therapy – Scott D.Miller

Is your therapy making your clients worse? The Guardian Strikes Again

A while ago, an article appeared in The Guardian, one of the U.K.’s largest daily newspapers. “Counselling and Therapy can be Harmful,” the headline boldly asserted, citing results of a study yet to be published. It certainly got my attention. Do some people in therapy get worse? The answer is, most assuredly, “Yes.” Research dating — read more
What can therapists learn from the CIA? Experts versus the "Wisdom of the Crowd"

What can we therapists learn from the CIA? In a phrase, “When it comes to making predictions about important future events, don’t rely on experts!” After a spate of embarrassing, high-profile intelligence failures, a recent story showed how a relatively small group of average people made better predictions about critical world events than highly-trained analysts with access to classified information. — read more
Do you know who said, "Sometimes the magic works, sometimes it doesn’t"?

Well, do you? It was Chief Dan George playing the role of Old Lodge Skins in the 1970 movie, “Little Big Man.” Whether or not you’ve seen or remember the film, if you’re a practicing therapist, you know the wisdom contained in that quote. No matter how skilled the clinician or devoted the client, “sometimes therapy works, sometimes it — read more
Good News and Bad News about Psychotherapy

Have you seen this month’s issue of, “The National Psychologist?” If you do counseling or psychotherapy, you should read it. The headline screams, “Therapy: No Improvement for 40 Years.” And while I did not know the article would be published, I was not surprised by the title nor it’s contents. The author and associate editor, — read more
Psychotherapy Training: Is it Worth the Bother?

Big bucks. That’s what training in psychotherapy costs. Take graduate school in psychology as an example. According to the US Department of Education’s National Center (NCES), a typical doctoral program takes five years to complete and costs between US$ 240,000-300,000.00. Who has that kind of money laying around after completing four years of college? The… — read more
Psychologist Alan Kazdin Needs Help: Please Give

Look at this picture. This man needs help. He is psychologist, Alan Kazdin, former president of the American Psychological Association, and current Professor of Psychology at Yale University. A little over a week ago, to the surprise and shock of many in the field, he disclosed a problem in his professional life. In an interview… — read more
The Study of Excellence: A Radically New Approach to Understanding "What Works" in Behavioral Health

"What works" in therapy? Believe it or not, that question–as simple as it is–has and continues to spark considerable debate. For decades, the field has been divided. On one side are those who argue that the efficacy of psychological treatments is due to specific factors (e.g., changing negative thinking patterns) inherent in the model of… — read more
Where is Scott Miller going? The Continuing Evolution

I’ve just returned from a week in Denmark providing training for two important groups. On Wednesday and Thursday, I worked with close to 100 mental health professionals presenting the latest information on "What Works" in Therapy at the Kulturkuset in downtown Copenhagen. The training was sponsored by Solutions, an organization directed by Henrik and Mette Pedersen that… — read more
Leading Outcomes in Vermont: The Brattleboro Retreat and Primarilink Project

For the last 7 years, I’ve been traveling to the small, picturesque village of Brattleboro, Vermont to work with clinicians, agency managers, and various state officials on integrating outcomes into behavioral health services. Peter Albert, the director of Governmental Affairs and PrimariLink at the Brattleboro Retreat, has tirelessly criss-crossed the state, promoting outcome-informed clinical work and organizing… — read more
Outcomes in Ohio: The Ohio Council of Behavioral Health & Family Service Providers

Ohio is experiencing the same challenges faced by other states when it comes to behavioral health services: staff and financial cutbacks, increasing oversight and regulation, rising caseloads, unrelenting paperwork, and demands for accountability. Into the breach, the Ohio Council of Behavioral Health & Family Service Providers organized their 30th annual conference, focused entirely on helping… — read more
My New Year’s Resolution: The Study of Expertise

Most of my career has been spent providing and studying psychotherapy. Together with my colleagues at the Institute for the Study of Therapeutic Change, I’ve now published 8 books and too many articles and scholarly papers to count. If you are interested you can read more about and even download many of my publications here.… — read more