What is Behavioral Relaxation Training? Session 179 with John Michael Guercio

Dr. John Michael Guercio joins me again to discuss a topic that we briefly covered in his last appearance; Behavioral Relaxation Training.

In this show, John does a deep dive into this work, drawing on the research of Drs. Roger Poppen, Duane Lundervold, and of course John himself.

Along with the aforementioned Drs. Poppen and Lundervold, John is the co-author of the third edition of the text, Behavioral Relaxation Training. He is also the author of Assessment of Adult Core Competencies: Teaching Skills to Adults with Autism and Severe Behavioral Challenges, which we discussed at length in his earlier appearance in Session 140.

We discuss how BRT was developed, its current applications, and the training required to do it. We also spent a good deal of time talking about becoming trained to implement BRT, scope of practice issues, and protecting client safety. So in case we were not clear in the discussion, if this is something you'd like to do, please seek out the appropriate training and supervision.

For Patreon Subscribers, there is an additional 10 minutes or so where John tells a fun story about meeting his childhood football hero, and how said hero invited him to his house for wings and beer. How cool is that!?!? I hope Tom Brady hears this so I can have a similar experience in the next 10 or 15 years, lol.

Here are links to resourced mentioned in the show:

• The movie, Paper Tigers
• Stillness Speaks, by Eckhart Tolle
• NADD Accreditation Programs
• Why Behavior Analysts Should Study Emotion: the example of anxiety. (Friman, Hayes, and Wilson, 1998)
• John's ABAI bio sketch (with email contact link)

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