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Emotionally focused therapy
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Emotionally focused therapy
Emotionally focused therapy and emotion-focused therapy (EFT) are related humanistic approaches to psychotherapy that aim to resolve emotional and relationship issues with individuals, couples, and families. These therapies combine experiential therapy techniques, including person-centered and Gestalt therapies, with systemic therapy and attachment theory. The central premise is that emotions influence cognition, motivate behavior, and are strongly linked to needs. The goals of treatment include transforming maladaptive behaviors, such as emotional avoidance, and developing awareness, acceptance, expression, and regulation of emotion and understanding of relationships. EFT is usually a short-term treatment (eight to 20 sessions).
Emotion-focused therapy for individuals was originally known as process-experiential therapy, and continues to be referred to by this name in some contexts. EFT should not be confused with emotion-focused coping, a separate concept involving coping strategies for managing emotions. EFT has been used to improve clients' emotion-focused coping abilities.
EFT began in the mid-1980s as an approach to helping couples. EFT was originally formulated and tested by Sue Johnson and Les Greenberg in 1985, and the first manual for emotionally focused couples therapy was published in 1988.
To develop the approach, Johnson and Greenberg began reviewing videos of sessions of couples therapy to identify, through observation and task analysis, the elements that lead to positive change. They were influenced in their observations by the humanistic experiential psychotherapies of Carl Rogers and Fritz Perls, both of whom valued (in different ways) present-moment emotional experience for its power to create meaning and guide behavior. Johnson and Greenberg saw the need to combine experiential therapy with the systems theoretical view that meaning-making and behavior cannot be considered outside of the whole situation in which they occur. In this "experiential–systemic" approach to couples therapy, as in other approaches to systemic therapy, the problem is viewed as belonging not to one partner, but rather to the cyclical reinforcing patterns of interactions between partners. Emotion is viewed not only as a within-individual phenomena, but also as part of the whole system that organizes the interactions between partners.
In 1986, Greenberg chose "to refocus his efforts on developing and studying an experiential approach to individual therapy". Greenberg and colleagues shifted their attention away from couples therapy toward individual psychotherapy. They attended to emotional experiencing and its role in individual self-organization. Building on the experiential theories of Rogers and Perls and others such as Eugene Gendlin, as well as on their own extensive work on information processing and the adaptive role of emotion in human functioning, Greenberg, Rice & Elliott (1993) created a treatment manual with numerous clearly outlined principles for what they called a process-experiential approach to psychological change. Elliott et al. (2004) and Goldman & Greenberg (2015) have further expanded the process-experiential approach, providing detailed manuals of specific principles and methods of therapeutic intervention. Goldman & Greenberg (2015) presented case formulation maps for this approach.
Johnson continued to develop EFT for couples, integrating attachment theory with systemic and humanistic approaches, and explicitly expanding attachment theory's understanding of love relationships. Johnson's model retained the original three stages and nine steps and two sets of interventions that aim to reshape the attachment bond: one set of interventions to track and restructure patterns of interaction and one to access and reprocess emotion (see § Stages and steps below). Johnson's goal is the creation of positive cycles of interpersonal interaction wherein individuals are able to ask for and offer comfort and support to safe others, facilitating interpersonal emotion regulation.
Greenberg & Goldman (2008) developed a variation of EFT for couples that contains some elements from Greenberg and Johnson's original formulation but adds several steps and stages. Greenberg and Goldman posit three motivational dimensions—(1) attachment, (2) identity or power, and (3) attraction or liking—that impact emotion regulation in intimate relationships.
Two professional bodies currently organize training and research in EFT approaches:
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Emotionally focused therapy
Emotionally focused therapy and emotion-focused therapy (EFT) are related humanistic approaches to psychotherapy that aim to resolve emotional and relationship issues with individuals, couples, and families. These therapies combine experiential therapy techniques, including person-centered and Gestalt therapies, with systemic therapy and attachment theory. The central premise is that emotions influence cognition, motivate behavior, and are strongly linked to needs. The goals of treatment include transforming maladaptive behaviors, such as emotional avoidance, and developing awareness, acceptance, expression, and regulation of emotion and understanding of relationships. EFT is usually a short-term treatment (eight to 20 sessions).
Emotion-focused therapy for individuals was originally known as process-experiential therapy, and continues to be referred to by this name in some contexts. EFT should not be confused with emotion-focused coping, a separate concept involving coping strategies for managing emotions. EFT has been used to improve clients' emotion-focused coping abilities.
EFT began in the mid-1980s as an approach to helping couples. EFT was originally formulated and tested by Sue Johnson and Les Greenberg in 1985, and the first manual for emotionally focused couples therapy was published in 1988.
To develop the approach, Johnson and Greenberg began reviewing videos of sessions of couples therapy to identify, through observation and task analysis, the elements that lead to positive change. They were influenced in their observations by the humanistic experiential psychotherapies of Carl Rogers and Fritz Perls, both of whom valued (in different ways) present-moment emotional experience for its power to create meaning and guide behavior. Johnson and Greenberg saw the need to combine experiential therapy with the systems theoretical view that meaning-making and behavior cannot be considered outside of the whole situation in which they occur. In this "experiential–systemic" approach to couples therapy, as in other approaches to systemic therapy, the problem is viewed as belonging not to one partner, but rather to the cyclical reinforcing patterns of interactions between partners. Emotion is viewed not only as a within-individual phenomena, but also as part of the whole system that organizes the interactions between partners.
In 1986, Greenberg chose "to refocus his efforts on developing and studying an experiential approach to individual therapy". Greenberg and colleagues shifted their attention away from couples therapy toward individual psychotherapy. They attended to emotional experiencing and its role in individual self-organization. Building on the experiential theories of Rogers and Perls and others such as Eugene Gendlin, as well as on their own extensive work on information processing and the adaptive role of emotion in human functioning, Greenberg, Rice & Elliott (1993) created a treatment manual with numerous clearly outlined principles for what they called a process-experiential approach to psychological change. Elliott et al. (2004) and Goldman & Greenberg (2015) have further expanded the process-experiential approach, providing detailed manuals of specific principles and methods of therapeutic intervention. Goldman & Greenberg (2015) presented case formulation maps for this approach.
Johnson continued to develop EFT for couples, integrating attachment theory with systemic and humanistic approaches, and explicitly expanding attachment theory's understanding of love relationships. Johnson's model retained the original three stages and nine steps and two sets of interventions that aim to reshape the attachment bond: one set of interventions to track and restructure patterns of interaction and one to access and reprocess emotion (see § Stages and steps below). Johnson's goal is the creation of positive cycles of interpersonal interaction wherein individuals are able to ask for and offer comfort and support to safe others, facilitating interpersonal emotion regulation.
Greenberg & Goldman (2008) developed a variation of EFT for couples that contains some elements from Greenberg and Johnson's original formulation but adds several steps and stages. Greenberg and Goldman posit three motivational dimensions—(1) attachment, (2) identity or power, and (3) attraction or liking—that impact emotion regulation in intimate relationships.
Two professional bodies currently organize training and research in EFT approaches: