Heel on the thumb side: The functional analysis (FAP) method for navigating the clinical tangle
Moderator
Ms. Lior Gilad
What's in the workshop?
Psychotherapy often focuses on the patient as the unit of analysis and intervention (N=1). But in fact, every therapeutic interaction, even the simplest one, involves the patient at a given moment (1), the therapist at a given moment (2), the patient’s learning history that led him to act as he does at that moment (3), the therapist’s learning history that led him to act as he does at that moment (4), and the shared learning history that the therapist and patient have created so far in the room (5). What a mess!!!
Functional Analytic Psychotherapy, or FAP for short, is a radical, yet integrative behavioral therapy, developed by Prof. Robert Kohlenberg and Dr. Mavis Tsai, with the aim of encompassing the entire field described above.
Therapists who encounter FAP for the first time are sometimes surprised by how much the approach combines the centrality that psychodynamic approaches give to the patient's history and the therapeutic relationship with an emphasis on 'here and now' work in the room and striving for tangible behavioral change in the patient's life and relationships outside the room.
A key tool for therapists in the FAP approach and in behaviorist approaches in general is functional analysis – the striving to understand behaviors in the treatment room (verbal and otherwise) as an expression of learned patterns and as a tool for achieving change, in accordance with the patient's subjective goals. Functional analysis helps the therapist understand the patient's behavior, identify what makes it difficult for the patient to move freely toward his goals, and directs the therapist to be a helpful connection for creating beneficial change in the patient's behaviors. All of this, in a lively and flexible manner, in a way that examines therapeutic interactions while in motion and allows the therapist flexibility and corrections as needed.
Workshop objectives:
· Participants will become familiar with functional analysis as a key tool for conceptualizing a case, constructing interventions, and examining their effectiveness.
· Participants will understand the dynamic-process nature of functional analysis.
· Participants will be exposed to the generative importance of the connection between the patient's behavior and the context in which it occurs (interpersonal and intrapersonal, current and historical).
· Participants will learn to distinguish and identify the difference between the function of a behavior and its appearance.
· Participants will be introduced to the five guidelines of FAP treatment.
· Participants will be able to connect the concepts learned with their clinical work.
Learning methods:
The workshop will include a discussion among participants, a presentation, examples, a live/recorded demonstration, and its analysis in light of the material studied.
About the moderator
Ms. Lior Gilad – Clinical Psychologist. Owner of private clinics in Jerusalem and Mevaseret Zion. Treats, guides and teaches ACT and FAP approaches in various settings, private and public. Member of the 'Israeli Center for ACT'. Founder and leader of the ACT study program at the Mifarashim Institute. One of the leaders of the Israeli branch of ACBS (the global umbrella organization of ACT), which she previously headed.