Integrating spirituality and psychotherapy: Ethical issues and principles to consider

Abstract

Professional and scientific psychology appears to have rediscovered spirituality and religion during recent years, with a large number of conferences, seminars, workshops, books, and special issues in major professional journals on spirituality and psychology integration. The purpose of this commentary is to highlight some of the more compelling ethical principles and issues to consider in spirituality and psychology integration with a focus on psychotherapy. This commentary will use the American Psychological Association's (2002) Ethics Code and more specifically, the RRICC model of ethics that readily applies to various mental health ethics codes across the world. The RRICC model highlights the ethical values of respect, responsibility, integrity, competence, and concern. Being thoughtful about ethical principles and possible dilemmas as well as getting appropriate training and ongoing consultation can greatly help the professional better navigate these challenging waters.

Religiosity, Spirituality, and Mental Health in Portugal: A call for a conceptualisation, relationship, and guidelines for integration (a theoretical review)

“…As a matter of fact, even though, professionals' personal religious and spiritual views can serve as important components for expertise (meaning these views can influence their assessment of their patient's spiritual and religious issues, as well as the decision as to whether the use of religious and spiritual interventions is relevant), these are not sufficient or even necessary conditions for the competence (Plante, 2007;Gonsiorek, Richards, Pargament & McMinn, 2009;Gockel, 2011).…”

“…Most of the mental health ethical guidelines (if not all) have as main assumption the respect and nondiscrimination for the client as a person: a multicultural person (Steen, Engels & Thweatt, 2006;Plante, 2007;Hathaway & Ripley, 2009;APA 1 , 2010;Barnett & Johnson, 2011;Rosenfeld, 2011;Cook, 2013;APA 2 , 2013;ACA, 2014). However, most of them go beyond that.…”

“…This issue was recognised to be particularly difficult to deal with, in cases when a mental health professional is either actively involved in a particular religious tradition or holds anti-religious and antispiritual beliefs, risking falling into some ethical pitfalls (Plante, 2007). For instance, one might fail to recognise the potential harm of specific religious and spiritual beliefs and practices or overestimating them by pathologising these beliefs and practices (Vieten et al, 2013).…”

Working with religious and spiritual athletes: Ethical considerations for sport psychologists

“…Yet, as noted in the introduction, 19 and indeed the impetus for the current article is the fact that such ideas remain on the fringes 20 of the emerging scholarship of CSP. Today's reality is that sport psychology practitioners 21 will work with athletes from varying religious and spiritual perspectives be those athletes The present article is intended to enhance practitioners' understanding and application 10 of the RRICC model (Plante, 2007), through the lens of cultural praxis, when working with 11 athletes of religious and spiritual persuasion. Closely monitoring ethical issues that emerge - 12 or are likely to emerge -during the course of our professional work is critical for clients' 13 cultural safety.…”

Hipnose e subjetividade: utilização da experiência religiosa em psicoterapia

“…É possível que se perceba despreparado para lidar com o tema, seja por não possuir conhecimentos sobre ele (Paiva, 2002;Pargament & Saunders, 2007), seja por não conseguir divisar os limites de seu papel a ponto de poder ser confundido com algum papel religioso (Aponte, 1996;Plante, 2007). Pode também ceder à tentação de enquadrar a experiência religiosa do cliente em algum conceito teórico que lhe seja familiar, mas que não condiga com as construções singulares de sentido do sujeito, seja uma categoria teórica de conteúdos universais, seja uma teoria de relações e papéis sociais ou ainda um quadro psicopatológico (Nathan, 1999).…”