Bespoke Members
Introduction
On January 9, 2026 Dr. Emily Holmes delivered a 90-minute webinar on the science and practice of mental imagery within cognitive behaviour therapy.
Content
This workshop will explore the science and practice of imagery-based cognitive therapy. From a cognitive science perspective, mental imagery involves an experience like perception in the absence of a percept: seeing in our mind’s eye, etc. It recruits similar brain areas to actual perception, enhances memory and learning, and, compared to verbal processing, imagery has a more powerful impact on our emotions. Intrusive, affect-laden images cause distress across psychological disorders. Imagery-based intrusive memories and “flashbacks” to past trauma are the hallmark of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Imagery can also “flashforwards” to the future such as to suicidal acts, in anxiety, or manic pursuits.
In this workshop, we will consider the assessment of mental imagery. Imagery ‘micro-formulation” will be introduced, putting imagery in the center to help understand its impact on an individual. We will also introduce four techniques to work with troublesome imagery (1) meta-cognitive techniques, (2) imagery rescripting, (3) positive imagery and (4) imagery competing tasks. This workshop will introduce the imagery-competing task intervention (ICTI) - a newly evolved technique to reduce intrusive memories after trauma. ICTI involves at least 3 steps and we will describe a guided digital version. This may look like a strange intervention (with a game!), but CBT has a history of creative evolution.
Learning Objectives
By the end of this workshop, participants will learn to:
• Explore the nature of mental imagery from theoretical, experimental and clinical perspectives.
• Illustrate how to assess and ‘micro-formulate’ mental imagery transdiagnostically.
• Introduce four key treatment techniques for working clinically with mental images.
• Present a novel imagery-competing task intervention for intrusive memories after trauma.
Training Modalities
Didactic content, Q&A
Key References
Hackmann, A., Bennett-Levy, J. & Holmes, E. A. (2011). Oxford Guide to Imagery in Cognitive Therapy. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN: 978-0-19-923402-8.
Holmes, E. A., Hales, S.A., Young, K., Di Simplicio, M. (2019) Imagery-Based Cognitive Therapy for Bipolar Disorder and Mood Instability. New York: Guilford Press. ISBN 9781462539055.
Can download worksheets (freely) from here
Imagery: The Language of Emotion, Christine A. Padesky, Emily A. Holmes; within Padesky, Christine, and Helen Kennerley (eds), Dialogues for Discovery: Improving Psychotherapy's Effectiveness (Oxford, 2023; online edn, Oxford Academic, 14 Dec 2023).
https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780199586981.003.0005
Iyadurai, L., Highfield, J., Kanstrup, M., Markham, A., Ramineni, V., Guo, B., Jaki, T., Kingslake, J., Goodwin, G.M., Summers, C., Bonsall, M.B., & Holmes, E. A. 2023. Reducing intrusive memories after trauma via an imagery-competing task intervention in COVID-19 intensive care staff: a randomized controlled trial. Translational Psychiatry, 13(1), 290. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41398-023-02578-0
Ji, J. L., Burnett Heyes, S., MacLeod, C., & Holmes, E. A. (2016). Emotional mental imagery as simulation of reality: fear and beyond - a tribute to Peter Lang. Behavior Therapy, 47(5), 702-719. (Special 50th Anniversary Issue: Honoring the Past and Looking to the Future: Updates on Seminal Behavior Therapy Publications on Etiology and Mechanisms of Change).
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.beth.2015.11.004
For freely available papers and resources grouped by category please check our research website - https://emilyholmes.net/
About the presenter
Dr Emily Holmes holds a doctorate in clinical psychology from Royal Holloway University of London. She received a PhD in Cognitive Neuroscience at the University of Cambridge. She set up the Experimental Psychopathology & Cognitive Therapies Research Group at the University of Oxford where she became Professor in 2010. She is currently a Distinguished Professor of Psychology at Uppsala University in the Department of Women’s and Children’s Health.
Dr Holmes’ work as a clinical psychologist has fuelled her research questions. She is interested in psychological treatment innovation in mental health – both in creating new techniques and reaching more people. Under the wider umbrella of mental health science, her approach brings together psychology, neuroscience, psychiatry, maths, arts and more. Specializing in mental imagery - and finding it endlessly fascinating -her research has demonstrated that mental imagery has a more powerful impact on emotion than does words. Current research focuses on developing innovative interventions and preventive approaches for distressing intrusive (image-based) memories after psychological trauma. Dr. Holmes is a Fellow of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, and Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Arts (UK). She is on the Board of Trustees the MQ Foundation and passionate about supporting mental health science.
Who should attend
This event is suitable for mental health professionals - at all levels and working in any disorder area - who are curious about mental imagery.
Low Intensity clinical contact hours survey - BABCP Low Intensity Special Interest Group
Please click below if you are interested in contributing to the survey.
The BACP Low Intensity SIG are interested in the impact of clinical contact hours on Low Intensity/Wellbeing Practitioner wellbeing. This questionnaire contains six multi-choice questions and a free text box for you to share your experiences. The answers to these questions will help the BABCP SIG plan how to meet CPD topics and other developments within the SIG. The SIG hope to produce a write up of the answers to this questionnaire to be shared with SIG members and to be used in training.
This FREE conference is for Psychological Wellbeing Practitioners working in Talking Therapies for Anxiety and Depression services and is brought to you by Bespoke Mental Health in collaboration with the NHS National PWP Leads Network.