PCSP is a peer reviewed, open-access journal and database. It provides innovative, quantitative and qualitative knowledge about psychotherapy process and outcome. PCSP is published by the National Register of Health Service Psychologists.
January, 2023 - see our newest case, Keo, a native Hawaiian with a deprived and abusive background treated using culture- sensitive existential therapy principles. Click on the upper left button for "the newest case".
The Case Studies
Jan. 16, 2023 -- FROM THE EDITOR
ANNOUNCING THE PUBLICATION OF OUR 64th ISSUE (Vol. 19, Module 1)
Existential Psychotherapy in a Deep Cultural Context: The Case of “Keo”
*** Jerrold Shapiro, Santa Clara University
Commentaries
*** Arthur Bohart, Santa Clara University
*** Amy Curtis, Private Practice, Burlington, VT, & Ronald Miller, Saint Michael's College
EDITOR'S NOTE
From author Jerrold Shapiro’s Abstract: " 'Keo,' a 23-year-old native Hawaiian man came from a deprived and abusive background. After a period of seeming to turn his life around, Keo became depressed and withdrawn upon learning of a native Hawaiian culture curse that had been perpetrated on him and his sister.
In the 24 sessions I saw Keo, I drew on my existential therapy principles to focus on his subjective reality and to work in conjunction with the Hawaiian subculture associated with the curse, including referral to a Kahuna, a healer in the native Hawaiian culture.
A major existential dialectic that emerged in the case was Keo’s pull towards freedom from the curse versus his pull towards the status quo to avoid the anxiety associated with change."
