Mentalizing in the Development and Treatment of Attachment Trauma

by Jon G. Allen

This book brings together the latest knowledge from attachment research and neuroscience to provide a new approach to treating trauma for therapists from different professional disciplines and diverse theoretical backgrounds. The field of trauma suffers from fragmentation as brands of therapy proliferate in relation to a multiplicity of psychiatric disorders. This fragmentation calls for a fresh clinical approach to treating trauma. Pinpointing at once the problem and potential solution, the author places the experience of being psychologically alone in unbearable emotional states at the heart of trauma in attachment relationships. This trauma results from a failure of mentalizing, that is, empathic attunement to emotional distress. Psychotherapy offers an opportunity for healing by restoring mentalizing, that is, fostering psychological attunement in the context of secure attachment relationships-in the psychotherapy relationship and in other attachment relationships. The book gives a unique overview of common attachment patterns in childhood and adulthood, setting the stage for understanding attachment trauma, which is most conspicuous in maltreatment but also more subtly evident in early and repeated failures of attunement in attachment relationships.

Genres: Psychology, Nonfiction

362 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

Jon G. Allen, Ph.D., holds the position of Clinical Professor as a member of the Voluntary Faculty in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the Baylor College of Medicine. He is a member of the honorary faculty at the Houston Center for Psychoanalytic Studies and the adjunct faculty of the Institute for Spirituality and Health at the Texas Medical Center. He retired from clinical practice as a senior staff psychologist after 40 years at The Menninger Clinic, where he taught and supervised fellows and residents; conducted psychotherapy, diagnostic consultations, and psychoeducational programs; and led research on clinical outcomes. He continues to teach, write, and consult.

Reviews

[Tiffany]

A rigorously researched, yet accessible and above all hopeful, overview of research on attachment, mindfulness, mentalization, and the ways that therapists can use mentalization skills (along with simple human interpersonal relating skills) to help patients heal from attachment trauma.

[Riley L · Rating 5 out of 5]

A well-structured academic work, clear logic and easy to read even for laymen, but just as the writer says, it’s a simple yet sophisticated methodology for therapists to practice but not as handy as to apply in daily life.

[Claire · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another attachment book in the mix. Allen does a better job at keeping a focus on mentalizing however and thus the role of relationship in treating attachment trauma. Over and over again Allen is able to note how failures in mentalizing rear themselves in the difficulties (classic symptoms and otherwise) of clients and in the therapeutic relationship. Other author/clinicians name and appear to write about this, but I don't think genuinely hold such developmental 'failures' in mentalizing as core to the issues.

Allen views mentalizing as the foundational tool for making use/the effectiveness of any other establish/evidence-based trauma treatment out there. If you're wanting manualized/structured guidance of how to treat trauma you will probably be disappointed to some degree (hopefully in reading this book from beginning to end though you will understand the centrality of mentalizing). That said there are treatment models springing up. Allen himself notes that he has perhaps presented "the least novel approach to trauma treatment imaginable". He stays true to his experience and belief in relationship.

Well-written, easy-to-read. Covers - as all attachment books - the basics on styles etc, and trauma but does so from both childhood and adult experience, which is increasingly of interest in the field. Covers the neurobiology of attachment also for those interested.