Roemer & Orsillo, 2010

This volume is the latest in the series Guides to Individualized Evidence-Based Treatment, which aims to facilitate the transportation of evidence-based therapies from research and academic communities to the frontlines of clinical settings. The authors present a synthesis of several of the important and increasingly popular mindfulness- and acceptance-based behavioral therapies, including acceptance and commitment therapy, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy, mindfulness-based relapse prevention, integrative behavioral couple therapy, and dialectical behavior therapy. The authors offer us their distillation of the essential principles and elements of this new group of behavioral therapies and present a general model that proposes that many problems and disorders for which our patients seek treatment result from three related mechanisms: a maladaptive relationship to internal experience (such as fusion, judgment, and/or lack of awareness), experiential avoidance, and behavioral constriction. The authors show the clinician how to use the general model as the foundation for an individualized case formulation and treatment plan that addresses the unique details of each patient's symptoms and problems. They show the therapist how to use the individualized case formulation to understand the relationships among a patient's multiple disorders and problems and to select treatment targets and interventions. They describe and offer numerous examples of interventions that are designed to help individuals accomplish their treatment goals by altering their relationship to their internal experience, reducing experiential avoidance, and promoting valued action. The authors also describe how to integrate other evidence-based therapies into this therapy and how to account for cultural factors. The result is a therapy that clinicians can use in a flexible way to address a wide range of clinical phenomena.