ABSTRACT
Direct Decision Therapy, a system proposed by Harold Greenwald, focuses upon the decisions that people make. The task of the psychotherapist is to help clients. These are: find out about the decisions they have made in the past that have led to their problems; make decisions to change their behavior; and carry out these new decisions. Greenwald also emphasizes the importance of finding out about the context in which former decisions were made. Once the context is found, the decision will appear to be appropriate given the context. Greenwald described a psychiatric patient that he interviewed in front of the staff of a mental hospital in order to demonstrate Direct Decision Therapy. Marie was a typical, hopeless schizophrenic. Greenwald is quite willing to use techniques from other systems of psychotherapy that are consistent with his orientation. For example, role playing can be useful; Greenwald sometimes suggests that clients act the way they would like to be.
