Real-Life Role Play: A Cognitive Therapy Case Study With Two Young Sex-Abuse Survivors
Keywords:
real-life role playAbstract
The author of this case study describes the use of an adaptation of roleplaying in cognitive therapy with two adolescent sex-abuse survivors who were treated in individual and conjoint sessions. Each girl had been sexually abused by a male caregiver. Both men committed suicide after the girls disclosed the abuse. Both girls benefited from sharing insights in the conjoint sessions, with the older girl enacting the role of teacher and the younger girl that of learner. Both were able to challenge and change beliefs about their trauma histories and emerged with different beliefs about themselves, others, arid the future, and consequently were able to react differently to their pasts.
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