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Syndromal classification is a well-developed diagnostic system but has failed to deliver on its promise of the identification of functional pathological processes. Functional analysis is tightly connected to treatment but has failed to develop testable. replicable classification systems. Functional diagnostic dimensions are suggested as a way to develop the functional classification approach, and experiential avoidance is described as 1 such dimension. A wide range of research is reviewed showing that many forms of psychopathology can be conceptualized as unhealthy efforts to escape and avoid emotions, thoughts, memories, and other private experiences. It is argued that experiential avoidance, as a functional diagnostic dimension, has the potential to integrate the efforts and findings of researchers from a wide variety of theoretical paradigms, research interests, and clinical domains and to lead to testable new approaches to the analysis and treatment of behavioral disorders.

Republished in the special 50th Anniversary issue: Honoring the past and looking to the future: Updates on seminal behavior therapy publications on current therapies and future directions, Part II.

The present article summarizes the assumptions, model, techniques, evidence, and diversity/social justice commitments of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). ACT focused on six processes (acceptance, defusion, self, now, values, and action) that bear on a single overall target (psychological flexibility). The ACT model of behavior change has been shown to have positive outcomes across a broad range of applied problems and areas of growth. Process and outcome evidence suggest that the psychological flexibility model underlying ACT provides a unified model of behavior change and personal development that fits well with the core assumptions of counseling psychology. KeywordsAcceptance and Commitment Therapy, psychological flexibility, unified model Counseling psychology has had a historical commitment to a developmental and skills-based model that seeks the empowerment of individuals in a social