Trauma-Informed Adlerian Play Therapy: A Case Study

Abstract:According to Adlerian theory, early life influences, such as potentially traumatic events, can have an impact on an individual's lifestyle (his or her general orientation to life). For counselors working with children who have experienced traumatic events, it is important to have a modality to conceptualize and to provide efficacious interventions. This case study shows how one child's symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder following chronic sexual abuse were significantly decreased after trauma-informed Adlerian play therapy (AdPT) participation. In fact, the child's symptoms, post-counseling, no longer met diagnostic criteria for PTSD at all. Through the use of trauma-informed AdPT, the client's parent reported complete symptom alleviation, making a compelling case for the use of AdPT in work with this population.