What Is The Best Therapy For Anger Management?
Anger issues can affect as much as eight percent of the population and lead to various problems. Learn more about anger management treatment here.
What Is Anger Management Therapy?
A 2016 study into anger in the community showed that nearly 8 percent of the population struggles with inappropriate or uncontrolled anger.1 This can lead to aggressive and even violent outbursts, making it challenging to engage and interact with others, including loved ones.
Anger management therapy is a type of anger management that utilizes therapeutic techniques to help better control and redirect anger safely and healthily. This works to acknowledge the source of the feelings, helping reaffirm the validity of the individual’s emotions while teaching them better ways to handle and regulate anger.
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What Is Anger Management?
Anger management is a series of methods, procedures, and therapies designed around helping individuals learn to manage and redirect their anger. While anger management therapy is one of the most common forms of anger management, not all forms of answer management are therapy-based.
How Does Anger Management Therapy Work?
Anger is a normal emotion, and, as a result, the focus of anger management therapy isn’t to diminish anger. Instead, it teaches individuals various skills, strategies, and techniques that help them process and express their anger inappropriately. It works by teaching better awareness and mindfulness of the self and essential emotional communication skills.
Types of Anger Management Therapy
Anger management therapy is not a single type of therapy. Instead, it’s a term given to many different therapies that can be beneficial in helping people learn to control and regulate anger and other emotions. Here are the four main types of anger management therapy.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, or CBT, is a form of psychotherapy that focuses on helping to create a better understanding of the connection between thoughts and actions. This means demonstrating how negative thoughts lead to a vicious cycle of negative actions while positive thoughts do the opposite.
However, negative thoughts and emotions are a part of being human, and so the goal of CBT isn’t to invalidate or erase thoughts or anger but rather to help create a better understanding of the impact of these feelings on actions. This means a strong emphasis on learning better means of expression that help acknowledge the feeling while still maintaining an appropriate and safe reaction.
CBT is often a leading choice in anger management therapy due to its versatile effectiveness.2
Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT)
DBT is a type of cognitive-behavioral therapy suited for personality disorders and conditions relating to mood, mind, and emotions.
Family Therapy
Family therapy is a type of group therapy where you and your family can discuss issues or miscommunications with the help of a professional therapist. The therapist can act as a mediator and allow both sides to express their feelings while guiding them to solutions.
Psychodynamic Therapy
Psychodynamic therapy focuses on cultivating a better idea of self.3 This awareness and mindfulness are beneficial in recognizing and naming any emotions you feel. It can also help you learn to better identify triggers.
What Is the Best Therapy for Anger Management?
The best type of anger management therapy depends on your unique needs. All the above therapies can be beneficial options, but they may not fit every circumstance. For instance, if you’re not struggling with relationships in your family or with loved ones and you have a strong support system, then family therapy may not be the best option for helping you manage your anger and emotions.
How Can I Handle My Anger?
Therapy is only one step in learning to manage your anger and adequately express it. During your sessions, you’ll learn a variety of techniques beneficial in recognizing, understanding, and expressing your anger in a way that is beneficial for yourself while also healthy.
Anger Management Therapy Techniques
While anger management techniques can come in various shapes and forms, they can also be categorized by the types of goals they seek to accomplish.
The first type of technique is those that are preventative. This includes learning to avoid triggers while also focusing on working through conversations focusing on communication and clarification.
Preventative techniques work to redirect anger and energy in beneficial ways, such as through exercise.
Techniques to Promote Peace and Mental Wellness
Some techniques focus on managing anger in a moment. These can be prompts to cultivate relaxation and peace and exercises that focus on restructuring the way you view your anger.
Overall, the main anger management therapy techniques include:
What Anger Management Therapy Can Help With
Anger management therapy can be a beneficial way of restoring balance in yourself and your relationships. Unresolved anger or inappropriately expressed anger can lead to internal and external discontentment, so it’s essential to learn to properly acknowledge and express your feelings.
Anger Management Can Benefit What Elements of Mental Wellbeing?
Some of the situations and conditions that anger management therapy can help with include:
Anger management can also help with leveled decision-making.4
Benefits of Anger Management Therapy
If uncontrolled anger inhibits you from living your life to the fullest, you’ll find that anger management therapy can offer many benefits. Whether used in combination with other anger management techniques or by itself, anger management therapy helps you better understand your emotions and express them in a healthy, safe way.
Anger management therapy provides professional guidance in developing the skills necessary to prevent, acknowledge, and defuse uncontrolled anger. This includes teaching how to identify triggers while also working to help develop the techniques to encourage relaxation and address the problems themselves while working towards a solution.
