Integrating Jungian and Self-Psychological Perspectives Within Cognitive-Behavior Therapy for a Young Man With a Fixed Religious Delusion

Abstract

Although cognitive-behavior therapy (CBT) can be effective in reducing delusional thinking in schizophrenia, many patients are considered poor candidates, typically because of a lack of distress from the delusion and resistance or low motivation to challenge its validity. Recent developments in CBT for schizophrenia, however, stress the need to move from a sole focus on challenging beliefs toward a person-based model in which recognition of the vulnerability of the self guides treatment and the content of therapy is perceived as personally meaningful by the patient. This article demonstrates how the Jungian technique of archetypal amplification was modified and used within the structure of CBT treatment of a young man with schizophrenia with a religious delusion who refused to engage in standard CBT. His case demonstrates that schizophrenia patients who initially refuse to question the validity of their delusional beliefs can nevertheless be successfully engaged in CBT when the focus promotes alternative understandings of the self and preserves self-esteem.