Content area
Full Text
This paper presents schema-focused therapy (SFT) as an integrative approach to psychotherapy supervision. SFT was developed to address personality dysfunction and to assist therapists with clients for whom straightforward cognitive therapy or other brief interventions are insufficient. It bridges cognitive-behavioral and depth-oriented approaches and includes developmental, interpersonal, and experiential elements. SFT serves as a useful guide in the supervisory process, providing a methodology for organizing case information about how clients operate. It is valuable in case conceptualization, strategy, implementing interventions, resolving difficulties and understanding the role of the supervisee's own schemas in the therapy process.
SCHEMA-FOCUSED TRAINING AND SUPERVISION
Schema- focused therapy (Bricker, Young, & Flanagan, 1993; McGinn & Young, 1994; Young, 1994a; Young & Klosko, 1993) is an integrative therapy model that incorporates cognitive, behavioral, experiential, and interpersonal interventions. SFT is congenial with current developmental, dynamic, cognitive-behavioral, and experiential psychotherapeutic models. It offers a practical model for assessing client difficulties, coping styles, and client capacities. It allows conceptualization of a case and its dynamics, and directs therapeutic interventions and strategies.
Overview of the SFT Theoretical Model
The term "schema" in this model refers to dysfunctional, enduring patterns of thinking, feeling, acting, and relating to others, which guide perceptions, affective responses, and self-defeating behavior patterns across a range of life situations. Young (1994a) defines an EMS as a extremely broad and pervasive theme regarding oneself and one's relationships with others, developed during childhood and elaborated throughout life, and dysfunctional to a significant degree. EMSs result from a combination of the child's innate temperament interacting with early childhood experiences with significant others. Patterns of dysfunctional thinking, behavior, and defensive processes evolve as a result of the cumulative impact of negative experiences. These persist over time and are deeply entrenched. Schemas function to minimize early suffering, however, they also serve as guides for the interpretation of later experience and a basis for establishing self-defeating cycles. When activated, schemas can lead to high levels of negative affect and self-defeating consequences, and can interfere with affective expression, attachment, social validation, and autonomy.
EMSs are implicit in how individuals define themselves, the choices they make in relationships, and their capacity for adaptation. Young has proposed 18 Early Maladaptive Schemas1 (core themes), which he has grouped into five more...