Neurodivergent children, adolescents, and adults demonstrate both learning and attention challenges that contribute to academic, social, and workplace failures. The emotional consequences of these disorders can often include lowered self-esteem, pervasive feelings of shame, profound insecurity about academic skills, and a deep sense of vulnerability. This leads many individuals with neurocognitive difficulties to consult with psychotherapists for help in alleviating their psychiatric symptoms. Nechama Sorscher argues that it is therefore essential for clinicians to be mindful of the various types of learning disorders and their impact on the developing psyche while facilitating insight and awareness of these issues. Assessment and Intervention with Children, Adolescents, and Adults with Neurocognitive Challenges: A Psychodynamic Perspective provides an overview of the different types of learning disorders, reviews the literature on common psychological themes found in the psychotherapy of individuals with these disorders, and offers practical suggestions for treatment, as illustrated in case histories. This book discusses how to accurately assess and successfully intervene with children, adolescents, and adults with learning disabilities, attention disorders, and autism spectrum disorder.
Nechama Sorscher is a clinical psychologist and neuropsychologist.
Nechama Sorscher's debut is an incisive and long overdue addition to our field's literature on the application of psychodynamic theory to assessment practice. Sorscher's thirty-plus years of specialized experience saturates her work with unmatched insight into this too-frequently overlooked (but needy) clinical population. Her writing style is alacritous yet thoughtful; it is both expansive and accessible. I have long considered Sorscher a first-rate thinker and clinician. As such, this book presents a rare opportunity for clinicians of all levels of expertise to learn from one of the very best. --Clarice Kestenbaum, Columbia University This is an excellent book: clear, comprehensive, well-written, and replete with examples that show us how an integration of psychodynamic principles and neurocognitive development make clinical process richer and more effective. Nechama Sorscher provides us with an up-to-date resource that belongs in every mental health provider's office. --Marsha Levy-Warren, NYU, author of The Adolescent Journey This volume provides a much-needed guide for professionals who seek to expand their knowledge and deepen their understanding about the assessment and treatment of individuals with neurocognitive challenges. By synthesizing an extensive contemporary body of research with her considerable clinical experience, the author provides an integrated view of how neurodevelopmental issues interface with young people's evolving personality. She uses vignettes of children, adolescents, and young adults to demonstrate the complex ways in which struggles around learning, socializing, and self-regulation powerfully affect the sense of self across the lifespan, posing threats to self-esteem and heightening susceptibility to shame. The author's combined expertise in both neurocognitive evaluation and psychodynamic psychotherapy yields unique sections that clinicians will find particularly useful, such as: engaging parents in difficult but productive post-evaluation discussions, integrating the results of neurocognitive assessments into dynamically-oriented treatments, addressing the special treatment needs of psychotherapy patients with neurocognitive issues at different phases of their development, recognizing and making use of the transference and countertransference paradigms that tend to arise in the treatment of populations with neurocognitive challenges, and thinking about ways in which the pandemic has left its mark on vulnerable children, adolescents and young adults. This book's potential as a teaching tool is enhanced by the author's straightforward and conversational style, a well-organized presentation, and the generous use of clinical material from assessments and psychotherapies. --Pamela Meersand, Columbia University
