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a2zpsychology.com > Psychology Guide > Therapies > Attack Therapy |
Attack Therapy
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Attack therapy is a controversial type of psychotherapy evolved from ventilation therapy. It involves highly confrontational interaction between the patient and a therapist, or between the patient and fellow patients during group therapy, in which the patient may be verbally abused, denounced, or humiliated by the therapist or other members of the group. The method has been used by groups such as Synanon, and similar methods have been employed in Large Group Awareness Training. A 1990 report by the Institute of Medicine on methods for treating alcohol problems suggested that the self-image of individuals should be assessed before they were assigned to undergo attack therapy; there was evidence that persons with a positive self-image may profit from the therapy, while people with a negative self-image would not profit, or might indeed be harmed. Methodology Attack therapy can be particularly problematic when the group members are captive, and not allowed to leave during the sessions. In Group Psychotherapy with Addicted Populations, Flores notes that attack therapy can take place when individuals are psychologically intimidated in a confrontational atmosphere. In her book Help at Any Cost: How the Troubled-teen Industry Cons Parents And Hurts Kids, Maia Szalavitz writes that attack therapy can include the tactics of isolation, and rigid imposition of rules, which later leads to a restoration of limited permissive freedom, and an acknowledgement of those that did comply with the strict rules.Psychologist Donald Eisner writes in The Death of Psychotherapy that attack therapy: "attempts to tear down the patient's defenses by extreme verbal or physical measures."Tudor describes attack therapy in Group Counselling, writing that the individual is ridiculed in front of others, and cross-examined and questioned about their personal behavior patterns. According to Maran's book Dirty, attack therapy can take place in "all-night encounter groups and daily interactions." Monti, Colby, and O'Leary write in Adolescents, Alcohol, and Substance Abuse that in attack therapy, there was a movement to: "tear them down in order to build them up", referring to a methodology of tearing down the individual ego in order to then educate the individual in the inherent thought-patterns of the group and the group leader. In Concise Encyclopedia of Psychology, Corsini and Auerbach note that attack therapy puts an emphasis on the expression of anger by each individual. One Nation Under Therapy by Satel and Sommers characterized attack therapy as among the "more bizarre expressive therapies", and put it in the same category as The Primal Scream, Nude Encounter, and Rolfing. In Social Problems, Coleman and Cressey write that in attack therapy, one individual is criticized and "torn down" by the rest of the larger group. |
