Psych 222 Context

1
Psych 222Context Social Construction

• Deconstructing categories
• Deconstructing relationships
• Intro to feminist therapy
• Current context of therapy
• Current role of therapists
• Current challenges
• Assumptions of feminist therapy
• Core principles
• Cases

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Deconstructing Categories

• According to your readings
• What is the function of the concept of race?
• How does race affect lived experience?
• What is the function of sexual orientation
  categories? How are we affected by categories?
• What is the function of defining an underclass?
• What is the undeserving poor?
• How has disability been used to justify
  inequality?

3
Deconstructing Relationships

• To what extent are all relationships in society
  structured by domination and subordination?
• Can categories exist without power differentials?
• Is it possible for equality to exist in
  relationships?
• What is the therapists role in helping people
  create equality in their own relationships?
• What is the therapists role in creating equality
  between groups?
• To what extent should therapists be advocates?
• To what extent should therapists be activists?

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Intro to Feminist Therapy

• Critical Psychology questions assumptions
• Stems from civil rights movement, rape crisis
  movement and anti-psychiatry movement
• States Therapy exists in a cultural context and
  traditional approaches often reflect and
  reinforce power arrangements

5
Current Context for Therapy

• Medical model of clinical psych (Since WW2)
• Clinicians treat psychopathology
• Individual level intervention
• After the fact
• Emphasis on treatment of disease
• Corporate ownership of psychotherapy
• Emphasis on outcomes and accountability
• Short term problem focused
• Standardization in assessment and treatment
• Clinical trials as gold standard, seen as
  unbiased

6
Current Role of Therapist

• Predominance of CBT model
• Therapists seen as professional experts
• Movement toward manualized treatments

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Current Challenges

• Drastic cuts in funding for social supports
• Neighborhood support systems diminishing
• Punitive policies in schools
• Emphasize accountability
• Reduce enrichment
• Two tiered system of healthcare
• Increased poverty linked to increased violence,
  addiction, and risk behaviors

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Core Principles of Feminist Therapy

• Clients stories matter (Phenomenology)
• Integrative Can be used with different
  approaches
• Personal is political
• Context matters
• Gender is at the core of power relationships
• Gender is socially constructed
• Emphasizes interdependence over autonomy
• Emphasizes transformation of self and society not
  just adjustment, symptom reduction, or
  actualization
• Sees therapists as agents of social change
• Believes good therapy is feminist therapy

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Cases

• Scott
• Abby
• Anna Sergie