ACT in the UK symposium, BABCP National Conference Edinburgh 2008

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy had more of a presence at the British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies National Conference this year, with pre-conference and half-day workshops, and several symposia on ACT and ACT-related research. Also, for those interested in the broader contextual approach to CBT there were workshops and symposia on Behavioural Activation, as [...]

Psychologists involved in torture: Martin Seligman’s unwitting contribution?

A while ago I wrote about the disturbing allegations by Jane Mayer of the role of US psychologists in developing interrogation methods that involved torture, apparently used at the detention facility in Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere.
Jane Mayer has written a book-length account of her investigations,The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How the War on [...]

Even MPs struggle with the stigma of mental illness

Despite there being accurate information more available to the general public, it appears that stigma of mental illness continues to affect the lives of millions of Britains, including the powerful and influential.  A recent survey has found that 1 in 5 British MPs  have experienced a mental health problem but fear to disclose this because [...]

Psychosis from a psychological perspective

I recently sat in on a presentation about psychological interventions for serious mental illness at an international conference , where the audience was mostly made up of US health professionals working in psychiatric settings.

What was interesting (or to be more accurate, disconcerting) for me were the number of comments from the audience expressing surprise that [...]

Acceptance…. like learning to ride a bike

I found a nice little video on youtube recently of Kevin Polk describing the contingency-shaped nature of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (or Acceptance & Commitment Training, as they call it in the program at the regional centre of the Veteran Affairs in Togus, Maine USA). A nice metaphor that ACT is like learning to ride [...]

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy in Early Psychosis

Recently, with my colleague Joe Oliver, we presented our work (at the ACT Summer Institute IV) on developing acceptance and commitment therapy to help young people recovering from a first episode of psychosis. We titled our presentation “ACT Early”, and described the work we have been doing in developing groups and individual therapy for this [...]

“Prozac Nation”? Try Placebo Nation…

Freedom of information opens up the file drawer on Prozac, with The Guardian reporting today that Prozac and similar antidepressants are no more effective than placebo for mild to moderate depression:
“Prozac, the bestselling antidepressant taken by 40 million people worldwide, does not work and nor do similar drugs in the same class, according to a [...]

Street slang or thought disorder? A tough call.

Nice little article in the British Medical Journal last week (written by several clinicians from the OASIS service), about a difficulty that can arise in assessing young people who might have the early signs of psychosis: putting their unconventional speech in context. (The use of unusual words and phrases as part of a pattern [...]

South Pole Scuffle

Also in the news today – a couple of men had “a drunken christmas punch up” at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole station, resulting in one having injuries serious enough to need medical evacuation to a hospital in New Zealand. Just as well it was summer over there, so that the injured fellow could be flown to hospital relatively easily (at great [...]

The release of David Hicks, a test of Australian values

Another moment to test the compassion of the Australian public, as the news has broken that David Hicks is to be released from prison, albeit under a control order. Although the Federal Police regard Mr Hicks as an ongoing danger it would seem that he currently poses little risk to others, considering his mental state (Sydney [...]