The application of sentiment analysis to a psychotherapy session : an exploratory study using four general-purpose lexicons

Dissertação de Mestrado apresentada no ISPA – Instituto Universitário para obtenção de grau de Mestre na especialidade de Psicologia Clínica.In this study we explore the application of sentiment analysis to a complete and in-person psychotherapy session. Sentiment analysis is a text mining technique that allows for the analysis, interpretation, and visualization of textual data. We investigate how we can apply a lexicon-based approach to analyze clinical session data, using four general-purpose lexicons available within an open-source statistical programming language environment, R. We conducted our study by comparing the performance of four general-purpose lexicons to the performance of n = 52 human raters, using inter-rater reliability (IRR) and intraclass correlation (ICC) measurements. Our findings suggest there is low to moderate agreement between human ratings and lexicon generated ratings, depending on the lexicon used. There are some benefits in applying a lexicon-based sentiment analysis approach to psychotherapy session data, namely the way it efficiently processes and analyses data and allows for novel visualizations of psychotherapy data. We recommend further investigation into the application of sentiment analysis as a technique, focusing on the performance of specific-purpose lexicons. We also recommend further research into comparing the performance of lexicon-based approaches to text classification approaches to the analysis of psychotherapy data

What makes therapy work? An exploratory study of the understandings of "expert" psychotherapeutic practitioners

This thesis explores the informants of effective psychotherapy derived from subjective and intersubjective practitioner/researcher perspectives. Unlike the empirical model of rationalist, objective precepts, these understandings stem from inductive reasoning that incorporates Aristotle’s (1976) notion of phronesis and Schön’s (1983) model of reflective practice. Essentially, this approach examines the tacit knowledge of ‘expert’ psychotherapists based on multiple collaborative, iterative-generative conversations. Accordingly, this process generated grounded theory characterized by a series of interrelated themes. The most significant of these established that client internalized second-order change is a primary feature of effective psychotherapy. It was also ascertained that client enhanced self-concept and subjective and objective change contribute to internalized second-order change.Secondly, client symptomology, psychological mindedness, reflexivity and openness to change were also viewed as major factors in facilitating this outcome. Thirdly, therapist contributions were recognized as important informants of effective psychotherapy. These include a commitment to emotional truth, authenticity, receptivity, therapeutic presence, clinical acumen and adoption of participant/observer and executive/caring stances. Fourthly, a number of interpersonal processes were identified as influential shapers of client second-order change. Specifically, the relational depth of the client/therapist encounter informed by the parties’ mutuality was considered pivotal.Fifthly, therapeutic turning points operating at covert and overt levels of awareness were highlighted. In keeping with informed discourse, these therapeutic events are described as therapeutic moments, vulnerable moments and present moments. Sixthly, a model of therapist empathy thought to enhance these critical encounters emerged. Finally, a six-phased transtheoretical model to facilitate practitioner effectiveness was presented based on the study’s overarching themes

Assessing personality disorder through storymaking : a reliability and validity study of the 6-part story method

The 6-Part Story Method (6PSM) involves the participant creating and telling a fictional story which is then discussed with the interviewer. Stories were recorded from NHS mental health clinicians, and from adult mental health patients with and without a diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD). Statements describing the stories could be reliably scored by raters who were blind to the authorship of the stories. It was possible to use these statements to assemble a scale with good internal consistency, inter-rater reliability and test- retest reliability over a one-month period. The scale statements all related to the degree of negativity and failure expressed in the story. Ratings on this negativity scale given to stories from patients with a cluster B personality disorder diagnosis were significantly higher than the ratings given to stories from other participants.The text of the story transcriptions was analysed using computerised text analysis programs, which detected some patterns of language use that appeared to distinguish reliably between stories from participants with BPD and other stories.Participants were asked for their reactions to the 6PSM process, and their responses analysed using a Grounded Theory approach. This suggested that for most participants, the 6PSM works through increasingly close emotional identification with an initially distant and metaphorical main character

The law of malpractice liability in clinical psychiatry : methodology, foundations and applications

As a point of departure in this inherently interdisciplinary endeavour, the concept "Holistic Multidisciplinary Management" ("HMM") is introduced a.s a macrocosmic adaption of principles of project management. In line with HMM, a number of submissions regarding terminology and definitions in the interdisciplinary context of medicine (and particularly clinical psychiatry) and law, are made, and the foundations of medical malpractice are examined. Building on the various foundations laid, specific types of conduct that can constitute clinical-psychiatric malpractice, are addressed. A common theme that emerges in the various contexts covered, is that the psychiatrist must negotiate various proverbial tightropes, involving inter alia tensions between restraint and freedom, excessive and insufficient medication, becoming too involved and not being involved enough with clients, as well as client confidentiality and the duty to warn third parties. It is concluded that law and medicine. must work harmoniously together to establish appropriate balance. This can be achieved only if mutual understanding and integrated functioning are promoted and translated into practice.LawLL.M

Extra/Ordinary Minds: Mad Genius Rhetoric and Women's Memoirs of Mental Illness

This dissertation examines how autobiographical narratives by/for persons with mental illness draw from set of cultural clichés (topoi) I call “Mad Genius” rhetoric. As popular as it is controversial, Mad Genius rhetoric imagines an age-old link between “madness,” or apparently problematic mental states, and extraordinary gifts of creativity, intelligence, and other talents. I ask: How is Mad Genius rhetoric taken up by real mentally ill people, especially women, in self-referential texts? What conditions encourage authors to construct Mad Genius personae in life writing, and what rhetorical purpose do such personae serve? Examining these questions through a lens of mental health rhetoric, I build case studies grounded in four highly influential mental illness memoirs: Susanna Kaysen’s Girl, Interrupted, Kay Redfield Jamison’s An Unquiet Mind, Nana-Ama Danquah’s Willow Weep for Me, and Elizabeth Wurtzel’s Prozac Nation. I argue each author’s narration enacts a Mad Genius persona at the nexus of her severe psychic pain and her personal gifts, explicating both how she draws on Mad Genius topoi in her writing and the contextual factors that apparently encourage her to do so. Specifically, my studies explore four discrete Mad Genius topoi: 1) the Tortured Artist, which posits that genius leads to madness; 2) the Brainiac, which posits that madness confers genius; 3) the Survivor, in which madness and genius are thought to share a common source in external trauma; 4) the Ex-Gifted Kid, in which madness/genius are thought to be innate and inextricably intertwined. As a preface to my case studies, each chapter also analyzes Mad Genius rhetoric in some contemporary pop culture archive, emphasizing both the enduring popularity of these four topoi and the centrality of auto/biographical narratives in their widespread circulation. Notions of personal specialness do seem to carry mentally ill authors through acute crises, but my readings reveal the rhetorical functions of Mad Genius, demystifying its enduring popularity amid broader cultural stigmas against mental illness. Reading these popular books as individualized responses to systemic rhetorical exclusion, I conclude that Mad Genius topoi are evidently effective, yet ultimately unsustainable frameworks through which to cope with severe psychic pain.Doctor of Philosoph

Towards the use of drama as a therapeutic tool to enhance emotional rehabilitation for people living with HIV/Aids: a case study of Paradiso HIV/Aids support organisation

ABSTRACT This study explores ways to address the emotional needs of people living with HIV/Aids, with specific focus on Paradiso group therapy in Lilongwe, Malawi. The study recognises that people living with HIV/Aids deal with physical as well as psychological challenges. Based on this premise, this study investigates whether the use of drama and theatre processes can enhance emotional rehabilitation for people living with HIV/Aids, and seeks to explore what drama and theatre methods would contribute towards their emotional health. The study examines Theatre for Development (TFD), a methodology that has played a critical role in addressing various HIV/Aids issues in Malawi. In the assessment, it is argued that TFD remains a relevant model but only as an awareness building strategy about HIV/Aids. This study concludes that TFD is, however, unable to help people explore, confront and express the personal traumatic experiences of living with HIV/Aids. Likewise, the investigation finds the traditional method of teaching utilised by the Paradiso group therapy inadequate in the sense that it does not acknowledge the lived experiences of people living with HIV/Aids. To this end, an integrated process-orientated drama methodology; drawing on the educational elements of process drama and the healing aspects of drama therapy is developed. The methodology was tested in a series of workshops with Paradiso group therapy members. The outcomes reveal that the approach is effective in providing a clear structure through which people can examine the trauma of stigma as a result of living with HIV/Aids. The study further reveals that an integrated process-orientated drama methodology is effective in enabling people to deconstruct negative HIV/Aids beliefs and narratives and in facilitating the reconstruction of new and functional ones that allow them to experience healing and emotional growth

(Mis)Interpreting Arts and Health: What (Else) Can an Arts Practice Do?

This research project concerns arts practices in healthcare settings and the encounter between artist, researcher, healthcare professional and institution. Rather than understanding arts practices as either therapeutic or recreational services, this research asks instead, what (else) can an arts practice do? This is accomplished by connecting two previously separate bodies of scholarship; health sociology and an art criticism of expanded arts practices. By connecting these bodies of scholarship, this inquiry offers a new conceptual language and orientation for arts and health practitioners distinct from the evidence-based practice model most prevalent in academic and professional discourses and consequently establishes a transdisciplinary trajectory for artistic and research practices. Navigating between polemical art critical discourses and appropriating health discourses the research seeks to follow a generative path, to create a position of affirmation, where art encounters can be understood in the way they produce affects, defined by how they connect and transform, by what they do. Such an approach addresses a lacuna in scholarship created by the almost exclusive academic interest in impact studies and the sparseness of associated critical writing. The research inquiry then makes a contribution to knowledge of relevance to artists, researchers, healthcare professionals and institutions because it offers an expanded conceptual vocabulary and scope for art practices in healthcare settings

‘Two Souls Alas…’: Jung’s two personalities and the making of analytical psychology

The thesis falls into two parts. The first examines Jung’s two personalities, as described in his memoir, Memories, Dreams, Reflections. The argument is that Jung’s experience of the dynamic between the two personalities informs basic principles behind, first the development of Jung’s psychological model and second Jung’s entire mature psychology. It is suggested that what Jung took from this experience was the principle that psychological health required the avoidance of one-sidedness, achieved through the dynamic of the two personalities. This dynamic was thus central to Jung’s notion of individuation. In short, this required the individual to bring any one-sided position into tension with a conflicting ‘opposite’ position, in order that a third position could be achieved which transcended both of the earlier positions. The second part of the thesis utilises the conclusions of the first section to bring an internal critique to bear on Jung’s analytical psychology as enshrined in the collected works. It is suggested that in certain arenas Jung’s personal one-sidedness distorted his psychology in such a way as to undermine his ability to follow through the ‘logic’ of the two personalities (as identified in part one). Jung’s tendency to prioritise the inner dimension of psychological work, and to downplay or ignore the outer dimension shows up in analytical psychology’s persistent problems engaging with political, social and historical matters. It is argued that this one-sidedness expresses a bias in the direction of Jung’s no 2 personality. Examples to support this argument are given from Jung’s writings on contemporary affairs, and from his casework with patients

Hooked on the Internet: the prevalence, risk, theory and presenting problem of Internet addiction

As the Internet becomes increasingly ubiquitous and mobile, Internet addiction appears as a potential mental health problem in adolescents and students. From the reported negative consequences, it appears Internet addiction can have a variety of detrimental outcomes for young people that may require professional intervention. The unique contribution to knowledge of this research is (i) the assessment of the interplay between certain personality traits and the usage of specific Internet applications in contributing to an elevated risk of Internet addiction in two independent samples of 3,105 adolescents in the Netherlands and 2,257 university students in the UK, (ii) the development and testing of the concise Internet addiction components model using the quantitative data obtained, and (iii) the phenomenological exploration of the presenting problem of Internet addiction from the perspective of 20 psychotherapists from Europe, the USA, and Canada. A mixed methods approach was used in the form of psychometric measurement and qualitative interviews. Data were analysed using logistic regression, confirmatory factor analysis, structural equation modelling, and interpretative phenomenological analysis