Self-Mapping in Treating Suicide Ideation: A Case Study

Abstract

This case study traces the development and use of a self-mapping exercise in the treatment of a youth who had been at risk for re-attempting suicide. A life skills exercise was modified to identify units of culture called memes from which a map of the youth's self was prepared. A successful treatment plan followed the mapping exercise. The process of self-map construction is presented along with an interpretive analysis. It is suggested that therapists from a range of perspectives could use this technique in assessment and treatment.

Graphing the Self: An application of graph theory to memetic self-mapping in psychotherapy

“…Repellant memes may either exemplify "what the self is not" or introduce instability into the self. Figure 1 recreates a memetic self-map co-constructed with a client known in the literature as "Suzie" (Robertson, 2011b). Words within ovals are referents for a complex of connotative, affective and behavioral characteristics describing self-referencing units of culture or memes.…”

“…The depictions of other characteristics such as psychological strength, impact, relationship, and internal cycles could be enhanced using GT concepts. Sciences,7(1) 41 Robertson (2011b) represented the strength of bonding of two memes by the proximity of their locations: memes closer to each other exhibited greater attractive force than those further apart. Considerations of attractive or repulsive psychological strength may be clinically estimated and represented graphically using edge line weight.…”

“…The eight gateway paths enabling affirmative to negative transitions are: angry -> hostile to peers; angry -> father hater; angry -> depressed person; contradictory -> depressed person; contradictory -> angry; reincarnation -> suicidal; writer -> depressed person; and writer -> suicidal. Robertson's (2011b) therapeutic strategy was to create a new and alternative memetic theme with the referent "human rights" around which a positive cluster of already existent memes could be organized. Such a development would strengthen the "social interest" aspect of the client's self to help give her life meaning and purpose.…”

“…In a subsequent case study, he (Robertson, 2011b) presented three diagrams representing a the self of a youth with suicide ideation as it changed during the course of therapy. The client's initial resistance to treatment was understood as a function of her constructed identity centered on the self-descriptor "depressed person."…”

“…This paper re-examines the mapped progress exhibited by youth experiencing suicide ideation (Robertson, 2011b) from the perspective of Graph Theory (GT) 2 networks with memes taken as corresponding to GT vertices and the pair-wise relationships between memes corresponding to GT edges. Self-mapping diagrams are used to illustrate GT's potential for sequence analysis in understanding the evolution of a suicidal youth's self during therapy.…”