History of Brief Therapy

Brief therapy originated in the United States. When Freud introduced psychoanalysis to America in 1909, it quickly gained traction and soon became the established approach. However, major shifts in the mid-20th century would challenge this dominance.

With the U.S. entering World War II in late 1941, a significant number of draftees were dismissed for psychological reasons—around 1 million out of 11 million—and nearly another million soldiers required hospitalization for mental health concerns during the war. Facing a critical shortage of psychiatrists, the American government sought new, faster therapeutic methods, sparking the development of psychotraumatology.

In 1963, the National Mental Health Act committed the government to providing accessible mental health care. Cost concerns, especially related to crime, led to social workers taking on a more central role. Among them, Virginia Satir became known for pioneering family therapy.

During the "golden years" after the war, therapy gained social acceptance but also became more costly. To curb expenses, insurers increasingly refused to cover long-term psychoanalysis, favoring shorter, outcome-oriented therapies like behavioral therapy.

With the rise of new diagnostic standards (DSM), the application of statistics, video recording, medical informatics, neurobiology, and advanced imaging, psychiatry moved away from Freudian ideas toward a more scientific, rational understanding of the mind.

New thinkers challenged Freud and Adler. Notably, Virginia Satir, Fritz Perls, and Milton Erickson developed interactive, unconventional methods, often using metaphors and paradoxes. In the 1970s, researchers John Grinder and Richard Bandler studied and documented these therapists' techniques, eventually creating Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP).