Evidence-based Group Therapy Project Instructions
EBGT Project
Project Description
The project is known as the Evidence-based Group Treatment Website (EBGT) Project. The focus of the project is to develop an electronic catalog for clinical group therapy similar to APA Division 12’s for clinical individual therapy. This is an international project involving the combined efforts of universities and groups throughout the world. The final product will be a website to help clinicians find evidence-based group treatments and resources.
How can I assist?
If you are currently one of the universities or groups involved in the project, your task is to assist in developing an individual treatment page for at least one of the following twelve diagnoses:
- Eating Disorders
- Borderline Personality Disorder
- Pain
- Bipolar Disorder
- Major Depressive Disorder
- Generalized Anxiety Disorder
- Obsessive Compulsive Disorder
- Social Anxiety Disorder
- Panic Disorder
- Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
- Schizophrenia
- Substance Use
Treatment pages consist of:
- A basic description of the treatment
- Evidence for the treatment, including meta-analyses and individual research studies (such as randomized controlled trials)
- Manuals, worksheets, books, or videos associated with the treatment
This Treatment Form will help structure your work and will help transfer it to the website. To see examples of completed treatment forms click here or here. These examples help provide some direction and show what kind of studies we included.
Suggested Ways to Approach the Task
Previous treatment pages were developed by identifying known empirically-supported treatments from recent meta-analyses. If a meta-analysis does not exist for your treatment, systematic reviews may help. In addition, teams should include high-quality clinical trials of treatments for their disorder. One way to decide which evidence-based treatments (empirically-supported treatments) to use is to see which treatments already appear on Division 12's website (https://div12.org/treatments/). Once a treatment is identified, you should then identify manuals, worksheets, workbooks, books, videos, and clinical studies associated with the treatment and include them in your Treatment Form.
In some cases, it is unclear whether a treatment should be included. For example, there may be only one study supporting a given treatment for a specific disorder, whereas other treatments have 3-4 studies each to support them. In these cases, we recommend talking thing through with the most senior researcher on the team, and then talking with Dr. Burlingame. With some disorders, including treatments with fewer studies makes sense. With others, it is less advisable. Furthermore, there is also interdisciplinary work which involves group treatment, individual treatment, and physical therapy or other types of treatment. For example, DBT often includes group and individual elements. In this case, too, it is good to discuss with the senior researcher and then with Dr. Burlingame. These are the types of decisions that will require some judgment from researchers and talking through issues with Dr. Burlingame to stay as consistent as we can.
Additional Support
Here is a video that explains these instructions. If you already understand the task, feel free to skip it!
We are always happy to help our collaborators. If you need assistance or have questions, don’t hesitate to reach out to Tate Paxton at tatepaxton37@gmail.com