Textbook of Transpersonal Psychiatry and Psychology - Hardcover

by Bruce Scotton (Editor), Allen Chinen (Editor), Allen Chunen (Editor)

This important new book brings together the work of top scholars and clinicians at leading universities and medical centers on the benefits and risks of transpersonal therapy. After comparing a variety of multicultural approaches-Zen Buddhism, existential phenomenology, and Christian mysticism, among many others-the book offers a wealth of information on specific disorders and the application of transpersonal psychology techniques such as visualization, breathwork, and "past lives" regression. With solid scholarship, wide scope, and accessible style, Textbook of Transpersonal Psychiatry and Psychology will become the standard work for students, researchers, clinicians, and lay readers interested in extending psychiatry and psychology into sciences that describe the functioning of the human mind, thereby building bridges between those disciplines and spirituality.

Back Jacket

Taking a fresh, multidisciplinary perspective, this book summarizes and integrates the emerging fields of transpersonal psychiatry and psychology. After surveying the Western roots of transpersonal psychiatry and psychology in William James, Carl Jung, and Christian and Jewish mysticism, the book reviews the rich contributions of such differing cultures as shamanism, Hinduism, and Buddhism, illustrating the influence of these traditions on the therapeutic community. The authors then proceed to the latest scientific research on meditation, psychedelics, altered states, and parapsychology. Organizing human experience into a continuum - from a basic level dominated by biological factors to personal, psychological structures and on to complex, spiritual experiences - seasoned transpersonal clinicians discuss distinctive issues, problems, and treatments at each level. Through engaging, real-life cases, the contributors describe practical techniques, including the outcomes and risks of various interventions. With solid scholarship, wide scope, and accessible style, Textbook of Transpersonal Psychiatry and Psychology will become the standard work for students, researchers, clinicians, and lay readers interested in extending psychiatry and psychology into sciences that describe the full range of functioning of the human mind, thereby building bridges between those disciplines and spirituality.

Author Biography

Bruce W. Scotton, M.D., is associate clinical professor of psychiatry at the University of California at San Francisco and is a Jungian analyst in private practice in San Francisco and Corte Madera.

Allan B. Chinen, M.D., is associate clinical professor of psychiatry at the University of California at San Francisco and in private practice in San Francisco. He is the author of Waking the World, In the Ever After, Once Upon a Midlife, and Beyond the Hero.

John R. Battista, M.D., M.A., is a longtime student, educator, practitioner, and contributor to the fields of transpersonal psychiatry and psychology. He is currently in private practice in New Milford, CT, and was formerly residency training director in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of California at Davis.