Product Description
An important breakthrough in the treatment of one of the most challenging classes of psychological disorders This book introduces psychotherapists to Integrative Relational Psychotherapy (IRP), a dynamic new approach to the diagnosis and treatment of personality disorders that capitalizes on recent major advances in the fields of personology and therapy systems theory. Combining a rigorous biopsychosocial model of personality with a relational framework for patient assessment and treatment planning, IRP is designed to produce rapid and sustained systemic change in patients suffering from virtually all DSM–identified personality disorders. With the help of numerous case studies and vignettes drawn from his own practice, Dr. Jeffrey Magnavita provides a remarkably lucid, fully referenced presentation of the theoretical underpinnings of IRP. He arms you with tested relational assessment tools, psychometrics, and interviewing techniques that can easily be incorporated into individual, couples, and family therapy practices. And he develops clear guidelines for creating customized, highly focused treatment strategies––for individual clients or families––that integrate an array of systemic intervention modalities to be administered sequentially or in combination.
From the Inside Flap
Over the past two decades, family theorists have greatly expanded our understanding of the systemic influences that evoke, reinforce, and compliment personality disorders. At the same time, personality theorists have had equal success in mapping the intrapsychic landscapes of a wide range of personality pathologies. Unfortunately, the kind of healthy cross–pollination of ideas that leads to scientific advancement remains minimal at best between these two disciplines. Most system theorists who treat personality disorders continue to ignore individual models, while personality theorists doggedly maintain their focus on intrapsychic/intrapersonal dynamics. In this groundbreaking book, Jeffrey Magnavita goes a long way toward rectifying this lamentable situation. Relational Therapy for Personality Disorders introduces a dynamic new approach to the evaluation and treatment of personality disorders that builds upon important developments in both camps. Known as Integrative Relational Psychotherapy (IRP), this comprehensive treatment approach draws upon an array of theories, methods of change, and technical interventions. At the heart of IRP is a biopsychosocial model of personality that draws upon the latest research into genetic, developmental, social, cultural, interpersonal, and other forces that can give rise to and sustain personality pathologies. Another key component of IRP is a finely calibrated relational framework for patient assessment and treatment planning that defines personality pathologies in terms of the relational contexts within which they manifest themselves—including dyadic, couple, group, family, and societal systems. With an eye to evoking rapid and sustained systemic change, Dr. Magnavita devotes particular attention to dynamic treatment–matching. Working from the assumption that every patient is unique and that, from one case to the next, the same disorder can have varying underlying maintenance structures, he provides guidelines for developing and deploying treatment strategies that partake of a wide range of focused systemic modalities, to be delivered sequentially or in combination. Representing an important advance in the treatment of one of the most challenging classes of psychological disorders, Relational Therapy for Personality Disorders is an indispensable source of inspiration and ideas for all mental health professionals.
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