Treatment of violated assumptive worlds with EMDR

The author presents a description of the treatment methodology called eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR), which facilitates the adaptive integration of traumatic information. EMDR is theoretically based upon the information-processing model called accelerated information processing. This chapter articulates the information-processing model of healing from traumatic loss. In traumatic loss there is an inability to integrate the traumatic information into one's assumptive world. Unprocessed traumatic information may result in intense feelings of vulnerability, helplessness, and low self-worth and efficacy. At the end of this chapter the author introduces the concept of expansion of basic world assumptions as a normative outcome of processing the traumatic situation. Expanded basic world assumptions involve a deeper awareness of vulnerability.

Book Section

English

Roger M. Solomon

Solomon, R. M. (2002). Treatment of violated assumptive worlds with EMDR. In J. Kauffman (Ed.), Loss of the assumptive world: A theory of traumatic loss (pp. 117-126). New York, NY: Brunner-Routledge