Bachelor of Arts in Psychology: Therapeutic Techniques & Counseling 1 Flashcards

Which therapeutic technique involves the therapist deliberately adopting the client's distorted beliefs to demonstrate their absurdity through logical extension?

Answer: Paradoxical intention

Paradoxical intention, developed by Viktor Frankl, instructs clients to intend or wish for the very thing they fear, revealing the illogical nature of the anxiety and breaking the cycle of anticipatory dread.

In person-centered therapy, which of the following is NOT one of Carl Rogers' three core therapeutic conditions?

Answer: Transference resolution

Rogers identified unconditional positive regard, empathic understanding, and congruence (genuineness) as the necessary and sufficient conditions for therapeutic change. Transference resolution is a psychoanalytic concept, not part of the person-centered framework.

A therapist asks a client to keep a daily record of automatic thoughts linked to specific emotions and situations. This technique is most associated with which therapy?

Answer: Cognitive behavioral therapy

Thought records (also called dysfunctional thought records) are a core CBT tool used to help clients identify, evaluate, and challenge automatic negative thoughts by tracking the situation, emotion, thought, and an alternative balanced response.

What does the term 'countertransference' refer to in a therapeutic relationship?

Answer: The therapist's emotional reactions to the client influenced by the therapist's own history

Countertransference refers to the therapist's own unconscious or conscious emotional responses to the client, which can be shaped by the therapist's unresolved issues. Managing countertransference is essential for maintaining therapeutic boundaries.

Which stage of William Miller and Stephen Rollnick's motivational interviewing model involves the client making a commitment to change and developing a specific action plan?

Answer: Planning

The four processes of motivational interviewing are engaging, focusing, evoking, and planning. The planning stage occurs when the client's ambivalence has sufficiently resolved and they are ready to commit to change and map out concrete steps.

A counselor working with a trauma survivor helps the client narrate and reprocess a traumatic memory while tracking moving visual stimuli side to side. Which evidence-based therapy is being used?

Answer: Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR)

EMDR, developed by Francine Shapiro, uses bilateral stimulation—most commonly side-to-side eye movements—while the client recalls traumatic memories, facilitating adaptive processing and reducing the emotional charge of the memory.