Emotional Schema Therapy

This book presents innovative tools for helping patients to understand their emotional schemas--such as the conviction that painful feelings are unbearable, shameful, or will last indefinitely--and develop new ways of accepting and coping with affective experience. Therapists can integrate emotional schema therapy into the treatment approaches they already use to add a vital new dimension to their work. Rich case material illustrates applications for a wide range of clinical problems; assessment guidelines and sample worksheets and forms further enhance the book's utility.

Robert L. Leahy, PhD, is Director of the American Institute for Cognitive Therapy in New York City and Clinical Professor of Psychology in the Department of Psychiatry at Weill Cornell Medical College. Dr. Leahy is Associate Editor of the International Journal of Cognitive Therapy and is past president of the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies (ABCT), the International Association for Cognitive Psychotherapy, and the Academy of Cognitive and Behavioral Therapies (A-CBT). He is a recipient of the Outstanding Clinician Award from ABCT and the Aaron T. Beck Award from A-CBT. Dr. Leahy is author or editor of 29 books for mental health professionals and the general public, including If Only and The Worry Cure. His books have been translated into 21 languages.

I. Emotional Schema Theory 1. The Social Construction of Emotion 2. Emotional Schema Therapy: General Considerations 3. A Model of Emotional Schemas II. Beginning Treatment 4. Initial Assessment and Interview 5. Socialization to the Emotional Schema Model III. Specific Interventions for Emotional Schemas 6. The Centrality of Validation 7. Comprehensibility, Duration, Control, Guilt/Shame, and Acceptance 8. Coping with Ambivalence 9. Linking Emotions to Values (and Virtues) IV. Social Emotions and Relationships 10. Jealousy 11. Envy 12. Emotional Schemas in Couple Relationships 13.Emotional Schemas andthe Therapeutic Relationship Conclusions