ACT for psychosis masterclass
Advanced skills for supporting personal recovery
Building on the ACT for psychosis foundations workshop, this skills masterclass focuses on advanced, process-based interventions to support personal recovery. Working with paranoia, unusual beliefs, distressing voices, and shame presents unique challenges—this workshop will deepen your ability to apply ACT in these complex situations.
Through experiential exercises, case discussions, and session recordings, you’ll refine your skills in formulation, engagement, values-based activation, and exposure to help clients move toward meaningful recovery.
Background to the workshop
Supporting people in their recovery from psychosis requires more than symptom reduction—it involves helping them build lives that are meaningful, autonomous, and values-driven. While many individuals experience distressing symptoms, stigma, and system-related barriers, recovery is possible when therapy fosters psychological flexibility, self-compassion, and engagement in personally meaningful action.
ACT provides a powerful framework for supporting personal recovery, helping individuals change their relationship with distressing experiences rather than struggling against them. However, applying ACT in complex cases—especially when working with paranoia, unusual beliefs, distressing voices, and shame—requires skilful formulation and flexible, process-based interventions.
This advanced skills masterclass builds on the foundations workshop, helping practitioners refine their ability to engage individuals in ACT for psychosis (ACTp) and support them in moving beyond avoidance and toward recovery-oriented action.
What you will gain from this workshop
This skills-based masterclass is designed for practitioners who have a working knowledge of ACTp and want to develop more advanced, formulation-driven interventions.
By attending this workshop, participants will:
- Develop advanced ACTp formulation skills, learning how to tailor interventions to individual client needs
- Practice engagement strategies for working with individuals experiencing mistrust and paranoia
- Learn ACT techniques to support distressed voice hearers in shifting their relationship with voices
- Enhance values-based activation and exposure skills, helping clients take meaningful steps toward recovery
About this workshop
The workshop will be highly interactive and will include:
- Live demonstrations of ACT techniques tailored for complex psychosis presentations
- Experiential exercises to refine engagement and intervention skills
- Case discussions and session recordings to illustrate real-world applications
- Roleplays and guided practice to help participants integrate skills into their clinical work
This practical, hands-on approach ensures that participants leave with actionable skills they can immediately apply in their work.
Who will benefit from this workshop?
This intermediate level workshop is designed for ACT therapists, mental health practitioners, and supporters who have a foundational knowledge of ACTp and work with individuals recovering from psychosis.
It is ideal for:
- Psychologists, psychiatrists, and mental health nurses
- Social workers, therapists, and counsellors
- GPs, occupational therapists, and others (including peer workers) supporting individuals with complex mental health needs
Participants are expected to have prior knowledge of ACT and its adaptations for psychosis. This workshop builds on the foundations course and assumes familiarity with key ACT concepts such as psychological flexibility, acceptance, cognitive defusion, and values-based work.
At the end of this workshop, the learner will be able to:
- Formulate the challenges of psychosis within a psychological flexibility framework to guide promotion of personal recovery through ACT processes
- Utilise the ACTp therapeutic principles to support the agency and values based actions of people who experience distressing and impactful voices
- Adapt how ACT is offered to people struggling with mistrust and suspicious thinking
APA psychologists: This program is sponsored by Contextual Consulting and is approved for 3 CE credits for psychologists.
Nationally certified counselors: This workshop is available for 3 credit hours. Contextual Consulting Ltd. has been approved by NBCC as an Approved Continuing Education Provider, ACEP No. 7578.
To find out more, including attendance requirements and how to access your certificate, go to our continuing education information page.
If you have disability and require adjustments or accommodation, please email us at admin@contextualconsulting.co.uk to discuss your needs and we will do our best to help you.
Booking cancellation
The registration fee will be refunded minus a administration charge if cancellations are received at least two weeks before the workshop date.
Cancellations within two weeks of the event date are charged the full registration fee, other than in exceptional circumstances that can be verified.
Event cancellation
In the event of cancellation of the course outside of our control we will not be held accountable for travel and/or accommodation costs incurred. However, the workshop fees will be refunded.
All workshops will be subject to minimum delegate numbers being met; in the event that a workshop should be cancelled delegates will be given no less than 2 months’ notice.
Replacing delegates
If a delegate is unable to attend and a replacement is nominated there may be a charge depending on the individual circumstances, this will be advised at the time. Please contact the us to request a replacement of delegates at least a week before the workshop date.
Contextual Consulting is committed to the identification and resolution of potential conflicts of interest in the planning, promotion, delivery, and evaluation of continuing education. Potential conflicts of interest occur when an individual assumes a professional role in the planning, promotion, delivery, or evaluation of continuing education where personal, professional, legal, financial, or other interests could reasonably be expected to impair their objectivity, competence, or effectiveness.
There was no commercial support for this event. None of the planners or presenters for this educational activity have relevant financial relationship(s) to disclose with ineligible companies whose primary business is producing, marketing, selling, re-selling, or distributing healthcare products used by or on patients.
Morris, E. M., Johns, L. C., & Gaudiano, B. A. (2024). Acceptance and commitment therapy for psychosis: Current status, lingering questions and future directions. Psychology and Psychotherapy: Theory, Research and Practice, 97(1), 41-58. https://doi.org/10.1111/papt.12479