Building an integrative science for psychotherapy for the 21st century: Preface and introduction

Abstract

Psychotherapy is plagued with fragmentation of models, theories, and interventions. The future of psychotherapy requires an integrative framework rooted in the expanding science of psychology, neuroscience, and social contextualism. The papers in this special issue address these challenges for psychotherapy, ranging from explorations of the implications of epigenetics, evolutionary functional analysis, interpersonal neurobiology, the importance of social relationships as physiological regulators, through to the challenges of ethnic diversities and the growing digital technologies. Practitioner pointsAs therapists, we should be aware of the challenges posed by the proliferating 'schools of therapy' and consider commonalities rooted in a scientific understanding of the mind. The science of understanding the causes, alleviation, and prevention of mental health problems is increasingly multidimensional taking into consideration the interactions between biological, psychological and social processes and in the process dissolving the boundaries between different schools of psychotherapy.

Psychotherapy for the 21st century: An integrative, evolutionary, contextual, biopsychosocial approach

“…Although the psychotherapies are fragmented in terms of different schools, identified processes, and interventions, there are also calls for a more pluralistic, cross‐disciplinary, integrative, and consilient scientific approach (Gilbert & Kirby, ; Wilson, ). One grounding for this science is from insights into our origins; how and why we are built the way we are and suffer the maladies we do.…”

“…Many psychotherapies recognize the importance of evolutionary insights for understanding the mind (Gilbert & Kirby, ). While having insight into the phylogenetic and distal sources of the various types and functions of our emotion and motivation potentials is important, we need an evolutionary foundation for our science for another reason: The brain was not designed .…”

“… Fragmentation of processes and interventions plague the psychotherapies (Gilbert & Kirby, ). Part of the problem is that we have not agreed on a framework that could be the basis for integrating knowledge and the scientific enquiry of processes and interventions.…”

The mind in psychotherapy: An interpersonal neurobiology framework for understanding and cultivating mental health

“…A wide range of disciplines, including mathematics and physics, biology (including neuroscience, genetics, and medicine), psychology, linguistics, sociology, and anthropology, as well as other approaches are explored to find consilient principles emerging from these various approaches to understanding reality. Without much shared linguistic terminology or research strategies, finding ‘common ground’ across these varied disciplines can be a challenge (Gilbert & Kirby, ).…”

Psychotherapy for personal growth? A multicultural and multitheoretical exploration

“…For example, the motivational interviewing theory posits that people are oriented toward growth and change and that it is the therapist's task to elicit this inherent change in each person (see Magill et al, 2014). Many integrative therapies, such as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (Dindo, Van Liew, & Arch, 2017), Compassion Focused Therapy (Gilbert & Kirby, 2019), and Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (Linehan & Wilks, 2015) include interventions orientated towards personal growth. Cayoun (2014), for example, has framed personal growth within the framework of mindfulness‐integrated CBT as a kind of “wholesome craving” that, when triggered, it generates interest in healthy change processes such as wanting to become wiser, to learn skills that produce and maintain well‐being and good relations.…”