What Issues Can DBT Be Used for?

Greetings and welcome to the first video in this module. As we have learned, DBT was originally designed to treat symptoms of borderline personality disorder. However, research shows that DBT is efficacious in treating a wide variety of symptoms and disorders. So, the question becomes, how much do we adhere to standard DBT vs adapt standard DBT to even better accommodate specific symptoms, disorders, and populations? Well, that’s the question we will be answering in this video. So, let’s get started. Okay.

So As we have already seen in this course, DBT was originally designed by Marsha Linehan to treat symptoms of borderline personality disorder. However, decades of research now shows very clearly that DBT is also effective in treating a wide variety of clinical issues including, but certainly not limited to, anxiety, depression, bipolar, addictions, eating disorders, other personality disorders, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and even psychosis, and we could go on and on. So, the reason that DBT is effective in treating such a wide variety of symptoms is because the skill sets taught by DBT can be applied to almost any psychological disorder.

Bankoff, S. M., Poulin, R. M., Reidler, E. B., & PantaIone, D. W. (2015). The use of dialectical behavior therapy skills training as stand-alone treatment: A systematic review of the treatment outcome literature. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 71(1), 1–20.,Panos, P. T., Jackson, J. W., Hasan, O., & Panos, A. (2014). Meta-analysis and systematic review assessing the efficacy of dialectical behavior therapy (DBT). Research on Social Work Practice, 24(2), 213–223.

So For example, remember those five skill sets that we've talked about in previous videos, so the skillsets of mindfulness, distress tolerance, emotion regulation, dialectical thinking, and interpersonal effectiveness. So Is it only people with borderline personality disorder that can benefit from those skill sets? Well, of course not. Any potential disorder could benefit from at least one of those skill sets, if not more than one if not all of them. And that’s exactly why DBT has become such an effective treatment module in addressing such a wide variety of symptoms.

Neacsiu, A. D., Eberle, J. W., Kramer, R., Wiesmann, T., & Linehan, M. M. (2014). Dialectical behavior therapy skills for transdiagnostic emotion dysregulation: A pilot randomized controlled trial. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 59, 40–51.