post evaluation for rating the underlying schemas and anxiety manifested was taken by using "young's schema Questionnaire by Young " and "Beck Anxiety Inventory by Beck and Steer ".
Results: The results revealed momentous improvement in both variables.
Conclusion: It was concluded that Cognitive Behavior Therapy can be used as an effective intervention strategy when focused on schema constructs of individual suffering from dependent personality disorder.
Key words: Schema focused CBT; dependent Personality Disorder INTRODUCTION The treatment of a personality disorders remains controversial yet challenging task among professionals as underlying rationale and overlapping nature of such features becomes an additional task for clinician . Psychopharmacological treatment has been effective partially as no specific medication can be administered to the patients per se, however maladaptive personality traits like aggression, suspiciousness and mood instability, can be attempted to manage through medication . Psycho dynamic therapy was thought to be only effective approach around five decades back as it showed effective results in some controlled trial studies and a meta analysis as well. While a comparative study of a short term psychodynamic and cognitive therapy yielded equal results for cluster C personality disorders , and relatively severe personality disorders this combined treatment may prove effective.
Stone suggested to use a collaborative approach of supportive therapy, psychoanalytical intervention and cognitive behavior therapy for effective results.
Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) seems to be as effective as medication and has developed effective treatment methods focusing on self defeating thought patterns but certain issues serve as obstacle when character disorders are addressed with traditional methods, thus it fails to resolve charecterologsical issues...