Overview: Trauma therapy helps people process and heal from distressing or overwhelming experiences, such as abuse, accidents, loss, or violence. Modern approaches emphasise safety, choice, and pacing, so people do not have to relive trauma in a harmful way. Techniques may include talk therapy, somatic interventions, EMDR, and mindfulness practices.
History & Development: Trauma therapy has roots in psychodynamic and humanistic traditions, evolving significantly after studies of PTSD in soldiers and survivors of violence. Key figures include Judith Herman, who outlined a trauma-informed approach integrating safety, remembrance, and reconnection.
Helpful for: PTSD, complex trauma, childhood trauma
Overview: Integrative therapy blends techniques from multiple therapeutic approaches to meet the unique needs of each client. It is flexible, allowing the therapist to tailor interventions based on your personality, experiences, and goals. The therapeutic relationship is central to the healing process.
History & Development: Integrative therapy emerged in the mid-20th century as psychologists recognised that no single therapy works for everyone. Figures like Arnold Lazarus and Paul Wachtel promoted combining cognitive, behavioural, and psychodynamic approaches to address complex, overlapping concerns.
Helpful for: Complex or overlapping concerns, long-term personal growth
Overview: Solution-Focused Therapy focuses on strengths, resources, and future goals rather than past problems. Sessions are practical, goal-oriented, and encourage identifying what is already working in your life. It helps create small, achievable changes.
History & Development: Developed in the late 1970s and early 1980s by Steve de Shazer and Insoo Kim Berg at the Milwaukee Brief Family Therapy Centre, SFT grew from the idea that change is often possible without delving deeply into problem analysis, but by amplifying existing solutions.
Helpful for: Stress, life transitions, relationship challenges, brief therapy needs
Overview: CBT explores how thoughts, emotions, and behaviours influence one another. By challenging unhelpful thinking and developing healthier coping strategies, clients often experience relief from anxiety, depression, and other challenges. It is structured, collaborative, and skill-based.
History & Development: CBT was developed in the 1960s by Aaron T. Beck, initially for depression. It combined cognitive psychology and behavioural therapy principles, emphasising structured interventions and measurable change.
Helpful for: Anxiety, depression, OCD, phobias, insomnia
Overview: Person-Centred Therapy provides a supportive, non-judgemental space for self-exploration. Therapists offer empathy, authenticity, and unconditional positive regard, allowing growth to occur naturally when clients feel understood.
History & Development: Developed by Carl Rogers in the 1940s and 1950s, this humanistic approach challenged directive therapies by focusing on the client’s own capacity for self-healing.
Helpful for: Self-esteem, identity exploration, emotional processing
Overview: DBT combines acceptance and change strategies to manage intense emotions, self-harm, and relationship difficulties. It teaches skills in mindfulness, distress tolerance, emotion regulation, and interpersonal effectiveness.
History & Development: Created by Marsha Linehan in the 1980s for individuals with borderline personality disorder, DBT integrates cognitive-behavioural techniques with mindfulness practices from Zen Buddhism.
Helpful for: Borderline personality disorder, self-harm, emotional dysregulation
Overview: Gestalt therapy encourages present-moment awareness and helps integrate fragmented experiences into a complete sense of self. It focuses on thoughts, feelings, and bodily sensations as they occur rather than extensive past analysis.
History & Development: Developed by Fritz Perls, Laura Perls, and Paul Goodman in the 1940s and 50s, Gestalt therapy emphasises experiential learning and self-awareness in the here and now.
Helpful for: Emotional awareness, relationship difficulties, personal growth
Overview: EMDR helps process traumatic memories using bilateral stimulation (eye movements, taps, or sounds). This reduces the emotional intensity of distressing memories and supports healing without detailed verbal recounting.
History & Development: Developed by Francine Shapiro in the late 1980s, EMDR arose from observations that certain eye movements appeared to reduce distress from negative thoughts. It became a structured therapy for trauma and PTSD.
Helpful for: PTSD, trauma-related anxiety
Overview: Play therapy uses play, art, and creative activities to help children express emotions they may not yet have words for. It supports emotional regulation, problem-solving, and coping in a safe environment.
History & Development: Popularised in the 1940s by pioneers like Virginia Axline, who adapted Carl Rogers’ humanistic principles for children. Play therapy has since become a standard approach in child mental health.
Helpful for: Children experiencing trauma, anxiety, or behavioural challenges
Overview: Existential therapy addresses questions of meaning, identity, freedom, and responsibility. It helps individuals live authentically and make values-based choices, even amid uncertainty or life transitions.
History & Development: Inspired by philosophers like Søren Kierkegaard, Viktor Frankl, and Jean-Paul Sartre, existential therapy developed in the mid-20th century as a humanistic approach focusing on life’s meaning rather than symptoms alone.
Helpful for: Life transitions, grief, existential anxiety
Overview: CAT integrates cognitive and psychodynamic ideas to identify unhelpful relationship and behaviour patterns. It helps people develop new ways of relating to themselves and others.
History & Development: Developed in the UK by Anthony Ryle in the 1980s, CAT combines the practical, structured aspects of cognitive therapy with insight-oriented psychodynamic thinking.
Helpful for: Relationship difficulties, personality patterns, trauma
Overview: Psychodynamic therapy explores how past experiences, especially early relationships, shape present thoughts, feelings, and behaviours. It promotes insight, self-understanding, and lasting emotional change.
History & Development: Rooted in Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalysis, psychodynamic therapy has evolved over the last century to include short- and long-term approaches, emphasising relational and emotional patterns.
Helpful for: Depression, anxiety, relationship issues, long-term patterns
Overview: MET helps individuals strengthen motivation for change through a collaborative, non-confrontational approach. It supports self-direction and choice rather than imposing advice.
History & Development: Developed by William R. Miller and Stephen Rollnick in the 1990s for addiction treatment, MET evolved from motivational interviewing principles to help people resolve ambivalence.
Helpful for: Substance use, lifestyle changes, ambivalence about therapy
Overview: Behaviour therapy focuses on changing learned behaviours using reinforcement, skills training, and structured strategies. It emphasises practical interventions and measurable goals.
History & Development: Rooted in B.F. Skinner’s work on operant conditioning and early behavioural psychology, behaviour therapy emerged in the mid-20th century as a practical, structured therapy for behaviour change.
Helpful for: Phobias, ADHD, habit behaviours
Overview: Exposure therapy helps people gradually face feared situations or memories in a safe, controlled manner. Over time, this reduces avoidance and fear responses, promoting confidence and independence.
History & Development: Based on principles of behavioural psychology and systematic desensitisation developed by Joseph Wolpe in the 1950s, it became a cornerstone of anxiety disorder treatments.
Helpful for: Phobias, OCD, PTSD, panic disorder
Overview: MBT helps individuals better understand their own and others’ thoughts and feelings, improving emotional regulation, relationships, and impulse control.
History & Development: Developed by Anthony Bateman and Peter Fonagy in the 1990s for borderline personality disorder, MBT combines psychodynamic principles with attachment theory.
Helpful for: Borderline personality disorder, attachment difficulties
Overview: DDP is an attachment-focused therapy for children and families that emphasises safety, connection, and emotional attunement. It helps heal early relational trauma and fosters secure attachment bonds.
History & Development: Developed by Dan Hughes in the 1980s and 1990s, DDP integrates attachment theory, neuroscience, and relational principles for children in foster, adoptive, or high-trauma settings.
Helpful for: Attachment trauma, foster and adoptive families
Overview:
Transactional Analysis focuses on understanding how people communicate and relate to others. It examines patterns of interaction (“transactions”) and internal ego states to increase self-awareness, autonomy, and healthier relationships.
History & Development:
Developed in the 1950s by psychiatrist Eric Berne, TA integrates psychoanalytic thinking with humanistic and cognitive approaches. It became popular for its clear, accessible concepts and practical application in therapy, education, and organizations.
Helpful for:
Relationship difficulties, communication problems, low self-esteem, anxiety, workplace conflict, personal development.
Overview:
Jungian therapy explores the unconscious through symbols, dreams, archetypes, and myths. It supports personal growth and individuation, the process of becoming one’s authentic self, by integrating conscious and unconscious aspects of the psyche.
History & Development:
Founded by Carl Gustav Jung, a former collaborator of Freud, Jungian therapy expanded psychoanalytic theory to include collective unconscious, archetypes, and spiritual dimensions of psychological life.
Helpful for:
Identity exploration, life transitions, trauma, depression, creativity blocks, existential concerns.
Overview:
Narrative therapy helps individuals separate themselves from their problems by examining and reshaping the stories they tell about their lives. It emphasises empowerment, meaning-making, and personal agency.
History & Development:
Developed during the 1970s and 1980s by Michael White and David Epston, narrative therapy draws from social constructionism and postmodern psychology, focusing on language, culture, and context.
Helpful for:
Trauma, self-esteem issues, anxiety, depression, family and relationship challenges, identity concerns.
Overview:
Creative and arts-based therapies use artistic expression, such as art, music, movement, drama, or writing, to support emotional processing, self-expression, and healing, especially when verbal expression is difficult.
History & Development:
Emerging in the mid-20th century, these therapies integrate psychology with creative disciplines. They are influenced by psychodynamic, humanistic, and trauma-informed approaches.
Helpful for:
Trauma, emotional regulation, stress, children and adolescents, neurodivergent individuals, grief, and self-exploration.
Overview:
Cognitive Processing Therapy is a structured, trauma-focused therapy that helps individuals identify and challenge unhelpful beliefs related to traumatic experiences. It supports the development of more balanced and adaptive thinking patterns.
History & Development:
Developed in the late 1980s by Patricia Resick, CPT is grounded in cognitive-behavioural theory and was originally designed for PTSD, particularly among survivors of sexual assault and combat trauma.
Helpful for:
PTSD, trauma-related anxiety, depression, guilt, shame, and distorted beliefs following trauma.
Overview:
Schema Therapy integrates cognitive, behavioural, attachment, and psychodynamic approaches to address deeply rooted patterns formed in childhood. It focuses on identifying maladaptive schemas and developing healthier coping responses.
History & Development:
Developed by Jeffrey Young in the 1980s and 1990s, Schema Therapy evolved from CBT to better support individuals with chronic and complex psychological difficulties.
Helpful for:
Personality disorders, chronic depression, trauma, relationship difficulties, long-standing emotional patterns.
Overview:
Narrative Exposure Therapy is a trauma-focused approach that helps individuals construct a coherent life narrative, placing traumatic experiences within a broader personal and historical context.
History & Development:
Developed by Maggie Schauer, Frank Neuner, and Thomas Elbert, NET was designed for survivors of multiple and complex traumas, particularly refugees and survivors of war or organised violence.
Helpful for:
Complex PTSD, multiple traumas, refugees, survivors of violence and displacement.
Overview:
Prolonged Exposure Therapy helps individuals gradually confront trauma-related memories, feelings, and situations in a safe and controlled way to reduce fear and avoidance.
History & Development:
Developed by Edna Foa, PET is based on emotional processing theory and is one of the most researched evidence-based treatments for PTSD.
Helpful for:
PTSD, trauma-related anxiety, avoidance behaviours, fear-based symptoms.
Overview:
Written Exposure Therapy is a brief, trauma-focused intervention that involves writing about traumatic experiences to support emotional processing and symptom reduction.
History & Development:
Developed by Denise Sloan and Brian Marx, WET is grounded in exposure-based principles and offers an accessible alternative to longer trauma therapies.
Helpful for:
PTSD, trauma-related distress, individuals who prefer brief or less intensive interventions.
Overview:
IRRT uses guided imagery to revisit and transform traumatic memories, allowing individuals to change the emotional meaning and outcome of distressing experiences.
History & Development:
Originally developed by Mervin Smucker, IRRT integrates cognitive-behavioural and imagery-based techniques to support trauma resolution.
Helpful for:
Trauma, PTSD, nightmares, childhood abuse, intrusive imagery.
Overview:
Group facilitation focuses on guiding and supporting groups to enhance communication, collaboration, learning, and shared understanding in therapeutic or developmental settings.
History & Development:
Influenced by group psychotherapy pioneers such as Irvin Yalom, group facilitation integrates systems theory, interpersonal learning, and experiential methods.
Helpful for:
Peer support, psychoeducation, interpersonal skills, group therapy, organizational or community settings.