Unifying Effective Psychotherapies: Tracing the Process of Change

Mental health professionals have long debated what makes effective psychotherapy work. Is it a specific treatment modality, or a set of common factors such as a strong therapeutic relationship? In this book, J. Scott Fraser argues that both perspectives are correct. His transtheoretical, transdiagnostic framework identifies the process of change that underlies all effective treatments.
 
From this viewpoint, all client problems boil down to negative, recurring cycles of thought and behavior. The goal of psychotherapy is to disrupt or reverse those cycles. While successful treatment requires common factors linked with specific interventions, these components must be embedded in a therapeutic rationale that implies a direction for treatment. There are many possible “correct” rationales, so finding the one that best fits the client and therapist is the task of treatment planning. The book uses varied and compelling case examples, featuring different client problems and treatments, to illustrate a common process of change.
 
Both philosophically rich and highly practical, this book helps readers understand the complexity and promise of psychotherapy.
 

J. Scott Fraser, PhD, is a clinical psychologist with nearly 40 years of clinical practice, supervision, training, and academic teaching. He has served as director of internship training, associate dean, and director of clinical training and as professor of clinical psychology in the nationally ranked and pioneering doctoral program at the School of Professional Psychology at the Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio. Before that, he was director of a crisis/brief therapy center in a large general hospital setting for 14 years. He is a Diplomate in Family Therapy through the American Board of Professional Psychology and an approved supervisor in the founders’ track of the American Association for Marital and Family Therapy. Dr. Fraser has presented and trained therapists in the United States, Europe, and Asia, and his recent writing focuses on integrating evidence-based approaches to psychotherapy. A compantion DVD titled The Process of Change in Integrative Psychotherapy, which uses the process model described in this book, is also available from APA in the Systems of Psychotherapy Video Series. Dr. Fraser coauthored Integrative Families and Systems Treatment (I-FAST): A Strengths-Based Common Factors Approach (2014), which represents the first research-based manual for teaching and practicing a moderated common factors approach to at-risk youth and families in community settings. His related book, coauthored with Andrew D. Solovey, Second-Order Change in Psychotherapy: The Golden Thread That Unifies Effective Treatments (2007), applies this integrative model across all evidence-supported approaches to psychotherapy. Now serving as emeritus professor, Dr. Fraser continues to write, train, and supervise through these models.