Skip to main content
ABCT 2024 58th Annual Convention Main banner
Psychology Tools Ad
Final Program


Icon Legend
This session is not in your schedule.
This session is in your schedule. Click again to remove it.
Presentation Icons
Recorded Session
Recorded Session
Ticketed Session
Ticketed Session
Evaluation ViewAttendees 8

Mini Workshop

Transdiagnostic

Making sense of the alphabet soup: Common mechanisms of change uniting evidence-based psychotherapies

Mini Workshop 15 - Making Sense of the Alphabet Soup: Common Mechanisms of Change Uniting Evidence-based Psychotherapies

Saturday, November 16, 2024
8:30 AM – 10:00 AM EST
Location: Grand Ballroom B, Level 5, Downtown Marriott
Earn 1.5 Credit
Keywords: Case Conceptualization / Formulation, Supervision, Change Process / Mechanisms
Level of Familiarity: Basic to Moderate
Recommended Readings: Mulder, R., Murray, G., & Rucklidge, J. (2017). Common versus specific factors in psychotherapy: Opening the black box. The Lancet Psychiatry, 4(12), 953-962. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/S2215-0366(17)30100-1,   Hayes, S.C. and Hofmann, S.G. (2021). "Third-wave" cognitive and behavioral therapies and the emergence of a process-based approach to intervention in psychiatry. World Psychiatry, 20(3), 363-375.,   Cuijpers, P., Reijnders, M., & Huibers, M.J.H. (2019). The role of common factors in psychotherapy outcomes. Annual Review of Clinical Psychology, 15, 207-231. ,   Harris, J. E., Kelley, L. J., Campbell, E. L., & Hammond, E. S. (2014). Key strategies training for individual psychotherapy: An introduction to multitheoretical practice. Journal of Psychotherapy Integration, 24(2), 138–152. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0037056,  
Many therapeutic approaches for the treatment of mental health problems have gathered an evidence base. However, the sheer number of different approaches, each with its own complex underlying theory, can be confusing especially to trainees just learning to navigate the many acronyms that seem to swirl together into an “alphabet soup.” Overwhelmed trainees often fear they must master a wide range of entirely different therapies before they can begin to meet the needs of their diverse clients. This workshop seeks to help make sense of this “alphabet soup” by highlighting some of the common mechanisms of change unifying different therapeutic orientations. The presentation will start with a discussion of reasons for considering these common mechanisms of change, briefly review how several major approaches (e.g. CBT, ACT, DBT, psychodynamic psychotherapy) share similarities, examine what research shows to be the “essential ingredients” across approaches, and end with the presentation of a simple and streamlined framework that unites these approaches and may be used to guide a transtheoretical case conceptualization. This framework provides audience members with a tangible and distilled scaffold for approaching each patient, which beginning clinicians can easily grasp and senior clinicians can use to ground their practice. The framework is also structured to be highly flexible to integrate diversity, equality and inclusion considerations, and respond to individual patient’s identities and unique lived experiences. Utilizing a highly interactive learning approach including slides, application of the framework to example cases, and ample time for discussion and questions, presenters aim to engage the audience in guided discussion of formulation and technique while highlighting strategies/approaches they have found crucial in their own clinical experience.

Outline:
• First, this workshop will present contextualizing information for why it is important to identify the common mechanisms of change across therapeutic approaches.
• Next, there will be time for a discussion of how the common mechanisms of change relate to several major psychotherapy approaches
• A brief review of relevant literature will be presented
• A framework that unites the different therapeutic approaches and guides transtheoretical case conceptualization will be introduced
• Attendees will have time to practice using the framework
• The workshop will end with a discussion of how the presented framework can also guide treatment planning
• Overall, this workshop will use an interactive learning approach and include ample time for discussion and questions

Learning Objectives:

At the end of this session, the learner will be able to:
  1. Identify at least three common mechanisms of change in psychotherapy which can apply across evidence-based theoretical orientations, diagnoses, and diverse client populations.
  2. Learn a new user-friendly transtheoretical case conceptualization framework based on these common factors.
  3. Use this transtheoretical case conceptualization to aid in tailoring treatment to individual clients as well as teaching psychotherapy trainees basic conceptualization and treatment planning skills.
  4. Long-term Goal: Implement the transtheoretical case conceptualization framework presented in an ongoing way in future clinical work to guide treatment planning.
  5. Long-term Goal: Critically consider how to integrate new theoretical perspectives in future clinical work, on an ongoing basis.