Addressing Heteronormative Assumptions: Working with Gender Schema in Schema Therapy
Nicole Manktelow
This paper introduces the concept of gender schema and argues for its inclusion as a target of treatment in schema therapy intervention.
The paper explores the origins of gender schema, using Bem’s pioneering work in the 1980’s as a platform from which to extrapolate the ways in which the hegemonic/patriarchal gender binary is internalised as gender schema. The paper introduces schema therapists to post-heteronormative discourse, which is not easily or readily available to most clinicians and is mainly absent within dominant psychology discourse.
The project of incorporating gender schema into the schema therapy field might be considered within a broader practice and project of decolonising our discipline.
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