10/chapter 12 let's get ethical, ethical

Question: Where are the ethical principles of APA most relevant to AT? 

Answer:

Ethics is defined as moral principles that govern a person’s or group’s behavior.  When outlining and designing ethics for any organization by even looking at the definition it is clear to see how establishing solid and reliable ethics plays an important part in how an organization functions.  A couple of defining principles from the American Psychological Association that are relevant to Adventure Therapy can be seen in several different areas. Gass, Gillis and Russell (2012) mention that it is important to understand your clients values, your values, and various factors that go into their identity.  If a professional isn’t careful, often times over-generalizing can lead to stereotyping.  This reason amongst others is why it is helpful to reference the ten areas for adventure therapists to assess before making ethical decisions in relation to clients.  Part of the ten identified include identifying the biological differences that different genders may experience, the stereotyping and discrimination that is experienced amongst those with disabilities and the socioeconomic status and perceive power or powerlessness experienced amongst these different ethnicities.  Across all of these domains the important commonality is to not discriminate against any of these populations.  This falls under the realm of the American Psychological Association ethical policies seen in Standard 3: Human Relations.  In standard 3.01, it specifically states that psychologists do not engage in unfair discrimination based on gender ethnicity or disability amongst other populations also categorized in Adventure Therapy practices.

Another overarching ethical principle that is highlighted in Adventure Therapy is the concept of nonmaleficence, which means, “above all do no harm”.  Basically, this idea covers the importance of risk and benefits that are experienced in adventure programming. Although it is impossible to avoid all harm in adventure programming I feel like this concept can be better understood under the umbrella of the American Psychological Associations ethics principles.  In section 3.04 Avoiding Harm, APA specially states that reasonable steps must be taken to avoid harm to people who they work with and work to  minimalize harm when it is foreseeable and unavoidable.  I feel like this section of human relations is especially relatable because without some form of risk, perceived or actual, AT programs wouldn’t function as they did.


Although many relevant ethical principles can be drawn between the two, I specifically focused on the human relationships piece because I feel like it is such a valuable portion for both the APA and AT and plays a big part in the moral of professionals in either field.  The question I am left with at this point is what are other overarching concepts that you feel are relevant to both AT and APA and why? Thanks for reading!


References:
Gass, Michael A., Lee Gillis, and Keith C. Russell. (2012).  Adventure Therapy: Theory, Research, and Practice. New York: Routledge

American Pscyholocial Association (2010). Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/ethics/code/index.aspx?item=6

Oxford University Press (2013). Ethics. Retrieved from http://oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/ethics

9/Chapter 10 competence

Question: How do competencies for becoming an adventure therapist compare and contrast with a different method of experiential treatment?

Answer:

Adventure Therapists have well-developed competencies in order to provide quality care to clients.  Ten competencies specifically that related to adventure therapists were effective listening, feedback, debriefing/reflection skills, group development stages, transfer of learning, client assessment, dealing with difficult clients, experiential learning, processing skills, integration strategies and solution-oriented processing (Gass, Gillis, Russell, 2012).

A practice with similar competencies is seen across eco-therapy.  eco-therapy can lead to moments where our vision of our surroundings becomes more intense, when things are more beautiful and meaningful than normal and we feel a sense of connectivity towards our surroundings.  These harmonious and meaningful experiences are also referred to as peak experiences in eco-therapy and Adventure Therapy.  While there are no set credentials to become a registered Eco-therapist (yet), you must have a traditional therapy degree for entry into eco-therapy practices.  This is one of the major differences in competency  the training. 

Although both are relatively new fields, they are similar is that they are utilized throughout different countries.  AT has seen a lot of different practices such as the Bush Adventure Therapy.  Eco-therapy expands its branches to Australia and beyond with the International  Community of Ecopsychology. 

Another big connection that I noticed between Adventure Therapy and Eco-therapy is experiential learning.  Psychotherapist and eco-therapist Linda Buzzwell talks translates taking someone in a fruit tree garden as acknowledging that they are taking part in something that is larger than themselves.  Another similarity is integration strategies, in eco-therapy’s case this is the use of use of a time diary.  A time diary helps people see how much time they spend outside verses inside.  You basically log time spent looking a cellphone, television or other forms of electronics verses the time you spent outside or interacting with nature. This way people can use their log as a way to make slight shift their lifestyle, implementing more time with nature gradually.  As people spend more time in nature, they are exposed to a more clam and nurturing environment.  To listen to the whole radio interview chick here. 

The main Question that I am left to chew on is:

What differences and similarities will develop as the fields develops as well?

Works Cited:

  Gass, M. A., Gillis, H. L., & Russell, K. C. (2012). Adventure therapy: Theory, research, and practice. (1st ed.). New York, NY: Taylor & Francis Group.

PRI's Envirmental News Magazine (2009). Ecotherapy. Retrieved from http://www.loe.org/shows/segments.html?programID=09-P13-00025&segmentID=5 

Taylor, S., (2012). The Power of Therapy: Ecotherapy and Awakening. Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/out-the-darkness/201204/the-power-nature-ecotherapy-and-awakening

Scull, J., (2009). What is ecosychology. Retrieved from http://www.ecopsychology.org/people.html

8/Chapter 7: Meant to assess

Question: Compare and contrast the approach to AT assessment presented in Chapter 7 to at least 2 different approaches to assessment in mental health treatment?

Answer: 

A health assessment is conducted by a medical professional and gives an overall picture of how well you feel emotionally and how you are able to think, reason and remember.  One type of mental health assessment is a written or verbal test.  These answers are rated and scored by a mental health practitioner and generally contain 20 to 30 questions that can be answered quickly in a yes or no format and usually don’t take long to complete.  These questionnaires often focus on specific problems, how you are able to think reason or remember or how well you are able to carry out routine activities.  Specifically, a mental health test such as the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale is used.  The WAIS is similar to Adventure Therapy’s GRABBS model in that it reveals the overall strengths and weaknesses of the test taker.  Another similarity is that verbal comprehension can be assessed during the design and diagnosis stage of the CHANGES model, which is also seen during assessment in Adventure Therapy. Specifically, the C in Changes is Context, and as Adventure Therapists gather information about client groups they can start to get an idea of their comprehension level.  Two differences in the model are that the WAIS provides information on ones full scale IQ and working memory. 

Another type of common mental health assessment could be an interview conducted with a mental health professional. These questions may range anywhere from are you neat and clean to are you standing up straight?  This works best when the interviewee is as detailed as possible and it could be helpful to provide a journal or diary if there is one that relates to the matter.  These specific questions will measure how you think, measure or reason.  One stress for the interview assessment is that it is conducted by a mental health professional (3).  This involvement with mental health professionals in assessment is seen in Adventure Therapy as well.  Although it is computerized, one form of interview assessment is the Global Mental Health Assessment Tool- Primary Care Version or GMHAT/PC.  This tool is used to identify mental health problems.  One similarity between interviews and AT’s assessment is that both start with basic instructions giving details about how to use the program and the clients are will informed on what the process looks like.  This is similar to the readiness part of GRABBS where a group after knowing the goals is assessed to see if they are ready.  A last main difference here is that an individual’s assessment is transcribed in some fashion while with AT it is not.

One question that I am left thinking about is…

What part of AT and these other mental health practices provide the best aspect of assessment for groups or individuals?

Citation: 

Cherry, K., (2013). The Wechsler Adult Intelligence Test. Retrieved from http://psychology.about.com/od/intelligence/a/wechsler-adult-intelligence-scale.htm

Heatlhwise Staff (2011). Mental Health Assessment. Retrieved from http://www.webmd.com/mental-health/mental-health-assessment?page=2

Sharma, V., Lepping, P., Cummins, A., Copeland, J., Parhee, R., Mattram, P., (June, 2004). The Global Health Assessment Tool- Primary Care Version (GMHAT/PC). Development, reliability and validity. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1414685/ 

Gass, Michael A., Lee Gillis, and Keith C. Russell. (2012).  Adventure Therapy: Theory, Research, and Practice. New York: Routledge