Top » Articles and Essays » Consumer Articles

Resources:

Psychotherapy for Depression
Your First and Best Treatment Choice This article was written in response to a number of shorter articles from an issue of the American Psychologist (June, 1995, Volume 50, Number 6). These articles were written in response to a prior article in this same journal, which made the same case for psychotherapy as being the treatment of choice for depression, but in gentler terms. I think the time for gentler terms is past and that individuals should be fully informed as to their treatment options, especially with regards to what has been conclusively shown to work for depression. Many individuals often turn to psychotropic medications for immediate relief of emotional problems. I don't believe the research backs up such a solution, as you will see below. Following the extensive quotes from the journal, I have also outlined the major points of these articles.
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 4329 - Rate This | Details

A Letter to My Psychiatrist ^{Top Rated}
by Jaimie L. White
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 800 - Rate This | Details

Articles and Writings from John Flanagan, LCSW
This site offers a few dozen helpful and well-written articles describing common issues and psychological terms, including: Agreements, Managing Reactivity, Art as Evocateur, Mind verses Self, Birthdays, New Years Resolutions, Bonding & Empathy, Overwhelm, Boundaries, Praise and Criticism, Catastrophizing, Protective Impulses, Control Issues, Reactivity, Empathic Failures Resistance to Change, Endings, Risk, Fairness, Secrets and Lies, Forgiveness, Self-Sabotage, Fear of Intimacy, Stress Management, Guilt, Symptoms, Hypervigilance, Telling the Truth, Inadequacy, Trapped Feelings, Indecisiveness, Triggers, Integrative Psychology and Trust. An elegant, well-designed site that makes reading his perspective on these issues enjoyable and easy.
Preview Website - 27-May-2005 - Hits: 440 - Rate This | Details

Consumer Reports Readers Rate Psychotherapy
Martin E. P. Seligman answers questions regarding the validity of the recent Consumer Reports reader survey
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 658 - Rate This | Details

Distinctions between therapists' degrees
What does all the titles after your therapists name mean? Whats a Ph.D., Psy.D., M.Ed., MSW, etc. mean? Find out here!
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 528 - Rate This | Details

Electroshock
Biased media reporting on this controversial technique. Learn more about Electroshock Therapy, and how it may work, and how some may fear it.
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 954 - Rate This | Details

Flame Wars
Effects of Mood States on Social Judgments in Cyberspace by Storm King
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 312 - Rate This | Details

Generic & trade names of medications
Learn the generic and trade name equivalent of a medication and also what it is used for.
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 560 - Rate This | Details

Hot Psychology Magazine ^{Top Rated}
Hot Psychology Magazine provides penetrating articles, thoughts and essays on the things that make we as humans tick.
Preview Website - 24-Dec-2004 - Hits: 478 - Rate This | Details

House of Cards ^{Top Rated}
Review of Robyn Dawes' book on Psychology
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 335 - Rate This | Details

How to Choose a Therapist
...and Other Questions Answered About Starting Your Psychotherapy So often I've been asked, "So how does one choose a good therapist?" After all, nobody wants to put their intensely personal emotional problems into the hands of an inexperienced, ineffective, or useless practitioner. The below guidelines will offer suggestions you may want to follow in choosing your next therapist. By the way, while I was at one time a therapist in practice, I have also been in my own therapy. This article was written with both experiences in mind.
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 435 - Rate This | Details

Licensing Information
Need to contact your local licensing board about a therapist or counselor you're seeing? Links to all of their Websites are here.
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 113 - Rate This | Details

My Dance With Shadow
A poem by Diana Bay
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 442 - Rate This | Details

Patient rights ^{Top Rated}
Your basic rights as a mental health patient. You have rights as a patient regardless of what kind of treatment you seek. Check here and see what you have a right to.
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 489 - Rate This | Details

Sacred Life?
Suicide interventions on the Internet

Since the influx of individuals signing-on for the first time, the Internet has become a microcosm of all the problems of society at large. Usenet, the messaging forum of the Internet, has been acutely affected by issues of morals and ethics. These issues range from children reading unmoderated, inappropriate newsgroups such as those in the alt.sex hierarchy, to companies disregarding Usenet precedence and tradition, deluging hundreds of newsgroups with their unwanted advertisements. Other on-line service providers, such as CompuServe and American On-line, have much stricter codes of standards and can enforce them through their membership structures. They also have formal organizational structures and moderators scan most discussion areas on-line. On the Internet, anyone can become a member at anytime and participate in any discussion anywhere. There is no formal organizational structure and very few moderators of newsgroups.
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 444 - Rate This | Details

SARANDI: Sexual Abuse Recognition and Non-Disclosure Inventory of Young Adolescents ^{Top Rated}
Sexual Abuse Recognition and Non-Disclosure Inventory of Young Adolescents by Nancy Faulkner, Ph.D.
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 484 - Rate This | Details

The Horror of HMOs
Anonymous experience with HMO "care" Followup
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 223 - Rate This | Details

The Starvation of Our Mental Healthcare System
An essay by David B. Goldstein, Ph.D. (September 8, 1999).
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 318 - Rate This | Details

Therapeutic Neglect: A First-Person Account
Cub Lea writes about his unfortunate experiences with therapists and therapy.
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 299 - Rate This | Details

True and Fair?
An essay by John McManamy about drug company-funded research (November 17, 1999).
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 207 - Rate This | Details

Types of Therapies ^{Top Rated}
Theoretical Orientations and Practices of Therapists

There are probably hundreds of different types of theoretical orientations and techniques that therapists use nowadays in the field of psychotherapy. You, as a consumer of mental health services, want an overview, however, of these types of approaches to therapy and practice. Luckily, you've turned to the right place. In this document, I will review the main schools of theory and the techniques they utilize in practice. Granted, such an overview is going to miss a lot and generalize even more (something my professors back in graduate school would kill me for!), but I feel information is important. I will, therefore, try and be mildly objective and unbiased in my presentation, when possible. Be aware that any therapist, no matter what their background or training actually is, can say they practice or subscribe to any of the below major schools of thought in psychology; a therapist's educational degree is no guarantee of any one theoretical or treatment orientation.
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 717 - Rate This | Details

Unprofessional Practices
Creating diagnoses through publicity and media campaigns
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 236 - Rate This | Details

When do you Divorce your Doctor?
When do you divorce your doctor? Regardless of whether the initials after the name read LCSW, Ph.D. or MD, the painful reality is that sometimes you've got to get out for the sake of your own well-being.
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 279 - Rate This | Details

Why Managed Care Hurts You
Demand better from your HMO or insurance company now! Reader Response What's the big deal about this? Try getting psychotherapy services from your HMO or insurance company and you'll soon realize what the "big deal" is. There are two major and a whole lot of minor problems with regards to how managed care hurts your ability to access timely and effective treatment. The first problem is that insurance companies, looking out for the bottom line, will seek to limit either the time or type of psychotherapeutic services offered you. The second problem is that these same companies seek to limit your choices in who you can see.
Preview Website - 1-Apr-2000 - Hits: 193 - Rate This | Details