Positive psychotherapy: a transcultural and interdisciplinary approach to psychotherapy

The development of society may be described in terms of the following structural changes: (a) increased population, which requires other rules of contact for adequate forms of social relationships; (b) urbanization, with people living together in clusters, which, on the one hand, intensifies social relationships, but, on the other, reduces possibilities for real friendship; (c) differentiation, which rests on increasing technological development and requires specialization in partial functions; (d) transcultural problems. With people in the industrialized countries, this somatic-psychosocial relationship finds expression in the famous deadly sins of civilization, the risk factors. The following five factors are responsible for the origin and development of psychosocial and psychosomatic diseases, especially the so-called diseases of civilization: alcohol; intoxicants and drugs; smoking, overweight, sedentary life; and emotional stress (anxiety and inner tension).