Psychotherapy Is Increasingly Based on Neuroscience. These Are the New Techniques
Recent neuroscience discoveries are giving new techniques that can help people overcome old trauma.
Today, more and more people are turning to psychologists and psychotherapists for support, but they often don't think about how to choose a truly effective therapist. It seems that those professionals who keep up with the latest discoveries in the field of the human brain have improved and alternative methods to help their clients.
In recent years, neuroscience, the field of study of the human brain, has brought discoveries that help us better understand how we think and feel. Moreover, these discoveries offer new opportunities for psychologists and psychotherapists to work with mental health crises and traumatic events in people's lives.
Scientists have long known that human memory is continuously updated as a result of new circumstances. Now, neuroscience research has shown that memory retention depends on certain levels of stress. When the level of stress is relatively mild, memories are formed and retained, but when the stress becomes too prolonged or intense, it produces trauma where memories can be distorted or even lost.
In a recent article, Italian psychologists Davide Maria Cammisuli and Gianluca Castelnuovo emphasize that these observations can help psychotherapists when working with clients' traumas. An appropriate process of recalling past events, that is, a process with less stress and more control, can be very useful in processing trauma.
In other words, in a new supportive environment provided by the therapist, the recovered memory acquires new and more positive qualities. In modern psychotherapeutic practices, newer methods can be used for this purpose, such as accelerated resolution therapy, rewind techniques, cognitive restructuring, and image modification.
"Their goal is to help the patient experience less distress during memory reactivation, gain a new perspective on negative past events, rewrite a different ending, and transform the trauma," the study's authors emphasize. These advances are reshaping psychotherapy and giving therapists new tools to engage with deeply ingrained trauma.