Earliest Remembered Dreams versus Recent Remembered Dreams

This study is to compare the effects of working with Earliest Remembered Dreams (ERD) of individuals to more recent remembered dreams (RRD). A limited body of research examining the characteristics of ERDs (Bulkeley et al. 2005) suggests that many individuals remember a dream from between the age of 3-12 years, and these dreams very often vivid and intense and therefore might facilitate an exploration of salient aspects of the dreamer's early emotional life. However ERDs have never been compared with RRDs to examine if differences exist in their therapeutic value. Each participant was involved in one session with an ERD and one session with an RRD, using the Hill (1996, 2004) model of dream work. The session outcome of these sessions was compared. The study shows that the ERDs reported were 4 times more likely to be nightmares and 2.6 times more likely to be recurrent dreams when compared to RRDs. In terms of session outcome, working with both ERDs and RRDs were found to be equally effective, however the salience of the dream was a significant predictor of the benefit reported by clients

Client Laughter, Not a Laughing Matter: The Interpersonal Role of Client Laughter in Psychotherapy

The purpose of this study was to investigate the presence of 5 characteristics (cheerfulness, politeness, reflectiveness, nervousness, and contemptuousness) in client laughter, and to examine the relationship between the presence of these 5 laughter characteristics and client attachment styles as observed in psychotherapy. The primary investigator, and 6 undergraduate students coded 813 laughter episodes, which were nested within 33 clients, nested under 16 therapists, in one psychotherapy clinic. Judges rated the intensity of each laughter episode in terms of the presence of these 5 laughter characteristics. Initial client attachment style was measured using a self-report measure. Laughter occurred on average, in 9 out of 10 sessions, and was rated highest on politeness and reflectiveness, followed by cheerfulness and nervousness, and was rated lowest on contemptuous. Initial attachment style of the clients influenced the characteristic observed in client laughter, throughout therapy. As theorized by Nelson (2012) clients seemed to use laughing to both connect and disconnect with the therapist. Implications for practice and research are discussed

Helping Skills Training for Undergraduate Students: Who Should We Select and Train?

Abstract We examined the effectiveness of the Hill model of helping skills training for 191 undergraduate students in six sections of a semester-long course. Students completed self-report, performance, and nonverbal measures at the beginning; they conducted one 20-min helping session at the beginning and another toward the end of the semester; and they completed self-efficacy measures at the end of the semester. Students' helping skills improved over the course of the semester, as evidenced by higher helper-and volunteer client-rated session quality, reduced proportion of words spoken in sessions, increased proportion of exploration skills used in sessions, and increased self-efficacy for using helping skills. Self-reported empathy predicted four of the five helping skills criteria at the beginning-of-semester assessment. Facilitative interpersonal skills predicted end-of-semester self-efficacy in helping skills when controlling for retrospective prelevels and instructor effects. Implications for training and research are presented