Albert Ellis Essay

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Diploma in Integrative Hypnotherapy and Psychotherapy. Module 5 Student: Paul McLaughlin Albert ELLIS. Albert Ellis (1913 - 2007) an American psychologist was born into a Jewish family in Pittsburgh. He was the eldest of three children. His father was a businessman, who frequently worked away from home. The father is reported as being not very affectionate towards any of his children. In his autobiography, Ellis describes his mother as a self absorbed and suffering from bipolar. Ellis took on the responsibility of caring for the other children in the family. Ellis was a sickly child being hospitalized on many occasions, during these times he received little emotional support. He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Business in 1943. Initially he started in business, and then moved onto writing fiction. However with business poor, Ellis found that he could write good non fiction, he then researched and wrote on human sexually. This convinced him to seek a new career in clinical psychology. After being awarded a PhD in clinical Psychology from Columbia and having published articles (prior to his PHD) he came to believe that psychoanalysis was the deepest and most effective form of therapy. However after personal analysis and supervision by Richard Hulbeck, Ellis;s belief in psychoanalysis was beginning to wane. By 1953 Ellis was referring to himself as a rational therapist. He now championed a new more active and directive type of psychotherapy which he refereed to as Rational Therapy (RT). In RT the therapist sought to help the client understand and to act on the understanding that their personal philosophy contained beliefs that contributed to his / her own emotional pain. The new approach stressed the need to actively work to change a clients self defeating belief or behaviour by demonstrating their irrationality, self defeatism and rigidity.
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