Article

Cand. Sc. [Psychology], a.p. Fedorov A.F. (Kovrov), Ilin A.V. (Vladimir)

“Use of Cognitive Methods in Work With Convicts With Addictive Behavior”

Cognitive methods in the psycho-correctional work of a penitentiary psychologist were applied as exemplified by individual consultation of the convicted predispositioned to addictive behavior. As a solution to the cognitive consultation problems certain cognitive and behavioral techniques were used. Convicts are prone to addictive behavior. Generally, the mechanism of development of addictive behavior is based upon intermittent (from time to time) reinforcement of a condition, when a convict who has experienced an emotional uplift, an excitement, wants to experience such a condition on and on. Likewise, the mechanism of development of addictive behavior is connected with the phenomenon of emotional deprivation. A person subjectively experiencing an affective condition must experience a physiological affect as well (rise of hypertension, increase of body temperature, physiological sensation), and normally there’s no division into subjective and physiological affects. A convict suffering a loss experiences sadness, depression – these emotions are signal information (they help to understand oneself, one’s condition). The following factors form the basis of addictive behavior: satisfaction of emotional needs – if convicts don’t get the desired they start feeling anger, there appears a low frustration tolerance (they can’t tell and understand their negative affect, can’t differentiate and explain it, which leads to experiencing horror, fear, tension).

A convict suffering an addictive disorder doesn’t feel anything, so they must be taught to feel, shown the relationship between the subjective and physiological affect. A cognitive method psycho-correctional psychologist’s task is to explain methods of cognitive evaluation (i.e. gathering and processing information) to a convict. An emotional state is supported by thoughts, so the core therapy should be aimed at a change in thinking. We ourselves call our feelings and we ourselves experience them. One must distinguish short-living and long-living emotions. Besides there are unhealthy negative emotions and healthy negative emotions - they must be recognized as well, and unhealthy negatives must be substituted by healthy ones.

Besides that it’s crucial that a convict is clarified on the necessity of abandoning self-ranking, it’s necessary to be able to separate an action from a personality (separate the evaluation of actions and deeds from the evaluation of personality), to explain the principles of long-term and short-term hedonism (having pleasure), to teach them think and speculate using long-term and short-term hedonism (having pleasure), i.e. think over their actions in the longer term, evaluate and foresee the consequences (you can have a long-term pleasure but you have to think what it may lead to). A psychologist explains things but the decision is up to a convict, thus making them take responsibility for such a decision. A psychologist shows them the way to the “source”, but convicts themselves “drink” from it. A convict prone to addictive behavior shows very low frustration tolerance, and this is one of the basic mechanisms of addiction emersion. Convicts show different frustration threshold – it depends on physiological and biological characteristics. As a consequence of low frustration tolerance, if a convict doesn’t tell their desires, they feel worry and discomfort seeming intolerable. One doesn’t have to give up desires, but at the same time it’s necessary to draw a convict’s attention to abandoning absolutist demands. You may want it but you don’t have to do it. One has to make a decision to do it or not. The addicted lack the stage of speculation. A desire is safe until it’s elevated to an absolute demand. A convict with an addictive form of disorder has psychological addiction coexisting with physiological one, that is why it’s more important to remove their psychological addiction first. The task of a psychologist is to distinguish a worrying and uncomfortable condition of a convict. A psychologist must teach a convict to use psychological techniques of easing their condition. A psychologist’s aim is to teach convicts to be psychologists to themselves. A convict must get a model of a free communication from a person they trust, who has a positive experience and accepts them such as they are.

Cognitive consultation which as a rule is highly-constructive and short-term begins with determination of problems and conceptualization of a case. Penitentiary psychologists play lots of roles: they offer to convicts a so-called “accepting attitude”, investigate problems together with them, help them question the justification of their thinking, as well as discover weak points in their logics by means of clashing them against reality. Questions are the main verbal instrument of a cognitive consultant-psychologist. The cognitive psychotherapy works with people having emotional disorders, prone to brutality, paranoia, having sexual problems, addictive disorders, low self-esteem and other difficulties. In the application of cognitive methods to convicts with addictive behavior the accent is made on prevention of relapse and decrease of criminal actions.