2021 Volume 48 Issue 2 Pages 49-53
Attempts to integrate diverse approaches to psychotherapy and counseling started in 1980s, after a longstanding rivalry among theoretical orientations. After the so-called ideological cold war, psychotherapists acknowledgement of inadequacies of single school approach and the intensive research appraisal of the effectiveness of each approach stirred the psychotherapy integration movement. In 1979, SEPI (Society for Exploration of Psychotherapy Integration) was established in the United States, and international debates and open inquiry were activated to increase therapeutic efficiency, efficacy and applicability of the theories and techniques. There are four routs to psychotherapy integration : technical eclecticism, theoretical integration, common factors approach and assimilative integration. Since late 1990, respect for diversity and pluralism of theories as well as human beings based on the social constructionist epistemology (postmodernism) has accelerated the coexistence of diverse theories and approaches. Now the collaboration of “therapist as a specialist on counseling” and “client as a specialist on oneself” is essential for the psychological support. Attempts to integrate psychotherapy integration and development of collaborative and pluralistic approach were discussed.
