Professor coauthors mental health counseling book

Andre Marquis lends expertise to promote an understanding of psychopathology
 

In an age when mental health disorders are on the rise and are a leading cause of disability in the U.S., where nearly one in five adults suffers from mental illness each year, counselors continue to advocate for an integral exploration of the underlying causes of disorders and the best way to treat mental health issues. 
 
A new book, co-authored by Andre Marquis, associate professor of counseling and human development at the University of Rochester’s Warner School of Education, closely examines the causes of, and treatments for, mental health disorders from various psychological and social perspectives. Marquis collaborated with Elliott Ingersoll of Cleveland State University, to publish Understanding Psychopathology: An Integral Exploration (Pearson, 2014), a guide written for students training to become mental health practitioners, counselors, social workers, psychologists, and psychiatrists and a unifying resource for individuals currently working in the mental health field.
 
Throughout the book, the authors cover various disorders, ranging from depression, anxiety, and eating disorders to Bipolar I Disorder, Schizophrenia, and psychological trauma, using the Integral model. This model, the authors explain, is an integrative and unifying framework oriented around four different perspectives—psychological, biomedical, cultural, and social—to help assist clinicians through the diagnosis and treatment of disorders among clients.
 
The book was designed to complement, rather than replace, the current edition of the common and widely-used Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association, also referred to as the DSM, as well as other diagnostic manuals for mental and emotional disorders. Marquis and Ingersoll highlight the importance of looking at symptoms from different points of view, particularly as the DSM edition continues to evolve.
 
 “Although the DSM edition changes over the years, how a disorder is labeled and how many symptoms you must have to be diagnosed with a disorder does not change what causes the disorder and how best to treat the disorder,” the co-authors explain in the introduction. “Being able to view symptoms from different perspectives increases the chance that a clinician will consider multiple variables related to the client’s symptoms (and then treatment) that might otherwise go unnoticed.”

The authors present research and theories of causes for each disorder from each perspective of the Integral model, examinations of the treatments for each, and case studies to help illustrate the concepts. Marquis’ contributions to the book include solo-authored chapters on anxiety disorders; substance-related disorders; and psychopathology, suffering and moral domain as well as a co-authored introduction and chapters on DSM (and other manuals) and sexual disorders, which he wrote with Warner School doctoral student Deborah Hudson and alumna Jessica Germano-Fokin ’12W (EdD). The book also includes chapters on Attention Deficit-Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), co-authored by Warner School counseling and human development chair Kathryn Douthit and alumna Tami Sullivan ‘12W (PhD); and sleep-wake disorders, written by doctoral student Ari Elliot ’10W (MS).
 
Marquis, a licensed mental health counselor in New York, focuses his teaching and research on counseling theories, psychotherapy integration and unification, group therapy, relational psychodynamics, developmental constructivism, human change processes, and Integral theory. His other scholarly interests include trends within the mental health field, from the ways that mental disorders are constructed and conceptualized to methodological issues involved in the empirically-supported treatment and evidence-based practice movements. Marquis is the author of The Integral Intake: A Guide to Comprehensive Idiographic Assessment in Integral Psychotherapy, Theoretical Models of Counseling and Psychotherapy, and dozens of peer-reviewed scholarly articles. He also serves various editorial roles for national publications, including the Journal of Psychotherapy Integration, the Journal of Unified Psychotherapy and Clinical Practice, and the Journal of Integral Theory and Practice, and is on the advisory board of the Unified Psychotherapy Project.