Stephan Hau

Rites of passage: Novice students' experiences of becoming psychotherapist

This qualitative study examines learning processes in psychotherapy programs, focusing on how skills develop during clinical training. More specifically, the study investigates what psychotherapy students in basic training tell about their own struggling. Three training groups were included (n = 25). Data from written final essays on supervised psychotherapies were analyzed by inductive thematic analysis and identified themes were independently reviewed for accuracy. Themes fitted four categories: reactions during the psychotherapy, thoughts about having two psychotherapies, the influence of the supervisor and the peer group, and finally reflections on what to continue to observe in future psychotherapies. Students were found to be uncertain about whether emotions experienced in their therapeutic work belonged to them and therefore should be kept to themselves, or belonged to the client and thus could be used in the psychotherapy. Students also experienced that their own feelings were being magnified in the psychotherapeutic situation. Conducting two parallel psychotherapies was considered by the students to make it easier to sort out what belonged to their own personality and what belonged to the client. All students underlined the importance of group supervision for gaining perspectives. An important conclusion is that students need help to sort out and understand their feelings in the supervision situation.

Flucht, Migration und Trauma: Die Folgen für die nächste Generation

Die Schicksale des ausgesetzten Konigssohns Odipus, von Odysseus, Persephone, Jason, Medea und vielen anderen Gestalten der Antike erinnern daran, dass Migration, Flucht und Trauma so alt sind wie ...

Viewing pictures triggers rapid morphological enlargement in the human visual cortex

Brain morphology change over the course of weeks, days, and hours, and can be detected by non-invasive structural magnetic resonance imaging. Rapid morphological changes at scanning has yet not been investigated. In a randomized within-group study, high-resolution anatomical images were acquired during passive viewing of pictures or a fixation cross. Forty-seven individuals gray matter volume and cortical thickness were investigated, and both measures increased in the visual cortex while viewing pictures relative to a fixation cross. Thus, brain morphology enlargements were detected in less than 263 seconds. Neuroplasticity is a far more dynamic process than previously shown, suggesting that individuals’ current mental state affects indices of brain morphology. This needs to be taken into account in future morphology studies and in everyday clinical practice.

Experimentelle Schlaf- und Traumforschung

Ungefahr ein Drittel seines Lebens verbringt der Mensch im Schlaf, und diese Zeit erscheint keineswegs verschwendet. Obwohl nicht alle Funktionen des Schlafes verstanden sind, ist dennoch unumstritten, dass Menschen schlafen mussen, um uberleben zu konnen. Schlaf wird haufig als Ruhezustand interpretiert, in dem regenerative Prozesse stattfinden, die unter anderem das Immunsystem betreffen, das Nervensystem, den Knochenaufbau oder den Stoffwechsel.

Sleep Studies in Serbian Victims of Torture: Analysis of Traumatic Dreams

One of prominent features related to the posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is according to DSM-5 “recurrent distressing dreams in which the content and/or affect of the dream are related to the traumatic event(s)”. The phenomenology and the underlying dynamics of traumatic dreams are areas of study that still need to be understood.

Erinnerung und Gedächtnis in der Schlaf- und Traumforschung

Das Thema dieses kurzen Kapitels umfasst ein sehr weites Feld. Deshalb soll es eingegrenzt werden (1) auf die Darstellung verschiedener Gedachtniskonzepte. Ein zweiter Teil (2) wird sich der Frage zuwenden, wie Schlaf bzw. Traum Erinnerungen und Gedachtnisprozesse beeinflussen.

Professional development and psychotherapy supervision

As with the previous issue of Nordic Psychology, this edition is also devoted to papers presented at the Nordic Conference “Psychotherapy and Supervision Research in Dialogue: A Nordic Conference a ...