Due 14 March 2017, this book by Professor Stephen Joseph was first published in 2005. Now extensively updated and retitled, The Handbook of Person-Centred Therapy and Mental Health makes a powerful case for the acceptability and effectiveness of person-centred approaches to working with people diagnosed with severe mental illnesses, such as psychosis, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, and also for working collaboratively with mental health practitioners who come to the work from a medical-model perspective. This updated second edition captures the significant changes in recent years in how mental health and ill health is conceptualised and understood, and in how mental health care is delivered.
Contributors from across the fields of research, policy-making and practice discuss the tensions between the person-centred approach and the dominant medical model.
- They demonstrate how Rogers’ theories of personality and the actualising process are able to provide a model of human functioning that is relevant not just to counselling but to all mental health professions, and to the social sciences.
- They give examples of how the person-centred approach is being applied successfully in practice (and evaluated).
- They offer personal testament to the challenges of working in a person-centred way within mainstream contexts, and review the vibrant political and professional divisions and arguments that continue to inform thinking and practice today.
New chapters examine the influence of the national Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) programme in England, and how researchers are successfully overcoming the challenge of evaluating the effectiveness of person-centred approaches to severe mental distress.
Available for pre-order, further details can be found on the publisher's website.
Posted on Friday 10th February 2017