Women who have been raped often experience profound psychological and emotional changes due, in part, to the difficulty inherent in assimilating this experience. Rape survivors may alter their entire world view, and may develop cognitive schemas that are maladaptive and dysfunctional. In order to assist women in constructing more adaptive schemas, it is often necessary to access and reprocess trauma-related beliefs. In this article, cognitive-experiential reprocessing (CER) is introduced as a viable approach for reprocessing the trauma of rape. In the context of a case study involving a young rape survivor, the rationale, goals, and practical considerations of CER are outlined.

This article (a) describes the role of feedback mechanisms in developmental constructivist conceptions of new learning and change and (b) suggests that such mechanisms may function as a common change factor in psychotherapy. Salient sources of feedback identified with diverse psychotherapy approaches are described and conceptualized in constructivist terms. It is concluded that developmental constructivist epistemology may serve as a viable integrative framework for psychotherapy practice.

The relation between client working models of attachment and therapist type of change assessments (first- vs. second-order) was examined in a sample of firsttime clients (N=46) seeking services through a university-based outpatient clinic. Results indicated that the problems and goals of clients who exhibited relatively secure working models of attachment were assessed by their therapists as being of a first-order nature, whereas the problems and goals of clients with more insecure working models of the world were assessed as being congruent with second-order conceptualizations. Implications for clinical research and the practice of cognitive psychotherapy are discussed.