Everett Worthington

Last updated
Everett Worthington
Born
Knoxville, Tennessee, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
Alma mater University of Tennessee
MIT School of Engineering
University of Missouri
Scientific career
FieldsPsychology
Institutions Virginia Commonwealth University

Everett L. Worthington Jr. is a licensed clinical psychologist and Professor of Psychology at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU). [1] His research interests include forgiveness and other virtues, religion and spirituality in clinical practice, and the hope-focused approach to counseling couples. [1] He has written over 30 books on topics including forgiveness of others, self-forgiveness, character strength, religion and psychology, and couples' therapy, and he has published over 350 scholarly articles and chapters. [2] Worthington has been frequently cited as an expert on his topics of interest in the scientific literature and public media. [3] [4] [5]

Contents

Education and career

Born in Knoxville, Tennessee, Worthington attended the University of Tennessee-Knoxville and was awarded an undergraduate degree in nuclear engineering in 1968. He attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology on an Atomic Energy Commission Special Fellowship and received his SMNE in 1970. Worthington served as a naval officer on active duty from 1970 to 1974, teaching nuclear physics at the Naval Nuclear Power School at Mare Island Naval Shipyard. He then attended graduate school in psychology (counseling) from 1974 to 1978 at the University of Missouri in Columbia, Missouri, where he received his MA and PhD degrees. He has since served as faculty in the department of psychology at VCU, primarily affiliated with the APA-accredited counseling psychology program. [2]

In addition, Worthington is a licensed clinical psychologist in Virginia. In the mid-1990s, he served the Commonwealth of Virginia as director of the Mental Health Planning Council. From 1998 through 2005, he was executive director and treasurer of A Campaign for Forgiveness Research, a non-profit corporation that raised $6.4 million to fund research about forgiveness. [6] In 2005, he served as visiting professor at University of Cambridge and at the University of Hong Kong. He has won numerous awards in research, teaching, and service, and in 2009, he won VCU's top honor, the VCU Award for Excellence. Worthington is a fellow of the American Psychological Association. [1]

Research and clinical contributions

Forgiveness

Worthington began investigating forgiveness as a clinical method, noting that in his practice of couple therapy most couples had issues they could not seem to forgive and those often provided roadblocks to improvement in their relationship. [7] Working with two of his graduate students, Michael McCullough and Steve Sandage, they developed the beginning of what would eventually become the REACH Forgiveness method for psychoeducational groups. [8] The REACH method has been tested in over 22 randomized clinical trials by numerous investigators around the world and it is one of the two most studied methods to promote forgiveness. [9] In addition, REACH Forgiveness has been used in psychotherapy, across cultures, with parents, in couple therapy and enrichment, in Christian communities, in classrooms, and in workbooks for at home use.

Worthington has made a number of theoretical contributions to understanding forgiveness. First, he has suggested that larger felt injustices—i.e., larger “injustice gaps”—are harder to forgive than smaller injustices. [10] The size of the injustice gap is directly related to the difficulty forgiving. Offender apologies, restitution, and victim perceptions of the offender suffering, guilt, and remorse reduce the size of the injustice gap, making offenses easier to forgive. Second, he has observed that the victim can reduce the size of the injustice gap by many ways, such as successful revenge (although that obviously will usually increase hostilities), turning the matter over to God for divine justice or to relinquish it to God, forbearing, or accepting that “stuff happens” and moving on with life. [11] The person could also reduce the injustice gap by forgiving. Third, there are two separate types of forgiveness. [12] Decisional forgiveness occurs when a person decides to act without malice or to act in such a way to treat the offender as a valued person and forswear vengeance. Emotional forgiveness is hypothesized to be the emotional replacement of negative unforgiving emotions with positive other-oriented emotions (i.e., empathy, sympathy, compassion, or even love toward the offender). Substantial evidence supports this emotional replacement hypothesis. [13] Fourth, emotional replacement is at the core of the REACH Forgiveness intervention, in addition to defining the two types of forgiveness and making a decision to forgive.

Religion and spirituality, especially in psychotherapy

In the mid-1980s, Worthington conducted research on and summarized existing research on religiously tailored psychotherapy. In a theoretical article, he put forth the concept that a client who valued religion tended to see the world through religious values. [14] He argued that clients held a subjective zone of toleration of values by which they evaluated psychotherapists. If the psychotherapist's values were perceived to be outside of the client's zone of toleration, then poor response to psychotherapy or drop out was a likely outcome. Over the years, Worthington and his colleagues have shown through meta-analyses [15] and qualitative reviews of research [16] [17] that religious and spiritual matching to a client's religious values—when the client is highly religious—improves outcome in psychotherapy. Nevertheless, in strictly matched treatments in which religious clients are randomly assigned to religious or secular treatment, differing only in the use (or not) of religious language and examples, religious and spiritual clients show little difference regardless of religious or secular psychotherapy. [15] There is a suggestion that this is because clients who are religious employ their faith perspective regardless of whether the counselor introduces it specifically. [18] In 2012, a joint task force of the Society of Clinical Psychology and the Division 29 (Psychotherapy) of the American Psychological Association evaluated a meta-analysis by Worthington and his colleagues [15] to conclude that the evidence supporting religious or spiritual matching was demonstrably effective. [19]

Hope-focused couple approach

Worthington formulated the hope-focused couple approach (HFCA) during the 1980s, and by 1989, the essence of it was in place. [20] By 1999, he articulated a focus (i.e., hope), a strategy (i.e., promoting faith, work, and love), and major targets of intervention (i.e., communication and conflict resolution and intimacy, forgiveness, and reconciliation). [21] He cataloged over 150 intervention techniques in his 1999 book, [21] and Jennifer Ripley and he cataloged an additional 100 techniques in their 2014 book. [22] The revised approach places more emphasis on attachment theory and uses forgiveness interventions as more prominent parts of couple therapy.

Related Research Articles

Psychotherapy is the use of psychological methods, particularly when based on regular personal interaction, to help a person change behavior, increase happiness, and overcome problems. Psychotherapy aims to improve an individual's well-being and mental health, to resolve or mitigate troublesome behaviors, beliefs, compulsions, thoughts, or emotions, and to improve relationships and social skills. Numerous types of psychotherapy have been designed either for individual adults, families, or children and adolescents. Certain types of psychotherapy are considered evidence-based for treating some diagnosed mental disorders; other types have been criticized as pseudoscience.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Albert Ellis</span> American psychologist (1913–2007)

Albert Ellis was an American psychologist and psychotherapist who founded rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT). He held MA and PhD degrees in clinical psychology from Columbia University, and was certified by the American Board of Professional Psychology (ABPP). He also founded, and was the President of, the New York City-based Albert Ellis Institute. He is generally considered to be one of the originators of the cognitive revolutionary paradigm shift in psychotherapy and an early proponent and developer of cognitive-behavioral therapies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Forgiveness</span> Renunciation or cessation of resentment, indignation, or anger

Forgiveness, in a psychological sense, is the intentional and voluntary process by which one who may have felt initially wronged, victimized, harmed, or hurt goes through a process of changing feelings and attitude regarding a given offender for their actions, and overcomes the impact of the offense, flaw or mistake including negative emotions such as resentment or a desire for vengeance. Theorists differ in the extent to which they believe forgiveness also implies replacing the negative emotions with positive attitudes, or requires reconciliation with the offender. In certain legal contexts, forgiveness is a term for absolving someone of debt, loan, obligation, or other claims. Such legal usage can also be thought of as mercy, being distinct from forgiveness.

Clinical psychology is an integration of human science, behavioral science, theory, and clinical knowledge for the purpose of understanding, preventing, and relieving psychologically-based distress or dysfunction and to promote subjective well-being and personal development. Central to its practice are psychological assessment, clinical formulation, and psychotherapy, although clinical psychologists also engage in research, teaching, consultation, forensic testimony, and program development and administration. In many countries, clinical psychology is a regulated mental health profession.

Counseling psychology is a psychological specialty that began with a focus on vocational counseling, but later moved its emphasis to adjustment counseling, and then expanded to cover all normal psychology and psychotherapy. There are many subcategories for counseling psychology, such as marriage and family counseling, rehabilitation counseling, clinical mental health counseling, educational counseling, etc. In each setting, they are all required to follow the same guidelines.

Rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT), previously called rational therapy and rational emotive therapy, is an active-directive, philosophically and empirically based psychotherapy, the aim of which is to resolve emotional and behavioral problems and disturbances and to help people to lead happier and more fulfilling lives.

Person-centered therapy (PCT), also known as person-centered psychotherapy, person-centered counseling, client-centered therapy and Rogerian psychotherapy, is a form of psychotherapy developed by psychologist Carl Rogers and colleagues beginning in the 1940s and extending into the 1980s. Person-centered therapy seeks to facilitate a client's actualizing tendency, "an inbuilt proclivity toward growth and fulfillment", via acceptance, therapist congruence (genuineness), and empathic understanding.

Couples therapy attempts to improve romantic relationships and resolve interpersonal conflicts.

Leslie Samuel Greenberg is a Canadian psychologist born in Johannesburg, South Africa, and is one of the originators and primary developers of Emotion-Focused Therapy for individuals and couples. He is a professor emeritus of psychology at York University in Toronto, and also director of the Emotion-Focused Therapy Clinic in Toronto. His research has addressed questions regarding empathy, psychotherapy process, the therapeutic alliance, and emotion in human functioning.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of psychotherapy</span>

Although modern, scientific psychology is often dated from the 1879 opening of the first psychological clinic by Wilhelm Wundt, attempts to create methods for assessing and treating mental distress existed long before. The earliest recorded approaches were a combination of religious, magical and/or medical perspectives. Early examples of such psychological thinkers included Patañjali, Padmasambhava, Rhazes, Avicenna and Rumi.

Emotionally focused therapy and emotion-focused therapy (EFT) are related humanistic approaches to psychotherapy that aim to resolve emotional and relationship issues with individuals, couples, and families. These therapies combine experiential therapy techniques, including person-centered and Gestalt therapies, with systemic therapy and attachment theory. The central premise is that emotions influence cognition, motivate behavior, and are strongly linked to needs. The goals of treatment include transforming maladaptive behaviors, such as emotional avoidance, and developing awareness, acceptance, expression, and regulation of emotion and understanding of relationships. EFT is usually a short-term treatment.

Gay affirmative psychotherapy is a form of psychotherapy for non-heterosexual people, specifically gay and lesbian clients, which focuses on client comfort in working towards authenticity and self-acceptance regarding sexual orientation, and does not attempt to "change" them to heterosexual, or to "eliminate or diminish" same-sex "desires and behaviors". The American Psychological Association (APA) offers guidelines and materials for gay affirmative psychotherapy. Affirmative psychotherapy affirms that homosexuality or bisexuality is not a mental disorder, in accordance with global scientific consensus. In fact, embracing and affirming gay identity can be a key component to recovery from other mental illnesses or substance abuse. Clients whose religious beliefs are interpreted as teaching against homosexual behavior may require some other method of integration of their possibly conflicting religious and sexual selves.

Common factors theory, a theory guiding some research in clinical psychology and counseling psychology, proposes that different approaches and evidence-based practices in psychotherapy and counseling share common factors that account for much of the effectiveness of a psychological treatment. This is in contrast to the view that the effectiveness of psychotherapy and counseling is best explained by specific or unique factors that are suited to treatment of particular problems.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Donald H. Baucom</span> American psychologist

Donald H. Baucom, is a clinical psychology faculty member at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. He is recognized for founding the field of Cognitive-Behavioral Couples Therapy. Baucom is also recognized as one of the top marital therapists and most prolific researchers in this field. Currently, Baucom's National Cancer Institute funded study, CanThrive, has the largest observationally coded sample of any couples study to date.

Clinical behavior analysis is the clinical application of behavior analysis (ABA). CBA represents a movement in behavior therapy away from methodological behaviorism and back toward radical behaviorism and the use of functional analytic models of verbal behavior—particularly, relational frame theory (RFT).

The Power of Forgiveness is a 2008 documentary film by Martin Doblmeier about the process of forgiveness. It features interviews with renowned Buddhist teacher Thich Nhat Hanh, Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel, best-selling authors Thomas Moore and Marianne Williamson and others.

Family therapy is a branch of psychotherapy focused on families and couples in intimate relationships to nurture change and development. It tends to view change in terms of the systems of interaction between family members.

David Gordon Benner is a Canadian depth psychologist, author and wisdom teacher.

A forgiveness scale is a psychological test that attempts to measure a person's willingness to forgive. A true definition of forgiveness is debated by many researchers, yet Hargrave suggests that forgiveness refers to releasing resentment towards an offender.

Marvin R. Goldfried is an American psychologist and retired distinguished professor of clinical psychology at Stony Brook University. His area of interest include psychotherapy integration and LGBT issues. He is married to Anita Goldfried and has two sons, Daniel and Michael.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Virginia Commonwealth University. "Psychology Department". Archived from the original on 16 October 2013. Retrieved 11 February 2014.
  2. 1 2 Worthington, Everett. "Curriculum Vita" (PDF). Retrieved 11 February 2014.
  3. ↑ Healy, Melissa (December 31, 2007). "Forgive and be well?". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 24 October 2014.
  4. ↑ Grossman, Cathy (October 12, 2006). "Experts: Forgive doesn't mean forget". USA Today. Retrieved 24 October 2014.
  5. ↑ Izbicki, Ashley (May 2, 2013). "Cold case: Son ready to forgive mother's killer". WBIR-TV. Archived from the original on 24 October 2014. Retrieved 24 October 2014.
  6. ↑ Worthington, Everett. "Everett Worthington" . Retrieved 11 February 2014.
  7. ↑ Worththington, Everett (1993). Hope for troubled marriages: Overcoming common problems and major difficulties. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press. ISBN   978-0830816026.
  8. ↑ Worthington, Everett (2008). Steps to REACH forgiveness and to reconcile. Boston: Pearson Custom Publishing.
  9. ↑ Wade, Nathaniel; William, Hoyt; Julia, Kidwell; Everett, Worthington (2014). "Efficacy of psychotherapeutic interventions to promote forgiveness: A meta-analysis". Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology. 82 (1): 154–170. doi:10.1037/a0035268. PMID   24364794.
  10. ↑ Worthington, Everett (2009). A just forgiveness: Responsible healing without excusing injustice. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press. ISBN   978-0830837014.
  11. ↑ Worthington, Everett (2006). Forgiveness and reconcilitaiton: Theory and application. New York: Routledge. ISBN   978-1583913338.
  12. ↑ Worthington, Everett; Witvliet, Charlotte; Pietrini, Pietro; Miller, Andrea (2007). "Forgiveness, health and well-being: A review of evidence for emotional versus decisional forgiveness, dispositional forgiveness, and reduced unforgiveness". Journal of Behavioral Medicine. 30 (4): 291–302. doi:10.1007/s10865-007-9105-8. PMID   17453329. S2CID   9482481.
  13. ↑ Worthington, Everett; Scherer, Michael (2004). "Forgiveness is an emotion-focused coping strategy that can reduce health risks and promote health resilience: Theory, review, and hypotheses". Psychology & Health. 19 (3): 385–405. doi:10.1080/0887044042000196674. S2CID   10052021.
  14. ↑ Worthington, Everett (1988). "Understanding the values of religious clients: A model and its application to counseling". Journal of Counseling Psychology. 35 (2): 166–174. doi:10.1037/0022-0167.35.2.166.
  15. 1 2 3 Worthington, Everett (2011). "Chapter 20: Religion and Spirituality". In Norcross, John (ed.). Relationships that work. Oxford University Press. pp. 402–419. ISBN   978-0-19-973720-8.
  16. ↑ Worthington, Everett; Johnson, Eric; Hook, Joshua; Aten, Jamie (2013). Evidence-based practices for Christian counseling and psychotherapy. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press. ISBN   978-0830840274.
  17. ↑ Worthington, Everett; Hook, Joshua; Davis, Don; Gartner, Aubrey; Jennings, David (2013). "Chapter 34: Conducting empirical research on religiously accommodated treatments". In Pargament, Kenneth (ed.). APA handbooks in psychology: APA handbook of psychology, religion, and spirituality. pp. 651–669. ISBN   978-1-4338-1077-0.
  18. ↑ Rye, Mark; Pargament, Kenneth (2002). "Forgiveness and romantic relationships in college: Can it heal the wounded heart?". Journal of Clinical Psychology. 58 (4): 419–441. doi:10.1002/jclp.1153. PMID   11920695.
  19. ↑ Norcross, John; Wampold, Bruce (2011). "Chapter 21: Evidence-based therapy relationships: Research conclusions and clinical practices.". In Norcross, John (ed.). Relationships that Work (2nd ed.). New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 423–430. ISBN   978-0-19-973720-8.
  20. ↑ Worthington, Everett (1989). Marriage counseling: A Christian approach to counseling couples. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press. ISBN   978-0830817696.
  21. 1 2 Worthington, Everett (1999). Hope-focused Marriage Counseling: A guide to Brief Therapy. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press. ISBN   978-0830827640.
  22. ↑ Ripley, Jennifer; Worthington, Everett (2014). Couple therapy: A new hope-focused approach. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
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