Types of therapy
Knowing which therapy to choose is important as specific methodologies work better with certain personality types and issues.
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What types of therapy are there?
As there are dozens of approaches to therapy and counselling that are designed to help with a broad range of issues, knowing which type of therapy is best for you is important. Often, clients will go through many different therapists in their lifetime and may switch between methods and practices depending on what they need at the time.
While an individual may not know exactly what type of therapy is right for them until they are well into their therapy journey, having a broad understanding of the different types of treatment can help them be better placed to make decisions down the road.
The founding models of psychotherapy
These therapies serve as the basis for most models used today.
Psychoanalysis
Psychoanalysis is built on the work of Sigmund Freud, who pioneered the idea that our psychological issues are built in the unconscious mind.
A psychoanalyst will discuss with clients their past experiences using techniques such as free association and dream analysis with the aim of uncovering repressed feelings that affect the person’s current mental state and behaviour.
Person-centred therapy
Client-centred or person-centred therapy was developed by Carl Rogers and is based on the theory that we all have the innate potential and desire to better ourselves. In person-centred therapy, the counsellor doesn’t take the role of an expert but rather offers the client unconditional positive regard, congruence, and empathy in order to help them better themselves
Jungian therapy
Jungian therapy often involves practices that engage the unconscious part of the brain, such as dream analysis, word association, creative activities, and in some cases hypnosis. Jungian therapy can be beneficial to clients looking to understand themselves and their drivers better and to develop skills to manage difficult situations and emotions better.
Gestalt therapy
Gestalt is derived from German and means ‘whole’ or ‘pattern’. Gestalt therapy focuses on the client as a whole and does not seek to separate their behaviour, emotions, and past experience. Gestalt therapists will work with clients to get them to understand how they operate in the present to better understand how they manage situations and emotional responses. This is similar to humanistic and integrative counselling.
Therapy and counselling can help to improve mood, wellbeing, and develop skills that can benefit in day to day life.
Transactional analysis
Transactional analysis incorporates humanistic, psychodynamic, and cognitive-behavioural approaches in order to understand how and why a client behaves the way they do towards others.
