Mentalization Based Therapy (MBT) is an evidence-based psychotherapy which was developed by Dr. Anthony Bateman and Dr. Peter Fonagy from the Anna Freud Center (London UK). Mentalizing is the idea of keeping someone else’s mind in your mind. Successful mentalizing involves the understanding of what is going on in our own minds and the minds of other people along with realising how this may be affecting the emotions, thoughts and actions of both ourselves and those around us. However, when our mental health is affected this can lead to impairments in our abilities to mentalize, which can lead to misunderstandings of emotions, thoughts and actions which can negatively impact on social interactions and relationships. The goal of MBT therapy is to help individuals to increase their mentalizing capacity in the here and now.

MBT was originally developed as a treatment for Borderline Personality Disorder but has shown to be affective for a variety of disorders including interpersonal difficulties, depression and anxiety.