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CBT Radio


Mar 11, 2010

This podcast episode is relevant to both consumers and professionals.

In this episode, R. Trent Codd, III, Ed.S., LPC, LCAS interviews Robert J. Meyers, PhD about Community Reinforcement and Family Training (CRAFT). Topics discussed include:

  • What Community Reinforcement and Family Training (CRAFT) is 
  • What a concerned significant other (CSO) can do to get their loved one into substance abuse treatment 
  • Whether a substance abuser has to “hit bottom” before they can be persuaded into treatment 
  • The research base for CRAFT 
  • How CRAFT impacts the emotional well-being of concerned significant others 
  • How the CRAFT approach differs from other approaches such as the Johnson Intervention approach 
  • How CRAFT impacts domestic violence 
  • And more! 

ROBERT J. MEYERS BIOGRAPHY

Dr. Meyers has been in the addiction field for 37 years with 23 of those years being at the University of New Mexico.  He is currently the director of Robert J. Meyers, Ph.D. & Associates and a Research Associate Professor Emeritus in Psychology at the University of New Mexico's Center on Alcoholism, Substance Abuse and Addiction.  He has been involved in over a dozen clinical trials funded by the National Institutes of Health, including Project Match and the Clinical Trials Network.

Dr. Meyers began his work with the Community Reinforcement Approach (CRA) in 1976.  At that time he helped develop the first CRA outpatient procedures, which were used in the seminal study published by Dr. Nathan Azrin and colleagues in 1982.  In the late 1990's Dr. Meyers helped design and evaluate the adolescent version of CRA (A-CRA).  Dr. Meyers also developed the new innovative "intervention" program used to engage resistant substance abusers to enter treatment.  This new intervention called Community Reinforcement and Family Training (CRAFT), an evidence-based protocol, has been shown to be superior to more traditional interventions in several randomized clinical trials.  His CRAFT work has led Dr. Meyers and CRAFT to be one of the 14 featured segments of the Emmy Award-winning HBO Addiction series. Dr. Meyers has also been featured in Oprah magazine for his outstanding work using the Community Reinforcement Approach.

Dr. Meyers is an internationally known speaker and trainer who has delivered trainings throughout the USA and in 12 countries around the world. Dr. Meyers has trained therapist from 6 of the worlds 7 continents.  He has published over 100 scientific articles or chapters and co-authored 5 books and one manual on addiction treatment, including "Get Your Loved One Sober: Alternatives to Nagging, Pleading and Threatening" and "Motivating Substance Abusers to Enter Treatment: Working with Family Members". Several of his books are also available in Dutch, Finnish, German and Korean.  The book "Get Your Loved One Sober: Alternatives to Nagging, Pleading and Threatening" is currently being published in Dutch, Japanese and Spanish.