Motivation Stimulation Therapy: What Does It Consist Of?

Motivational stimulation therapy is a widely used therapeutic approach in patients with self-destructive behaviors. It is brief and with it, a desire for improvement and improvement is achieved in the person, something essential to start later, specific psychological treatments aimed at each specific need: addiction to drugs, alcohol, self-injurious behaviors, etc.

Many times we have men and women who, even being fully aware of their problem, do not find the reasons or the courage to get involved in therapy. This psychological resource seeks to give the patient strength and motivation to awaken in him his skills, values ​​and strengths. Being able to empower them is undoubtedly a very useful exercise that will mediate the subsequent therapeutic process.

On average, four or five sessions are enough. Time during which a good alliance is achieved between the professional and the person; something decisive to undertake that later journey towards the recovery process. We analyze it.

Motivation Stimulus Therapy: Purpose and Techniques

Before defining what motivational stimulation therapy is, it is important to first understand who it is for. Knowing in which people it is useful and its effectiveness is guaranteed is decisive. For starters, self-destructive behaviors refer, according to research from the University of Utah, to a wide variety of behaviors,

These range from self-harm to harmful behaviors, suicidal thoughts, and self-injurious behaviors. Thus, among the most common dynamics that define self-destructive people are undoubtedly addictions. They are highly adverse actions that not only threaten the integrity of oneself.

In addition, what is almost always appreciated is a lack of meaning in life, an absence of values, meanings and disinterest in one’s own well-being. Therefore, a basic purpose that this therapy seeks is to promote motivation and a feeling of control in the person.

It is to get him back to having an inescapable existential purpose in mind : to improve the situation in which he finds himself. Let us therefore see some keys to understand how it is developed and what its techniques are.

A managerial treatment oriented to change and motivation

This therapy was designed in 1993 as a clinical trial for alcohol addicts. The results were so optimal that it was decided to improve its bases to apply it to more psychological realities. Thus, the principles on which motivational stimulation therapy is based are the following:

• Part of motivational psychology. The basic objective is to promote the action, emotion and enthusiasm of the person to work on change and its improvement.
• It employs motivational interviewing techniques and a counseling style developed by Drs. William R. Miller and Stephen Rollnick.
• A therapeutic approach aimed at assessing the person’s needs and behaviors is integrated into the motivational interview itself. Only in this way can one act based on them through dialogue and trust.

Empathy as the key to the therapeutic alliance

“I understand what you feel, I feel your anguish, I connect with your reality and I respect you, I listen to you, I am here for you …” . One of the essential pillars of motivational stimulation therapy is to always start from empathy. The professional must create a climate of connection and acceptance so that the person can trust.

Feedback to reinforce the motivating attitude

Dialogue and feedback will be a constant in this type of therapy. The objective is to encourage the person to regain not only self-confidence, but also the belief that they can put aside their addiction or addictive behavior.

It should be noted that this type of therapy can be complex because many times we face people without any motivation or affection for themselves.

Therefore, it is essential to avoid arguments, to contradict and even less to judge. Dialogue must always be dynamic, positive and constructive, able to defuse resistance, energetic to excite and promote the illusion for change.

Motivation Stimulation Therapy and Drive Toward Self-Efficacy

“You can deal with this. It will not be easy, you will not achieve it in two days, you will have hard times, but you will achieve it because you have resources in you and we will help you develop them ”. If there is an essential dynamic that permeates motivational stimulation therapy, it is to promote self-efficacy in the patient.

For this, irrational ideas, defenselessness, and reformulating past failures should be worked on to promote the need to try again. Likewise, it is important to work on many ideas that are often instilled in the family environment, which often stops trusting the patient himself when we are in cases of addiction.

Duration and post-therapy steps

Motivational stimulation therapy lasts for four or five sessions. The objective is, as the name indicates, to promote the motivation of the person towards his recovery. The most decisive and hard work comes later at the moment in which psychological therapy is started adjusted to each need, be it an addiction to drugs, alcohol, etc.

Studies such as those carried out at the University of Massachusetts, for example, indicate that this therapy even reduces anxiety and insecurity towards further treatment. What is basically achieved is to empower the person to engage in this process of improvement and healing. We are therefore facing a strategy of great value.