Third wave psychotherapies comprise a heterogeneous group of treatments, including acceptance and commitment treatment (ACT), behavioural activation, cognitive behavioural analysis system of psychotherapy, dialectical behavioural therapy, metacognitive therapy, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy and schema therapy. (Kahl, 2012).
Research in the field of third wave psychotherapy is still at the beginning. There are small samples and high differences between participants groups. Most of the research is about DBT. only a few studies implied ACT. Buerger, A., Vloet, T. D., Haber, L., & Geissler, J. M. (2021).
In the presentation I focus on the implementation of the ACT and EMDR approaches. ACT is a well-known approach in the third wave of psychotherapy. EMDR is a leading approach to treat trauma. I will explain how each of these theories address eating disorders, and how it can be implied into therapy. While ACT has some research in ED, EMDR is still in the stage of case studies. It is difficult to run controlled clinical studies due to high variance between patients and the multiple treatments accepted in ED. However, both theories have strong evidence base results in treating the causes of ED. ACT is well known in reducing obsessive compulsive and urge control behaviours. EMDR shows strong evidence in reducing symptoms of trauma and complex trauma, and especially desensitization to triggers. Thus, these therapies can be used efficiently with the necessary flexibility needed for the complexity of EDs. Although protocols are popular in ACT and EMDR, the basic assumption is the need for cognitive flexibility and the ability to change unadapted cognitive networks. This allows personal patient-oriented treatment.
