As a paradigm of a wounded healer, parentified therapists may be gifted with therapeutic talents, but also with related vulnerabilities that may have a significant influence on their therapeutic practice. Therefore, the aim of the current study was to explore the impact of parentification on therapeutic practice, especially on the therapeutic skills of empathy and boundary settings. For this purpose, a mixed method design was employed in which 38 trainee psychologists provided self-report data on the constructs of parentification measured by parentification questionnaire (Jurkovic, 1997), empathy, measured by Interpersonal Reactivity Index (Davis, 1980), and boundary settings, measured by Exploitation Index (Epstein, 1990) in a survey study, while 4 trainee psychologists were interviewed in a separate study. First, the quantitative data were analysed to assess the existence of possible relationships among the variables of parentification, empathy and boundary transgressions by a regression analysis. The results offered significant suggestions for the predictive power of parentification in regard to empathy and boundary transgressions. Following this, a qualitative study analysed the interviews with the 4 trainees using thematic analysis to explore the above relationships and provided a deeper insight, especially for their therapeutic utility. Combining the findings, the current study supported that parentification may first of all catalyse the choice of a psychologist's profession, well as the choice of the psychotherapeutic approach. In regard to the interpersonal skills, parentification may positively impact the development of enhanced levels of empathy, boundary flexibility, and creativity. On the other hand, parentification may also negatively impact on practitioners by making them more vulnerable to enmeshed therapeutic relationships. Especially in the case of destructive parentification, professional support may be needed to minimise the risk for enmeshed relationships, by increasing self-care and self-other differentiation. Clinical implications for parentified therapists were also discussed.

This thesis explores the desistance promoting potential of professional relationships between male youth workers and young men involved in violence. It adopts a psychosocial methodological and analytic frame to examine a common-sense proposition: that male workers who are colloquially described as 'down with the kids' are especially well suited to engage and mentor young men involved in violence. Five intensely observed longitudinal case studies follow the trajectories of young men and their youth workers over six years. Each case utilises different conceptual tools to offer different insights into their relationships, including: the presence of gendered, generational and unconscious dynamics between young men and male workers; how reciprocal identification can lead to male youth workers not seeing how young men neutralise their violent offending; worker reflexivity as a pre-requisite of the youth work role in late modernity and how this can be fractured by the biographical experiences of too-wounded healers; the importance of male workers with resources of street-social and masculine capital creating a third space where they and young men can examine their own intersectional identities, and; how worker self-disclosure can shift doer done-to dynamics within professional relationships and organisations. The thesis concludes that the male worker as mentor and role model discourse generates both assets and potential shortcomings in terms of desistance promotion. Embodying a 'down with the kids' worker subjectivity can provide a ready route into youthful, masculine subcultures and a means for male workers to meet their own need for generativity. But without proper training and supervision there is a risk that workers with their own history of offending can be ineffective at best, and at worst descend into professional burn-out. In this sense being down with the kids can lead inadvertently to workers going down with the kids. Reconceptualising youth work relationships incorporating psychodynamic and post structural perspectives (i.e. as psychosocial) offers a way to work through these issues productively and can usefully inform youth work practice and policy.

No description available.

No description available.

Substance abuse counseling has many counselors and supervisors who are in recovery from a personal history of substance abuse. Approximately 37% of supervisors in the substance abuse field reported being in personal recovery (Eby, Burke, & Birkelbach, 2009). Little is known about how a clinical supervisor’s personal recovery influences his or her clinical supervision. The purpose of this phenomenological research study was to investigate the perceived lived experiences of clinical supervisors’ in recovery during the clinical supervision of substance abuse counselors working towards a license or credential in Louisiana. A qualitative phenomenological methodology, Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) was used to analyze data from six clinical supervisors in recovery using semi-structured interviews. Themes emerged from the data, which resulted in 13 categories: 1) functions of supervision; 2) factors influencing the supervision relationship; 3) insight into addiction; 4) factors pertaining to self-disclosure; 5) managing dual relationships; 6) recovery isn’t enough; 7) relapse potential and management; 8) stigma of addiction; 9) structure of supervision; 10) countertransference; 11) feelings about self-disclosure; 12) importance of self-care; and 13) supervisors need supervision and consultation The categories provide increased understanding and insight into how recovery influences and were used in supervision by supervisors in recovery. Implications for supervisors in recovery, supervisees of supervisors in recovery, and clinical supervisor educators are also addressed.

The topic of my research is the lived experiences of eight psychotherapists and counsellors who consciously work with unusual phenomena as it arises in the therapeutic encounter. Unusual phenomena in this thesis refers to felt experiences which are considered to be beyond the everyday in the Cartesian paradigm and are often referred to as spiritual and/or mystical phenomena. Exploring these phenomena brings to light the potentialities in the vastness of consciousness which is considered to be an integral aspect of human existence in the thesis. I chose Heidegger’s hermeneutic phenomenological methodology for the research because it gives credence to the many and varied possibilities and potentialities both in particular lived experiences and in human existence as a whole. Van Manen’s lived existential provides the framework in which the participants’ experiences are explored. What emerged from the research is that unusual phenomena are not unusual for the participants. Although such phenomena are less visible and therefore less familiar in the everyday world, they are recognizable through their consistent presentation. This includes the participants having a powerful sense of ‘knowing’ which is all-encompassing and is beyond familiar landmarks such as the linear models of time and space. The participants bring their ‘knowing’ into the everyday world through embodiment and through their acknowledgment of the interconnectedness of existence. The expression of interconnectedness is experienced by the participants as lovingness, from which the ability for immediate healing in their therapeutic work becomes apparent. The participants’ accounts show a capacity for accessing the subtleties of human existence which emerge in the phenomenological process as the forgotten feminine of consciousness. The feminine of consciousness is a term used to describe a fundamental state of ‘being’ in contrast to the everyday masculine principle of ‘doing’. The research has implications for psychotherapy and counselling as it illuminates the need for a holistic approach which acknowledges the multidimensionality of human existence.

The topic of my research is the lived experiences of eight psychotherapists and counsellors who consciously work with unusual phenomena as it arises in the therapeutic encounter. Unusual phenomena in this thesis refers to felt experiences which are considered to be beyond the everyday in the Cartesian paradigm and are often referred to as spiritual and/or mystical phenomena. Exploring these phenomena brings to light the potentialities in the vastness of consciousness which is considered to be an integral aspect of human existence in the thesis. I chose Heidegger’s hermeneutic phenomenological methodology for the research because it gives credence to the many and varied possibilities and potentialities both in particular lived experiences and in human existence as a whole. Van Manen’s lived existential provides the framework in which the participants’ experiences are explored. What emerged from the research is that unusual phenomena are not unusual for the participants. Although such phenomena are less visible and therefore less familiar in the everyday world, they are recognizable through their consistent presentation. This includes the participants having a powerful sense of ‘knowing’ which is all-encompassing and is beyond familiar landmarks such as the linear models of time and space. The participants bring their ‘knowing’ into the everyday world through embodiment and through their acknowledgment of the interconnectedness of existence. The expression of interconnectedness is experienced by the participants as lovingness, from which the ability for immediate healing in their therapeutic work becomes apparent. The participants’ accounts show a capacity for accessing the subtleties of human existence which emerge in the phenomenological process as the forgotten feminine of consciousness. The feminine of consciousness is a term used to describe a fundamental state of ‘being’ in contrast to the everyday masculine principle of ‘doing’. The research has implications for psychotherapy and counselling as it illuminates the need for a holistic approach which acknowledges the multidimensionality of human existence.

Emergency department nurses are faced with traumatic patient events while functioning as members of multidisciplinary teams. Critical incident debriefing has been shown to benefit health care professionals and patient clinical outcomes. The purpose of this quantitative correlational study was to examine the relationship between the use of formal post-resuscitation debriefings and perceptions of teamwork in emergency department nurses. The study also addressed the type and timing of debriefing to determine whether these factors impacted perceptions of teamwork. The nurse as wounded healer theory served as the theoretical framework. Data from the Nursing Teamwork Survey were collected from 68 emergency department nurses from across the United States. Data were analyzed using a statistical correlation coefficient. Results showed that when debriefings were done more frequently, were conducted using a formal debriefing method, and were held immediately after a situation, there was a positive correlation with higher levels of trust, team orientation, backup, shared mental model, and leadership. Findings may be used to increase utilization of debriefings and improve perceptions of teamwork among emergency department nurses, which may improve patient outcomes.

No description available.

This study examines the literary texts of the Ligurian writer Giuseppe Conte published between 1972 and 2005. In Part One, the reasons are considered which justify this research on Giuseppe Conte. This author is discussed in the context of the literary movements of the second half of the 20th century in Italy, with special reference to his approach to literature, which proposes a modern rewriting of myth. Conte is in fact a co-founder of "Mitomodernismo". "Mitomodernismo" is a literary movement, established in 1994 and currently still active, which aims to revive modern society through a spiritual rebirth promoted by a recovery of basic human values, as these appear within the boundaries already suggested by myth since antiquity. The Mitomodernisti propose an alternative which could assist contemporaries to overcome the obstacles created by modern "maladies", particularly in the West, whether these be socio-cultural, ecological, or religious. Throughout Conte's entire æuvre one clearly perceives this strong desire for rebirth which for the author is concretised in "Fare Anima", that is, a way to reconnecting with the universe, of rising towards the "light". This tension towards rebirth could be compared metaphorically to the quest for the Graal, which involves suffering as a way to redemption. The artist's visionary work is comparable to the extrasensory journey undertaken by the shaman during his trance. For this reason, in Part One of this study the figure of the shaman will also be examined in a socio-cultural context, in order to transfer it better to the literary context. The whole of Part Two is dedicated to an analysis of Conte's æuvre - poetry, novels and also, but only indirectly, essays and articles - in the light of his fundamental themes, which metaphorically turn the writer into a "shaman". The analysis is based on some concepts put forward by the Swiss psycho-analyst Carl Gustav Jung, such as the function and symbolism of myth in literature from a psychoanalytical perspective. RIASSUNTO In questo studio vengono prese in esame le opere dello scrittore ligure Giuseppe Conte, pubblicate dal 1972 al 2005. Nella Parte Prima vengono considerate le ragioni che giustificano questa ricerca su Giuseppe Conte. L'autore viene discusso nel contesto dei movimenti letterari del secondo Novecento in Italia, ed in particolare il suo approccio alla letteratura che propone una riscrittura del mito in chiave moderna. Lo scrittore è infatti uno dei cofondatori del "Mitomodernismo". Il "Mitomodernismo" è un movimento letterario che vide la luce nel 1994 e che è ancora attivo alla data attuale. Esso si prefigge di risanare la società moderna mediante una rinascita spirituale promossa dalla ripresa dei valori umani di base, simili a quelli suggeriti dal mito fin dai tempi antichi. A tutto ciò i Mitomodernisti propongono un'alternativa che aiuti l'uomo contemporaneo a superare gli impedimenti creati da queste "malattie" moderne, particolarmente nell'ambito occidentale, siano queste socioculturali, ecologiche, religiose, o altre. Attraverso tutta l'opera di Conte si percepisce chiaramente questo desiderio di rinascita che per lo scrittore si concretizza nel "Fare Anima", vale a dire in un modo di ricollegarsi al cosmo, di innalzarsi verso la "luce". Questa tensione verso la rinascita può venire metaforicamente comparata alla ricerca del Graal attraverso la sofferenza che redime. L'opera visionaria dell'artista è paragonabile al viaggio extrasensoriale intrapreso dallo sciamano durante la sua trance. Per questo motivo nella Prima Parte di questo studio si esamina la figura dello sciamano anche in ambito socioculturale per poterla poi meglio trasferire in quello letterario. La Parte Seconda è completamente dedicata all'analisi dell'opera contiana - poesie, romanzi e, trasversalmente, i saggi e gli articoli alla luce dei suoi temi portanti, che dello scrittore fanno metaforicamente uno "sciamano". L'analisi viene condotta basandosi su alcuni concetti elaborati dallo psicoanalista svizzero Carl Gustav Jung, quali la funzione ed il simbolismo del mito in letteratura da una prospettiva psicoanalitica. / Classics & Mod Euro Lang / D. Lit. et Phil.