About this course

Learning Objectives

• Identify three possible interrelationships between trauma, dissociation, and psychosis, including ways that psychosis itself, and reactions to psychosis by others, can be traumatizing.
• Describe a possible causal route from trauma to psychotic experiences, and describe the role of dissociation within that process.
• Plan to integrate CBT for psychosis with various trauma therapies to effectively treat clients who have experienced both trauma and psychosis.
• Demonstrate a collaborative approach to helping clients develop coherent and compassionate stories of trauma and recovery which provide an alternative to both fragmented “psychotic” stories, and to helplessness-inducing “mental illness” stories..
• Discuss the common factors shared by PTSD and psychosis and the role interpretations of intrusions plays in differentiating the two.
• Critique treatment strategies which focus on suppression of symptoms and compare the possible outcomes with those resulting from integrative approaches.

Learning Levels

• Beginner
• Intermediate

Course Instructor(s)

• 

  Ron Unger, MSW

  Ron Unger works as a therapist, and as a therapy supervisor at the Center for Family Development and in private practice in Eugene Oregon. For the past 20 years he has also worked as an educator, providing seminars on CBT for psychosis and related topics across the United States and internationally. He served as the chair of the education committee for ISPS-US for over a decade and currently serves as the chair of the Pacific NW Branch of ISPS-US..

References

• Hardy, A., Keen, N., van den Berg, D., Varese, F., Longden, E., Ward, T., & Brand, R. M. (2023). Trauma therapies for psychosis: A state-of-the-art review. Psychology and Psychotherapy: Theory, Research and Practice, n/a(n/a). https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1111/papt.12499
• Strachan, L. P., Paulik, G., Roberts, L., & McEvoy, P. M. (2023). Voice hearers' explanations of trauma-related voices and processes of change throughout imagery rescripting: A qualitative exploration. Psychology and Psychotherapy: Theory, Research and Practice, 96(4), 982-998. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1111/papt.12491
• Barnes, G. L., Emsley, R., Garety, P., & Hardy, A. (2023). Investigating specific associations between childhood victimisation profiles and positive psychosis symptoms: the mediating roles of anxiety, depression and schema. Schizophrenia Bulletin Open. https://doi.org/10.1093/schizbullopen/sgad017
• Černis, E., Molodynski, A., Ehlers, A., & Freeman, D. (2022). Dissociation in patients with non-affective psychosis: Prevalence, symptom associations, and maintenance factors. Schizophrenia Research, 239, 11-18. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.schres.2021.11.008
• Hardy, A. (2017). Pathways from trauma to psychotic experiences: a theoretically informed model of posttraumatic stress in psychosis. Frontiers in psychology, 8, 697.
• Van der Hart, O., Nijenhuis, E. R., & Steele, K. (2006). The haunted self: Structural dissociation and the treatment of chronic traumatization. WW Norton & Company.
• Giannopoulou, I., Georgiades, S., Stefanou, M. I., Spandidos, D. A., & Rizos, E. (2023). Links between trauma and psychosis (Review). Exp Ther Med, 26(2), 386. https://doi.org/10.3892/etm.2023.12085