Counseling Disorders: A Case Study

Control Group. For participants in the control group the written instructions described that they would be put on a wait-list for the LSD treatment, but until then, they would complete an hour of counseling therapy every week for 8 weeks. Counseling for PTSD was any treatment or intervention provided by a mental health professional or professional in-training aimed at the alleviation of PTSD symptoms in participants diagnosed with the disorder (Erford, 2016). These fifteen participants completed an hour of counseling each week for eight weeks with a Licensed Professional counselor at a health clinic. The counselor discussed his/her problems with the patient. After eight weeks, the participants will be given questionnaire to measure their insight
The Beck Cognitive Insight Scale was comprised of 15 items assessing both self-certainty and self-reflectiveness (e.g., “I have jumped to conclusions too fast”), each rated on a 4-point Likert Scale (1 = Do Not Agree at All; 4 = Agree Completely). These 15 items were averaged to form a composite measure of cognitive insight by subtracting the score of the self-certainty scale from that of the self-reflectiveness score. The Revised NEO Personality Inventory contained 240 items reflecting a person’s neuroticism, extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness and openness (e.g., “I have a vivid imagination”), each rated on a 5-point Likert Scale (1=Strongly Disagree; 5= Strongly Agree). This measure was used to answer communication with the
We assessed insight by using Beck’s (2004) Beck Cognitive Insight Scale (BCIS). We used an independent samples t-test to determine what effect the LSD had on the insight, as assessed by this instrument. The results suggest that the participants who received LSD had gained more insight (M = 8.53, SD =.52) compared to those who did not receive it (M =2.00, SD =1.36), t (28) = 17.36, p < .001.
The effect of LSD on openness in P.T.S.D patients. We assessed openness using McCrae’s & Costra’s (1990) Revised NEO Personality Inventory. We used an independent samples t-test to determine what effect the LSD had on openness to communicate, as assessed by this instrument. The results suggest that the participants who received LSD had more open communication skills (M = 8.00, SD =1.78) compared to those who did not receive it (M =1.40, SD =.51), t (28) = 13.86, p < .001.
Discussion
The present study was consistent with previous research showing that people who were under the influence of LSD during therapy showed more signs of gaining insight and an increase in communication openness. We predicted that the group who ingested the LSD would achieve a higher level of insight and more openness in communication compared to the group on the wait list. In this study, those who were not on the wait list did achieve insight and communication openness, and thus the hypothesis was