Psychotraumatology and trauma therapy should be included in the science of psychotherapy

Abstract

It is argued that psychotraumatology constitutes one of the fields of psychotherapeutic science. The term of psychotraumatology not only covers some specific symptoms; it also corresponds to a specific etiology. That is why, according to the author, different schools of psychotherapy apply highly convergent therapeutic techniques when treating traumatized patients. The common etiological ground seems to constitute very similar practices across different schools of psychotherapy. So according to the author trauma therapy could be regarded as a prototype of an etiologically oriented “causal therapy” (see Fischer 2007). By this is meant a type of therapy that in it’s theory focuses on the causal, determining context of the pathology and in practice as well the therapy goes along with the causal context and the history of a patient’s specific disturbance. From an epistemological point of view in order to practice causal therapy a specific style of thinking is required, which is called “dialectic-ecologic” by the author. The ecologic aspect is represented by the etiological context, whereas dialectical thinking reconstructs the dynamic and dialectics of pathogenesis on the one side and salutugenesis, a patient’s attempt to overcome the pathogenetic conditions, on the other.

Keywords Science of psychotherapy; psychotraumatology; etiologically oriented psychotherapy; causal psychotherapy; dialectic-ecological thinking