Topoi

So when I was figuring out what topic to research for my writing class, I was looking for information on meditation that is somehow related to psychology. That is how I came across mindfulness-based therapies. I had never heard of this before, but I was immediately intrigued. I worried that there might not be enough on this topic to write an entire paper that would actually be worth reading, but applying the topoi method to my topic opened my eyes to a lot of possibilities that I had not considered.

Contrast
How does mindfulness therapy differ from psychoanalytic therapy? What are the pros and cons of these differences? Do mindfulness-based cognitive and behavior therapies differ significantly from traditional cognitive and behavior therapies? Does adding the mindfulness component introduce new ideas about mental illnesses and treatment?

Causes and Effects
Why has meditation become more widespread in Western culture, and what initiated its incorporation into science? There is a lot of empirical research on meditation and its benefits to mental health. Does this research precede the application of mindfulness in therapeutic approaches? Mindfulness-based therapies are short (eight sessions, each two hours) and are effective in the long-term. Does this increase the likelihood that people who do not want to commit lots of time or money to therapy will seek help? Considering it is equally effective as pharmacological interventions, will it have the effect of reducing our over-reliance on meds?

Changes
The addition of mindfulness to behavioral and cognitive therapy has caused some changes to the theories behind these interventions. Behavior theory no longer requires that symptoms, causes, and treatment be described in purely behavioral terms. It now allows for some psychological explanation and intervention. Both behavior and cognitive therapies have changed their focus from the form of negative thoughts to their function, which means they deal with thoughts that produce maladaptive effects, not negative thoughts in general. The goal of mindfulness is not to suppress maladaptive cognitions, but to learn to prevent the negative effects they have on our mood in specific situations.

A possible change associated with mindfulness-based therapy may be a greater acceptance of alternative approaches in medicine. Maybe people will be more open to using meditation instead of medicine for other illnesses as well, both mental and physical.



Well, that's as far as I've gotten with the topoi. Now I just have to figure out a thesis...