Listening in the treatment of psychological stress: an integrative review

Objective: to identify in Brazilian journals how listening has been defined within the mental health care. Methodology: this is an integrative review study carried out in the Scientific Electronic Library Online (SciELO) database, aiming to answer to the following questions: What is the concept of listening which grounds these papers? For what purpose is listening developed? How is listening performed? We obtained a sample of papers published in Portuguese, within the period from 2007 to 2011, which presented the term listening connected to mental health care. In the exploratory time, an exhaustive reading of the abstracts of 170 papers was performed. For data synthesis and analysis, an instrument comprising the following items was developed: paper identification, aims or investigation questions, journal excerpts, keywords, and thematic categories. Results: after successive readings, 37 papers were selected, which allowed the organization of the categories “listening as a means” and “listening as an end”, highlighting the excerpts on listening and identifying the keywords. Conclusion: there was a polysemy on listening both at the level of discourses and in the practices aimed at the patient undergoing psychological stress. One believes it’s necessary to promote a deeper reflection on listening as a therapeutic tool, so that there’s no risk of using it in an undefined way and with no purpose. Descriptors: mental health; stress, psychological; psychoanalysis. RESUMO Objetivo: identificar nos periódicos nacionais como a escuta tem sido definida no âmbito do cuidado em saúde mental. Metodologia: trata-se de estudo de revisão integrativa realizada na base de dados Scientific Electronic Library Online (SciELO), com a finalidade de responder as seguintes questões: Qual é o conceito de escuta que fundamenta esses artigos? Com que finalidade é desenvolvida a escuta? Como é realizada a escuta? Obteve-se a amostra dos artigos publicados em português, no período de 2007 a 2011, que apresentavam o termo escuta ...