Uniquely integrative and authoritative, this volume explores how advances in social psychology can deepen understanding and improve treatment of clinical problems. The role of basic psychological processes in mental health and disorder is examined by leading experts in social, clinical, and counseling psychology. Chapters present cutting-edge research on self and identity, self-regulation, interpersonal processes, social cognition, and emotion. The volume identifies specific ways that social psychology concepts, findings, and research methods can inform clinical assessment and diagnosis, as well as the development of effective treatments. Compelling topics include the social psychology of help seeking, therapeutic change, and the therapist–client relationship.

Social interactions are a central component of humans' lives and mental health. Both clinical and social psychology are vibrant fields that address this central topic. However, the advances, contributions, and achievements of each field are often unknown in the other discipline. This volume takes a programmatic stance based on the assumption that there are many commonalities between the two disciplines worth highlighting and synergies to develop and build upon. Six contributions, authored by experts in the respective fields, look at the intersection of the two disciplines. The authors consider theirsubject matter from the perspective of both fields and discuss possible implications for clinical and social psychology. Themes explored include ostracism, the role of perceptions of treatment in clinical outcomes, rejection sensitivity in relationships, coping with experienced injustice, and the link between mimicry and lying, as well as a theoreticaloverview of synergies between the two fields. The articles are insightful, exciting, and synergistic.

A colleague recently recounted a conversation she had had with a group of graduate students. For reasons that she cannot recall, the discussion had turned to the topic of "old-fashioned" ideas in psychology-perspectives and beliefs that had once enjoyed widespread support but that are now regarded as quaint curiosities. The students racked their brains to outdo one ofthe historical trivia of psychology: Le Bon's another with their knowledge fascination with the "group mind," Mesmer's theory of animal magnetism, the short-lived popularity of "moral therapy," Descartes' belief that erec tions are maintained by air from the lungs, and so on. When it came his tum to contribute to the discussion, one student brought up an enigmatic journal he had seen in the library stacks: the Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology. He thought that the inclusion of abnormal and social psychology within the covers of a single journal seemed an odd combination, and he wondered aloud what sort of historical quirk had led psychologists of an earlier generation to regard these two fields as somehow related. Our colleague then asked her students if they had any ideas about how such an odd combination had found its way into a single journal.

"Like a Bridge over Troubled Waters" The surge of current interest in the interface between clinical and social psychology is well illustrated by the publication of a number of general texts and journals in this area, and the growing emphasis in graduate programs on providing training in both disciplines. Although the bene fits of an integrated clinical-social approach have been recognized for a number of years, the recent work in this area has advanced from the oretical extrapolations of social psychological models to clinical issues to theory and research that is based on social principles and conducted in clinical domains. It is becoming increasingly common to find social psy chologists pursuing research with clinical populations and clinical psy chologists investigating variables that have traditionally been in the realm of social psychology. A major area of interface between the two disciplines is in research and theory concerned with how individuals respond to negative events. In addition to the trend toward an integrated clinical-social approach, the growing body of literature in this area reflects the explosion of cur rent interest in the area of health psychology; work by clinical and social psychologists on the topics of stress and coping has been one of the major facets of this burgeoning field. The purpose of the present volume is to provide a common forum for recent advances in the clinical and social literature on responses to negative life outcomes.

Publisher Description

This wide-ranging anthology of current research bridges clinical and social psychology, concentrating on clinical judgment, the development of maladaptive behavior, and intervention strategies. The editors provide extensive commentary that integrates the individual chapters into a comprehensive theoretical formulation. "Advances valuable insights on the status of the integration process. ... [Readers] will encounter a wealth of empirical findings drawn from a broad range of topics." --Contemporary Psychology

Many psychologists would agree that most emotional and behavioural problems are essentially social and interpersonal problems. Not only are psychological difficulties typically caused or maintained by interpersonal processes, but problems typically manifest themselves in the course of personal relationships. Many emotional and behavioural problems are rooted in normal interpersonal processes - precisely the processes that social psychology describes. This work documents the rich interplay between social and clinical psychology in theory and research.

Even as psychology becomes increasingly splintered and specialized, as evi denced by the growing number of special interest divisions of the American Psy chological Association, many psychologists are devoting their energies to finding commonalities between traditionally distinct fields and building bridges between them. Developmental psychopathology, for example, has emerged as a synthesis of child development theory and clinical child psychology. Health psychology has resulted from the cooperation and collaboration of many psychologists from a number of fields, including clinical, counseling, social, developmental, and physiological. Within clinical psychology is a growing movement toward "rap prochement" that is dedicated to finding common themes among seemingly dis parate approaches to psychotherapy. Thus, integration among different fields has increased even as diversity in psychology has flourished. One such integration or interfacing effort that is related in several ways to the integrative efforts just noted involves social, clinical, and counseling psychology. Although this effort is not a new one (see chapter 1), it was given a new lease on life by the publication of the first issue ofthe Journal of Social and Clinical Psy chology in 1983. Since that time, several volumes and numerous journal article and book chapters have been devoted to the general notion that social psychologi cal theory and research has much to offer clinical and counseling psychology, such as greater understanding of psychological and everyday problems in living and insight into clinical and counseling activities such as psychotherapy.