Other psychological therapies

There are a range of other therapies that could be described as psychological. Counselling is on example, which usually consists of helping a person identify problems and talk through possible solutions with someone who can provide an independent opinion. Sometime psychological work may occur around specific issues such as sexual abuse or other trauma. This often involves helping the person make sense of the emotions and thoughts that are associated with these events. Sometimes psychological therapies may involve other people who are involved in the person’s life, examples include family therapy or systemic therapy. Often relationships are examined in these types of therapy and people look at how their behaviour may be affecting others and what can be done about it. One particularly useful therapy that may assist people with an intellectual disability to manage their emotions and reactions is anger management therapy. There is an increasing body of useful resources to assist counselling providers to provide effective anger management programs to this population, including the “Keep Cool” program available from the Disability Services Commissioner in West Australia, and the “Anger Management Training Package” from the Bridging Project (Gulbenkoglu and Hagiliassis 2001).