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Treatment principles for VVCS anger management programs

ACPMH, together with the VVCS - Veterans and Veterans Families Counselling Service, developed guidelines for group-based anger management interventions for veterans. The guidelines were developed by Glen Bates, Professor of Psychology, Swinburne University together with David Forbes (ACPMH) and Helga Erlanger (VVCS). The guidelines were based on best practice data drawn from the empirical literature and expert consensus. The consensus data was drawn from the advice of a panel of experts from a range of backgrounds, including leading academics in the area of anger and aggression, and mental health clinicians with expertise in family therapy, children and adolescents, veterans’ psychiatry and anger in veterans. The panel also included a representative with expertise in practice guideline development from the domestic violence filed.

The guidelines identify:

1. Key assessment criteria and measures
2. Criteria to guide the inclusion of partners (with reference to issues of domestic violence)
3. Outline of key content areas
4. Key issues for consideration in the evaluation of outcomes
5. Outline of program structure

A key challenge in the development of the guidelines included a bringing together the clinical research literature in addressing problematic anger and aggression and the literature and practice addressing domestic violence. To date there had been little literature that had sought to bring these two areas together in a coherent program.