ACT in Perspective - A prosocial podcast using behavioral science to address human suffering

Hugh
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  • MENTAL HEALTH

In this podcast, we reach across the aisle and discuss how others are using behavioral science to address the very human condition of suffering. We discuss such issues related to chronic pain; race, wealth and class disparities; drug abuse; poverty; child abuse; domestic violence; criminal injustice; social media; mental illness; loneliness; educational and basic need deprivation; among many others. We also discuss the latest therapeutic models of treatment for these conditions as well as hear from others who have personally struggled, but have found their own successful adaptations. Welcome!

  1. 11/11/2023

    ACT and Applied Behavior Analysis with Dr. Tom Szabo

    Tom Szabo is a peer-reviewed Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) trainer, board certified behavior analyst, and faculty member of Capella University in the masters and doctoral behavior analysis programs. Over the last fifteen years, Tom has focused his practice on teaching people ways to ignite psychological flexibility in their personal lives and with others in clinical practice, schools, board rooms, shop floors, and community centers. He has developed iterations of ACT for autistic people, their parents and caregivers, siblings, and staff members. His research focuses on the development of ACT functional analysis and treatment that addresses issues related to race, gender, class, ethnicity, neurodiversity, disability, language, and dialect.

    59 min

  2. 06/09/2022

    #17: Season 2, Ep 6: Mastering the Clinical Conversation with Dr. Matthieu Villatte

    Welcome to another episode of ACT in Perspective podcast. I’m your host Hugh Simonich. Today we’re talking to Dr. Matthieu Villatte. Matt is trined as a cliniclak psychologist and is now an Assistant Professor at Bastyr University in Seattle, Washington. He is the author of numerous books and chapters on mindfulness, acceptance, experiential therapies, and contextual behavioral science, including Mastering the Clinical Conversation: Language as Intervention (Guilford Press, 2015), co-authored by Jennifer Villatte and Steve Hayes. As a peer-reviewed trainer in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy recognized by the Association for Contextual Behavioral Science (ACBS), he has facilitated over a hundred clinical trainings in the US, Canada, Australia-New Zealand, South America, and Europe. Over the past few years, he has also run dozens of online trainings gathering participants from all continents. Today, we’ll be discussing the details of his book Mastering the Clinical Conversation which provides psychotherapists with evidence-based strategies for harnessing the power of language to free clients from life-constricting patterns and promote psychological flexibility.  Techniques are demonstrated for activating and shaping behavior change, building a flexible sense of self, fostering meaning and motivation, creating powerful experiential metaphors, and strengthening the therapeutic relationship. Please help welcome Dr. Matthieu Villatte.

    1h 12m

  3. 27/08/2022

    #16: Season 2, Ep 5: ACT and Recovery with Dr. Thomas Szabo

    Welcome everyone to another episode of ACT in Perspective podcast. I’m your host Hugh Simonich. Today we’re talking with Dr. Thomas Szabo. Tom is an internationally recognized ACT trainer, a practicing Board Certified Behavior Analyst, and a graduate of the University of Nevada, Reno. Over the last 10 years, Tom has focused his practice on teaching people ways to ignite behavioral flexibility in their personal lives and with others in clinical practice, schools, board rooms, shop floors, and community centers. He is particularly interested in teaching people ways to use ACT to support individuals with high functioning autism and their families. Today Tom gives us a personal journey into his experience with recovery from alcohol. He provides us deep insights into the behavior analysis of recovery and what it means to him. We discuss his personal struggles, the power of the recovery group, prayer and his naturalistic explanation of a higher power. We discuss connections with ACT Training and the recovery program, and what the steps to recovery actually mean in behavior analytic language among other things. We open with his journey when he was in grad school and how that led to his bottom and ultimate recovery. Please help welcome Dr. Tom Szabo.

    1h 11m
  4. #15: Season 2, Ep 4: Beyond Words: Exploring the nature of experience

    31/07/2022

    #15: Season 2, Ep 4: Beyond Words: Exploring the nature of experience

    John Astin is an internationally known scholar in the field of mind-body medicine, his research focusing on the applications of meditative-awareness practices in psychology and health care. He received his PhD in Health Psychology from the University of California, Irvine, and completed postdoctoral training at Stanford Medical School. Dr. Astin has published over 50 book chapters and peer-reviewed articles in such journals as Annals of Internal Medicine, Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), American Psychologist, and Academic Medicine. His scholarly work has covered a broad range of topics including: the efficacy of complementary/alternative therapies, particularly mind-body practices, in the treatment of many common medical conditions; barriers to the integration of psychosocial factors in medical training and practice; and, the efficacy of mindfulness and acceptance-based approaches for relapse prevention in addiction. Dr. Astin is the author of is  the author of four books, exploring the nature of human experience—Too Intimate for Words (2005), This Is Always Enough (2008), Searching for Rain in a Monsoon (2012) and This Extraordinary Moment (2018). He is also a professional singer, songwriter and recording artist, having produced seven CDs of original contemplative music since 1987. Please visit: www.johnastin.com for further information about his work.

    1h 16m
  5. #14: Season 2, Ep 3: The Therapeutic Value of Psychedelics and Altered States with Nathan Gates, MS, LPC and Brian Pilecki, Ph.D

    28/02/2022

    #14: Season 2, Ep 3: The Therapeutic Value of Psychedelics and Altered States with Nathan Gates, MS, LPC and Brian Pilecki, Ph.D

    Nathan Gates, MS, LPC, and Brian Pilecki, Ph.D, discuss the benefits of psychedelics in the therapeutic process, particularly with the psychological flexibility of ACT and other process-based therapy models. We discuss the history of psychedelics, the major key players, the fears which led to government control in the late 60s and beyond, the underground psychedelic culture, and the recent resurgence of legitimate research of the past 20 years.  We discuss the exponentially growing peer reviewed research that's leading the way to treat depression, social anxiety, PTSD, the fears of those with terminal illnesses.  We are just scratching the surface of the transformative power of psychedelics when used correctly with psychological flexibility processes of behavior change.  There's an incredible amount of work left to do, but the evidence clearly shows the potential benefits that far exceed what psychotherapy and psychotropic medications could ever do alone.    Watch, enjoy, subscribe and leave a comment!  Thanks!

    1h 16m
  6. #11: Season 1, Ep 11 - Critical Race Theory: An analysis of how we view and respond to racial and ethnic disparities in the US

    20/08/2021

    #11: Season 1, Ep 11 - Critical Race Theory: An analysis of how we view and respond to racial and ethnic disparities in the US

    No doubt that Critical Race Theory (CRT) is often politicized and at the center of strong controversy; however, outside of the politics, the facts of racial and ethnic disparities of wellbeing across systems in the US are apparent.  And if we want to survive and grow as a nation, we need to recognize this as a highly contextualized problem that stems from a long and often violent history that has created and continues to create substantial suffering.  In this episode, we examine what CRT is, the basic tenets, where it came from and how it evolved.  We discuss the current political challenges in public education, along with the general criticisms of CRT from notable scholars, such as Glenn Loury, John McWhorter, Jason Riley and Coleman Hughes.  What arguments are made and are they valid or fallacious?  We also discuss our ethical responsibilities within behavioral science and psychology in how we address these disparities, and where we can go from here as individual practitioners and as field.  I'm joined with three notable scholars, educators, and social justice activists in the fields of behavioral science and psychology -     Denisha Gingles, MS, LGPC, BCBA, LBA;   Jonathan Tarbox, Ph.D., BCBA-D; and  Esther Calzada, Ph.D.  Remember to subscribe to help this channel grow and leave a comment or two, no matter how you feel about this matter.  Feedback is helpful.   Enjoy  :)

    1h 13m
  7. #10: Season 1, Ep 10 - The Psychology of Humor - The functions of comedy in a changing society with Tom Ford

    17/07/2021

    #10: Season 1, Ep 10 - The Psychology of Humor - The functions of comedy in a changing society with Tom Ford

    Today's topic is all about humor/comedy.  Humor is a universal human experience.  We love to laugh. We invest a lot of our time, energy and money into creating laughter. People often know funny when they see it, but have a difficult time describing it.  If we ask the average person: What is funny?  We're likely to get a blank stare.  Moreover, we typically don't explore such questions as, Why do we laugh? What effects does it have for ourselves and society as a whole? What are the different types and functions of humor? And most importantly, how can we best harness this power to improve our world?   We answer these and more questions with today's guest:     Dr. Thomas E Ford.  Tom Ford is a Professor of Psychology at Western Carolina University. He is a former Editor-in-Chief of HUMOR: the International Journal of Humor Research. He and his colleagues have developed the Prejudiced Norm Theory, an influential theory on the impact of disparaging humor on prejudice and discrimination. He is co-author of The Psychology of Humor: An Integrative Approach, and co-editor of his newest book, just out, The Social Psychology of Humor, among many other related articles.     We start off with defining humor - what it is and we we laugh.    If you like what you see, don't forget to SUBSCRIBE.  It's free and it really helps to support this channel.   This is also on Youtube with graphics and additional videos to help demonstrate what we're discussing. Just go to ACT in Perspective channel and check it out. Please help welcome Dr. Tom Ford.

    1h 33m

  8. 22/05/2021

    #9: Season 1, Ep 9 - The Origins of Consciousness: The essential role of feelings in subjective experience

    Dr. Mark Solms is one of the leading neuroscientists in the world, best known for his contributions into the mechanisms of dreaming, and his use of psychoanalytic methods in modern neuroscience.  His new book The Hidden Spring:  A Journey to the Source of Consciousness offers a comprehensive understanding of why we feel a subjective sense of self and how it arises in the brain.    Here we discuss the dawn of consciousness, the essential role of feelings and emotions and where they come from, the role of the cortex to make predictions in an uncertain world, and how that relates to our complex behavior.  We’ll discuss the basic drives of all organisms, and how these drives relate to the development of the brain and central nervous system.  We’ll get into the elementary physics of the Free Energy Principle, entropy, and homeostasis and how this all relates back to why we behave as we do.  We’ll get into the discussion of voluntary behavior, free will and choice and how to properly conceptualize what these terms represent.  We’ll talk briefly about the origins of self, the relationship of all living things, his thoughts on the possibility of constructing an artificial mind, and much more.    Solms breaks highly complex concepts down throughout this book and synthesizes these concepts into a clear, unified theory of consciousness.    Solms is the Director of Neuropsychology in the Neuroscience Institute of the University of Cape Town, South Africa where he lives, and honorary lecturer in neurosurgery and an honorary Fellow with the American College of Psychiatrists.     He has received numerous honors, has published about 350 journals, articles and book chapters, and authored eight books.  He is the editor and translator of the forthcoming 24-volume Revised Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud and the 4-volume work of the Complete Neuroscientific Works of Sigmund Freud.    We had a lengthy conversation exploring many of the concepts in his book, but we begin our conversation with a fascinating story related to his experience growing up in the pits of apartheid in South Africa, and how this influenced him to do his part in redressing racial and class disparity in his own country.

    1h 48m
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About

In this podcast, we reach across the aisle and discuss how others are using behavioral science to address the very human condition of suffering. We discuss such issues related to chronic pain; race, wealth and class disparities; drug abuse; poverty; child abuse; domestic violence; criminal injustice; social media; mental illness; loneliness; educational and basic need deprivation; among many others. We also discuss the latest therapeutic models of treatment for these conditions as well as hear from others who have personally struggled, but have found their own successful adaptations. Welcome!

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