Thursday, July 28, 2011
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Wise Counsel Interview on Logotherapy
Dr. Dave also hosts the world's premier psychology podcast Shrink Rap Radio - All the psychology you need to know and just enough to make you dangerous.
Click here for a direct link to the Wise Counsel interview on Logotherapy.
Click here for The Wise Counsel Podcast.
Click here for Shrink Rap Radio.
Saturday, May 14, 2011
Frontier Logotherapy: A Clinical Diplomate Project
FRONTIER LOGOTHERAPY:
A LOGOTHERAPY PRACTICUM IN A
MEDICALLY UNDERSERVED RURAL AND FRONTIER AREA
A Project Presented to the Viktor Frankl Institute of Logotherapy in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Diplomate in Logotherapy
After eight months of writing and editing, I am happy to report that my diplomate project is now complete. The project is part of the requirements of the Viktor Frankl Institute of Logotherapy leading to the clinical Diplomate in Logotherapy credential. The paper will be presented to the Institute next month and is now at the printer. Click on the image to the left to view a PDF version of the project.
Sunday, October 3, 2010
Shrink Rap Radio
Shrink Rap Radio
All the psychology you need to know and just enough to make you dangerous.
I wish to send a great big Thank You to Dr. Dave and Shrink Rap Radio for mentioning my Viktor Frankl podcast, LogoTalk.Net, on the last two episodes. Shrink Rap Radio is one of my favorite podcasts, and I highly recommend it.
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Monday, November 10, 2008
Interview with Dr. Donald J. Fort
Interview with Dr. Donald J. FortIn 2003 I completed this interview with Dr. Donald J. Fort, the retiring Executive Director of the Area Mental Health Center. This interview was available on the Area Mental Health Center website until recently. That website is undergoing a revision with a new webmaster. Consequently, the interview will now be available on my personal site.
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Thoughts on the Future of Logotherapy
I began my reflections on the future of Logotherapy by first looking into the past. Logotherapy was developed in an era when events such as the following took place.
“One day our immediate leader (a boy of about 16 years of age) pointed to some of us and said: “You, you, and you, follow me.” Of course, without raising any objections we followed him. He marched us to a tram station. We boarded the tram. After some time the doors to the tram were locked and a deadly silence fell upon all in the tram. I was horribly afraid, because I could not understand what was happening. But, of course, I also did not say a thing or even ask any questions. Then I saw and put two and two together. What I saw was terrible. Half starved, dirty people with yellow stars on their clothing. I was shocked. No one had prepared me for this moment. No one. Not my parents and not the leaders in the camp. No one had ever talked to me about what I was now witnessing. Soon the horror was over for me, but the effect on me stayed with me all of my life. The doors to the tram were unlocked and normal chatter filled the tram. None of us said anything about what we had just witnessed. No one asked questions and neither did I.”
- Prof. Dr. Walter Michel
Walter Michel was an Austrian teen forced into a Fuhrer-ertuchtigungs-lager. He later became my Hebrew professor. As a result of the war, the young man became obsessed with learning the truth. As part of this pursuit, he took a course in Logotherapie taught by Viktor Frankl at the University of Vienna in 1953. Speaking today, Dr. Michel tells me that “the thing I remember most is that Viktor Frankl made most sense when he spoke about the divine – none of my theology professors made sense not then nor now. I began to prefer philosophy to theology – actually I began to dislike theology very much.”
At that time, the existential vacuum was a raw wound that inspired a search for truth. I hear very few persons of my generation or younger concerning themselves with that question. It seems that the wound has been dressed with affluence and technological marvels. We now live in an era of care managed by accountants leading to a science that applies cost effectiveness as its dependent measure. In my view, this environment offers Logotherapy the opportunity to prove itself as the only depth psychology to stand up to scientific scrutiny and the only school of thought capable of mitigating the dehumanizing effects of this environment.
Increasing emphasis on evidenced-based practices is driven by managed care companies. Research has shown the effectiveness of symptomatic treatment; both medication and cognitive therapy are proven effective for depression, for example. One recent study showed an 81% recovery rate from depression with either cognitive therapy or medication. Relapse rate has been shown to be 25% with cognitive therapy (80% with medication). I found this 20% to 25% of clients either not recovering or relapsing to be intriguing when compared to Frankl's statement that about 20% of neuroses are of noogenic origin. I wonder if this population of non-recovering and relapsing persons significantly overlaps with the population of persons whose depression is of noogenic origin but who were never treated in a noogenic manner. It seems to me that a study applying Logotherapy to that population could make Logotherapy very attractive to managed care companies
Meanwhile, studies continue to fail to find evidence to support psychoanalysis, often implying extension to other depth psychology schools. A publication that made recent headlines detailed the lack of evidence for symptom substitution. Logotherapy, by contrast, has found research support for its principles, even to the point of eliciting this statement from Frankl, "I suspect that Logotherapy has become too scientific to become popular in the proper sense of the word." In my experience, these findings have not been as widely disseminated as the positive findings from the cognitive and humanistic schools or the negative findings from the depth psychology schools. Logotherapy may become the only validated depth psychology perspective if evidence of the existential vacuum becomes generally accepted. Perhaps, this may be done with some improvement to its operational definition (as provided in the Glossary of Terms and Frankl's works ) coupled with some type of differential diagnosis criteria.
Logotherapy also has the opportunity to influence the current environment of positivism. Even in a strict biological science such as neurology, there is growing awareness that a person can change the functioning of one's brain through the choices that one makes. One could argue that just as some diabetics can control their disease through the diet they choose, so some depressives can control their mood through the stands they choose to take.
Finally, it appears that this culture is becoming open to spirituality once more, but choosing to separate that spirituality from specifically religious practice. That leaves only personal experience as a guide, and much nonsense can result. Logotherapy offers spiritual guidance not bound to any doctrine, but based on reason and accurate observation. As such, it may prove to be the ark that carries the distillation of human spiritual wisdom through the flood of positivism and delivers it safely to a population that will trust their doctor but not their priest.
“One day our immediate leader (a boy of about 16 years of age) pointed to some of us and said: “You, you, and you, follow me.” Of course, without raising any objections we followed him. He marched us to a tram station. We boarded the tram. After some time the doors to the tram were locked and a deadly silence fell upon all in the tram. I was horribly afraid, because I could not understand what was happening. But, of course, I also did not say a thing or even ask any questions. Then I saw and put two and two together. What I saw was terrible. Half starved, dirty people with yellow stars on their clothing. I was shocked. No one had prepared me for this moment. No one. Not my parents and not the leaders in the camp. No one had ever talked to me about what I was now witnessing. Soon the horror was over for me, but the effect on me stayed with me all of my life. The doors to the tram were unlocked and normal chatter filled the tram. None of us said anything about what we had just witnessed. No one asked questions and neither did I.”
- Prof. Dr. Walter Michel
Walter Michel was an Austrian teen forced into a Fuhrer-ertuchtigungs-lager. He later became my Hebrew professor. As a result of the war, the young man became obsessed with learning the truth. As part of this pursuit, he took a course in Logotherapie taught by Viktor Frankl at the University of Vienna in 1953. Speaking today, Dr. Michel tells me that “the thing I remember most is that Viktor Frankl made most sense when he spoke about the divine – none of my theology professors made sense not then nor now. I began to prefer philosophy to theology – actually I began to dislike theology very much.”
At that time, the existential vacuum was a raw wound that inspired a search for truth. I hear very few persons of my generation or younger concerning themselves with that question. It seems that the wound has been dressed with affluence and technological marvels. We now live in an era of care managed by accountants leading to a science that applies cost effectiveness as its dependent measure. In my view, this environment offers Logotherapy the opportunity to prove itself as the only depth psychology to stand up to scientific scrutiny and the only school of thought capable of mitigating the dehumanizing effects of this environment.
Increasing emphasis on evidenced-based practices is driven by managed care companies. Research has shown the effectiveness of symptomatic treatment; both medication and cognitive therapy are proven effective for depression, for example. One recent study showed an 81% recovery rate from depression with either cognitive therapy or medication. Relapse rate has been shown to be 25% with cognitive therapy (80% with medication). I found this 20% to 25% of clients either not recovering or relapsing to be intriguing when compared to Frankl's statement that about 20% of neuroses are of noogenic origin. I wonder if this population of non-recovering and relapsing persons significantly overlaps with the population of persons whose depression is of noogenic origin but who were never treated in a noogenic manner. It seems to me that a study applying Logotherapy to that population could make Logotherapy very attractive to managed care companies
Meanwhile, studies continue to fail to find evidence to support psychoanalysis, often implying extension to other depth psychology schools. A publication that made recent headlines detailed the lack of evidence for symptom substitution. Logotherapy, by contrast, has found research support for its principles, even to the point of eliciting this statement from Frankl, "I suspect that Logotherapy has become too scientific to become popular in the proper sense of the word." In my experience, these findings have not been as widely disseminated as the positive findings from the cognitive and humanistic schools or the negative findings from the depth psychology schools. Logotherapy may become the only validated depth psychology perspective if evidence of the existential vacuum becomes generally accepted. Perhaps, this may be done with some improvement to its operational definition (as provided in the Glossary of Terms and Frankl's works ) coupled with some type of differential diagnosis criteria.
Logotherapy also has the opportunity to influence the current environment of positivism. Even in a strict biological science such as neurology, there is growing awareness that a person can change the functioning of one's brain through the choices that one makes. One could argue that just as some diabetics can control their disease through the diet they choose, so some depressives can control their mood through the stands they choose to take.
Finally, it appears that this culture is becoming open to spirituality once more, but choosing to separate that spirituality from specifically religious practice. That leaves only personal experience as a guide, and much nonsense can result. Logotherapy offers spiritual guidance not bound to any doctrine, but based on reason and accurate observation. As such, it may prove to be the ark that carries the distillation of human spiritual wisdom through the flood of positivism and delivers it safely to a population that will trust their doctor but not their priest.
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