Clients' beliefs about psychological problems

Abstract An investigation of clients beliefs about the causes and treatments of their own psychological problems, using a new instrument, the Opinions about Psychological Problems (OPP). We found that, although the beliefs about the various models were positively correlated, clients made clear overall discriminations between them. For causation, they tended to agree with the four psychological models (Behavioural, Cognitive, Humanistic and Psychodynamic) and the Naive model, and tended to disagree with the Socio-economic and Organic models. For treatment, they endorsed Behavioural, Cognitive and Humanistic most highly, and again disagreed overall with Socio-economic and Organic. Individual difference variables showed that clients reporting a higher level of psychological symptoms tended to endorse all causation beliefs more highly, and also were more likely to agree with Behavioural, Cognitive, Humanistic and Psychodynamic treatments. The structure of clients' beliefs differed from that found in previous ...

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