I think I have a name now for what I do…

The goal of ACT is to help clients consistently choose to act effectively (concrete behaviors in alignment with their values) in the presence of difficult or interfering private events.

I confess I was not aware of the raging debate within cognitive therapy between ACT therapists (acceptance and commitment therapy) and cognitive therapists until I read a recent Time magazine article about Steven Hayes. The few things I had seen about Dr. Hayes sounded like solution-focused therapy to me. When people ask me what I do I usually say cognitive-behavioral therapy with a nod to solution focused techniques. But in looking at the www.contextualpsychology.org website, I think I may have been doing ACT for quite awhile and not knowing it.

On the SSA front, I only worked on change for a very brief period first starting out. Instead, I have been about pursuing the goal of ACT with my clients who want to be post-gay. That is, I provide a context for clients to choose to act consistent with their values in the presence of SSA. In the process, some of those people experience a significant change in their experience of attraction. Many do not; however, a focus on changing those feelings is considered counterproductive. Rather, the emphasis is on expanding the awareness of agency in achieving an alignment of behavior and values.

In preparing a publication, I ran across this article:

Same-sex attraction in a birth cohort: prevalence and persistence in early adulthood
Authors: Dickson N.1; Paul C.; Herbison P.
Source: Social Science and Medicine, Volume 56, Number 8, April 2003, pp. 1607-1615(9)

Abstract:
There is a continuing debate about the importance of social versus biological factors in the expression of same-sex attraction. Investigation of prevalence, continuities, and changes over time among young adults growing up in a country with a relatively accepting climate to homosexuality is likely to illuminate this debate. Analyses were therefore undertaken of self-reported same-sex attraction at age 21 and 26, in a cohort of about 1000 people born in 1972/3 in one New Zealand city. Participants were also asked about same-sex behaviour and attitudes to same-sex relationships. By age 26, 10.7% of men and 24.5% of women reported being attracted to their own sex at some time. This dropped to 5.6% of men and 16.4% of women who reported some current same-sex attraction. Current attraction predominantly to their own sex or equally to both sexes (major attraction) was reported by 1.6% of men and 2.1% of women. Occasional same-sex attraction, but not major attraction, was more common among the most educated. Between age 21 and 26, slightly more men moved away from an exclusive heterosexual attraction (1.9% of all men) than moved towards it (1.0%), while for women, many more moved away (9.5%) than towards (1.3%) exclusive heterosexual attraction. These findings show that much same-sex attraction is not exclusive and is unstable in early adulthood, especially among women. The proportion of women reporting some same-sex attraction in New Zealand is high compared both to men, and to women in the UK and US. These observations, along with the variation with education, are consistent with a large role for the social environment in the acknowledgement of same-sex attraction. The smaller group with major same-sex attraction, which changed less over time, and did not differ by education, is consistent with a basic biological dimension to sexual attraction. Overall these findings argue against any single explanation for homosexual attraction.

DOI: 10.1016/S0277-9536(02)00161-2
Affiliations: 1: Department of Preventive and Social Medicine, University of Otago Medical School, P.O. Box 913, , Dunedin, New Zealand.

Some of my critics will no doubt say so what, but I had not thought before about why SSA in women would be more prevalent in New Zealand. Any guesses?