Psychotherapy In Korean Culture

Abstract

Ever since Nokchin, a young courtman in the time of King Hundok (809~825AD), began practicing a kind of didactic psychotherapy, Korean traditional culture had preserved a number of indigenous psychotherapeutic methods. Meditation in the Buddhist and Taoist traditions, the shaman's healing cult and the psychophysical exercises and behavior modification techniques of oriental medicine practitioners have all been preserved through Korea's long history. Western dynamic psychotherapy, on the other hand, was only introduced after the Korean War in the 1950's when Korean psychiatrists trained in America during and after the war began returning to Korea. During the 1960's, therapists faced a number of obstacles in their efforts to effectively utilize western style psychotherapy with Korean patients. The major factors were; Korean patients' magical expectations of the therapist, Korean patients' preference for a somatic approach to therapy and also the therapist's poor motivation for conducting psychotherapy. However, along with the rapid economic development of Korea, there have been other changes which have made psychotherapy more popular and successful among Korean people. In particular, the promotion of rational thinking among the people and the systematic training of therapists in psychiatric institutions and study groups of various schools of psychotherapy and a profound impact on the increased success of psychotherapy in Korea. And yet, culturally determined issues such as modes of communication, the inability of clients to understand that they must pay a fee for talking with a trained therapist even when they do not receive medicines and clients' often unreal expectations of western medicine must all be more fully explored, understood and dealt with.