Permissive Words

Milton Erickson used a variety of approaches in inductions. He could be direct and authoritarian or indirect and permissive. He was famous though, for his permissive, indirect approach that involved permissive language. Permissive Words Can Might Maybe Perhaps Possible Allow So, instead of “Relax deeply,” you might say “Perhaps you can relax deeply.”

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Truism (Truism sets)

A truism is a claim that is so obvious or self-evident as to be hardly worth mentioning, except as a reminder or as a rhetorical or literary device, and is the opposite of falsism. In philosophy, a sentence which asserts incomplete truth conditions for a proposition may be regarded as a truism. An example of […]

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Convergent thinking

Convergent thinking is a term coined by Joy Paul Guilford as the opposite of divergent thinking. It generally means the ability to give the “correct” answer to standard questions that do not require significant creativity, for instance in most tasks in school and on standardized multiple-choice tests for intelligence. Convergent thinking is the type of […]

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Divergent thinking

What is divergent thinking? The psychologist J.P. Guilford first used the terms convergent thinking and divergent thinking in 1967. Divergent thinking is also sometimes called ‘lateral thinking’. Divergent thinking is the process of generating multiple related ideas for a given topic or solutions to a problem. Divergent thinking occurs in a spontaneous, free-flowing, ‘non-linear’ manner. […]

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Learning Viewpoint

The Learning Viewpoint assumes that abnormal behavior is due to a persons past experiences which they have subsequently learned to associate with a particular emotion. Experiences we have during our childhood can cause us to become drawn to, or repelled from, similar situations in adulthood. For example, a person who was locked in a dark […]

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Psychodynamic Viewpoint

The Psychodynamic Viewpoint holds the view that some behavioral disorders occur as a result of repressed emotional conflicts and stem from Sigmund Freud’s psychosexual theory of development. The psychodynamic viewpoint sees mental disorders as being caused by repressed memories and conflicts in the unconscious mind.  Years ago, this was a very common explanation for a […]

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Biological Viewpoint

The Biological Viewpoint assumes that an abnormal behavior or viewpoint occurs as a result of something wrong with the body, and in most cases, the brain. Genetics, hormonal levels, disease, infections or a brain injury could all contribute to a person behaving differently from how they normally would. Biologically based psychological disorders tend to appear […]

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