Integrating Theory into Clinical Understanding · Capstone Exercise

Four Frameworks, One Client

One presentation, seven features, and no single framework in this module accounts for more than a part of it. One of the seven is not accounted for by anything in this module at all, and recognising that is the point of the exercise.

What this exercise practises

Assigning each feature of a complex presentation to the framework that actually explains it, writing a formulation that holds several frameworks at once and includes both people, and diagnosing what is wrong with a formulation that is accurate.

Two parts require writing and cannot be skipped. Nothing you write leaves your browser or is recorded anywhere, and you can copy your own responses at the end.

Estimated time to complete this exercise: 40 minutes

1Seven features
2Your formulation
3The colleague
4The next question
5Close

Before you begin

How this one works

This is the capstone. One presentation, seven features, and no single framework in this module accounts for more than a part of it.
Part 1 assigns each feature to the framework that explains it. One of the available answers is that none of them does, and it is the correct answer for one feature.
Parts 2 and 4 require writing. You cannot continue past either of them without producing something, and nothing you write leaves your browser or is recorded anywhere.
Part 3 is a colleague's formulation of the same case. It is accurate. Your task is to say what is wrong with it, which is a different thing from saying it is wrong.
Read the case once before you start. It is long because clinical presentations are, and the length is part of what is being practised.

The organising question is not what is wrong with this person. It is which framework best helps us understand this person's experience, and what that framework suggests we need to know next. Theory serves the client. When a client's experience resists the framework being applied, revise the framework rather than the description of the experience.

References

  1. Bancroft, J., & Janssen, E. (2000). The dual control model of male sexual response: A theoretical approach to centrally mediated erectile dysfunction. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 24(5), 571–579. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0149-7634(00)00024-5
  2. Basson, R. (2000). The female sexual response: A different model. Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy, 26(1), 51–65. https://doi.org/10.1080/009262300278641
  3. Chivers, M. L., Seto, M. C., Lalumiére, M. L., Laan, E., & Sattler, S. (2010). Agreement of self-reported and genital measures of sexual arousal in men and women: A meta-analysis. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 39(1), 5–56. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-009-9556-9
  4. Impett, E. A., & Peplau, L. A. (2003). Sexual compliance: Gender, motivational, and relationship perspectives. Journal of Sex Research, 40(1), 87–99. https://doi.org/10.1080/00224490309552169
  5. Janssen, E., & Bancroft, J. (2007). The dual-control model: The role of sexual inhibition and excitation in sexual arousal and behavior. In E. Janssen (Ed.), The psychophysiology of sex (pp. 197–222). Indiana University Press.
  6. Mark, K. P., & Murray, S. H. (2012). Gender differences in desire discrepancy as a predictor of sexual and relationship satisfaction in a college sample of heterosexual romantic relationships. Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy, 38(2), 198–215. https://doi.org/10.1080/0092623X.2011.606877
  7. Meston, C. M., & Buss, D. M. (2007). Why humans have sex. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 36(4), 477–507. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-007-9175-2
  8. Muise, A., Impett, E. A., & Desmarais, S. (2013). Getting it on versus getting it over with: Sexual motivation, desire, and satisfaction in intimate bonds. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 39(10), 1320–1332. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167213490963
  9. Tiefer, L. (2001). A new view of women’s sexual problems: Why new? Why now? Journal of Sex Research, 38(2), 89–96. https://doi.org/10.1080/00224490109552075
  10. Tolman, D. L., & Diamond, L. M. (Eds.). (2014). APA handbook of sexuality and psychology: Vol. 2. Contextual approaches. American Psychological Association. https://doi.org/10.1037/14194-000