Assignment 2: Positive Psychology and Spirituality

Substance abuse counseling lends itself nicely to the integration of positive psychology and spirituality. While both of these therapy approaches have been explored for many years, the integration into substance abuse counseling is a relatively new development. As such, many clients may not be aware of the techniques in positive psychology and spirituality that can be of use in their recovery.

Juanita has been seeking treatment for her marijuana use from you for a month now. While she has significantly cut back on her substance use, she is having difficulty quitting and remaining abstinent for periods that last longer than a few days. In your counseling sessions, Juanita has mentioned that she feels very badly about herself—she feels guilty about being unable to quit and explains that she doesn’t think she is strong enough to quit altogether. She has also expressed nervousness that her boyfriend would no longer like her if she quit smoking, and she has expressed concern that if he leaves her, she wouldn’t be able to find a new boyfriend because she doesn’t believe she is pretty enough. Juanita is also unsatisfied with her job as a cashier at the local grocery store, but has expressed her opinion that she doesn’t think she is smart enough to get a better job. You know from Juanita’s history, that her mother was very critical of Juanita when she was a child and that her father was absent for most of her childhood. In high school, Juanita excelled at classes in biology and math, but she never attended college.

To help Juanita overcome her barriers to marijuana abstinence, write a summary of what the counselor should cover in the next meeting with Juanita. Ensure that you cover the following points:

Explain the concepts of positive psychology to Juanita.
Examine the goals of positive psychology and explain how this approach will help Juanita obtain sobriety, focusing specifically on the concerns and dissatisfactions she has expressed.
Design at least two exercises based on positive psychology for Juanita to work on in between counseling sessions.
Explain spirituality to Juanita, emphasizing the differences between spirituality and religion.
Examine how spirituality and positive psychology can work together to help Juanita achieve her goals.
Write a 4–5-page paper in Word format. Use scholarly resources, including the textbook to support your ideas. Apply APA standards to citation of sources. Use the following file naming convention: LastnameFirstInitial_M4_A2.doc.

By Wednesday, July 5, 2017, deliver your assignment to the M4: Assignment 2 Dropbox.

You must proofread your paper. But do not strictly rely on your computer’s spell-checker and grammar-checker; failure to do so indicates a lack of effort on your part and you can expect your grade to suffer accordingly. Papers with numerous misspelled words and grammatical mistakes will be penalized. Read over your paper – in silence and then aloud – before handing it in and make corrections as necessary. Often it is advantageous to have a friend proofread your paper for obvious errors. Handwritten corrections are preferable to uncorrected mistakes.

Use a standard 10 to 12 point (10 to 12 characters per inch) typeface. Smaller or compressed type and papers with small margins or single-spacing are hard to read. It is better to let your essay run over the recommended number of pages than to try to compress it into fewer pages.

Likewise, large type, large margins, large indentations, triple-spacing, increased leading (space between lines), increased kerning (space between letters), and any other such attempts at “padding” to increase the length of a paper are unacceptable, wasteful of trees, and will not fool your professor.

The paper must be neatly formatted, double-spaced with a one-inch margin on the top, bottom, and sides of each page. When submitting hard copy, be sure to use white paper and print out using dark ink. If it is hard to read your essay, it will also be hard to follow your argument.

ADDITIONAL INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE CLASS

Discussion Questions (DQ)

Initial responses to the DQ should address all components of the questions asked, include a minimum of one scholarly source, and be at least 250 words.
Successful responses are substantive (i.e., add something new to the discussion, engage others in the discussion, well-developed idea) and include at least one scholarly source.
One or two sentence responses, simple statements of agreement or “good post,” and responses that are off-topic will not count as substantive. Substantive responses should be at least 150 words.
I encourage you to incorporate the readings from the week (as applicable) into your responses.
Weekly Participation

Your initial responses to the mandatory DQ do not count toward participation and are graded separately.
In addition to the DQ responses, you must post at least one reply to peers (or me) on three separate days, for a total of three replies.
Participation posts do not require a scholarly source/citation (unless you cite someone else’s work).
Part of your weekly participation includes viewing the weekly announcement and attesting to watching it in the comments. These announcements are made to ensure you understand everything that is due during the week.
APA Format and Writing Quality

Familiarize yourself with APA format and practice using it correctly. It is used for most writing assignments for your degree. Visit the Writing Center in the Student Success Center, under the Resources tab in LoudCloud for APA paper templates, citation examples, tips, etc. Points will be deducted for poor use of APA format or absence of APA format (if required).
Cite all sources of information! When in doubt, cite the source. Paraphrasing also requires a citation.
I highly recommend using the APA Publication Manual, 6th edition.
Use of Direct Quotes

I discourage overutilization of direct quotes in DQs and assignments at the Masters’ level and deduct points accordingly.
As Masters’ level students, it is important that you be able to critically analyze and interpret information from journal articles and other resources. Simply restating someone else’s words does not demonstrate an understanding of the content or critical analysis of the content.
It is best to paraphrase content and cite your source.
LopesWrite Policy

For assignments that need to be submitted to LopesWrite, please be sure you have received your report and Similarity Index (SI) percentage BEFORE you do a “final submit” to me.
Once you have received your report, please review it. This report will show you grammatical, punctuation, and spelling errors that can easily be fixed. Take the extra few minutes to review instead of getting counted off for these mistakes.
Review your similarities. Did you forget to cite something? Did you not paraphrase well enough? Is your paper made up of someone else’s thoughts more than your own?
Visit the Writing Center in the Student Success Center, under the Resources tab in LoudCloud for tips on improving your paper and SI score.
Late Policy

The university’s policy on late assignments is 10% penalty PER DAY LATE. This also applies to late DQ replies.
Please communicate with me if you anticipate having to submit an assignment late. I am happy to be flexible, with advance notice. We may be able to work out an extension based on extenuating circumstances.
If you do not communicate with me before submitting an assignment late, the GCU late policy will be in effect.
I do not accept assignments that are two or more weeks late unless we have worked out an extension.
As per policy, no assignments are accepted after the last day of class. Any assignment submitted after midnight on the last day of class will not be accepted for grading.
Communication

Communication is so very important. There are multiple ways to communicate with me:
Questions to Instructor Forum: This is a great place to ask course content or assignment questions. If you have a question, there is a good chance one of your peers does as well. This is a public forum for the class.
Individual Forum: This is a private forum to ask me questions or send me messages. This will be checked at least once every 24 hours.