Kalda’s courses are built on three evidence-based therapy approaches: cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), and dialectical behaviour therapy (DBT). The choice of these three isn’t generic; it’s anchored in the clinical leadership of Dr Jake Camp, whose research and practice on DBT for queer lives shapes how our flagship courses are designed.
This post explains why we use these three, what each does best, and how Jake’s work specifically grounds the framework.
Why these three?
A few shared properties make CBT, ACT, and DBT particularly good fits for queer mental wellbeing work in a course format:
Strong evidence base. All three have decades of clinical research behind them. CBT has the longest track record; ACT and DBT have meta-analysis-level evidence across a range of conditions.
Adapt to structured format. The work is concrete enough to teach, practise, and revisit. You can build a course around it.
Complementary, not competing. CBT focuses on thoughts and behaviours; ACT on relationship to thoughts and on values-based action; DBT on emotion regulation and distress tolerance. Most people benefit from a mix.
Queer-adaptable, particularly DBT. This is where Jake’s work comes in.
Jake Camp’s role
Dr Jake Camp (he/they) is Kalda’s clinical lead. Jake is a queer and nonbinary clinical psychologist with an active programme of research on adapting DBT and other CBT-family approaches for LGBTQ+ populations. The research centres lived experience in clinical adaptation, asking what queer people actually need from these modalities rather than retrofitting existing protocols.
Two of Kalda’s flagship courses, Overcoming Anxiety and Overcoming Depression, are built directly around Jake’s research and clinical practice. They use DBT-informed work alongside CBT and ACT, adapted for queer lives from the ground up rather than as an afterthought.
Other Kalda courses draw on the same clinical lineage. The framework choices across the library are not generic evidence-base reasoning; they reflect what Jake and the clinical team know works for queer populations from direct research and practice.
What is CBT?
Cognitive behavioural therapy works on the premise that thoughts, feelings, and behaviours are connected: how you think about a situation shapes how you feel, which shapes how you act. Change one element and the others tend to shift.
What it’s good at. Anxiety, depression, panic, OCD, social anxiety, low self-esteem, perfectionism, persistent unhelpful thinking patterns.
Core techniques in Kalda courses.
- Identifying recurring unhelpful thoughts
- Examining the evidence for and against them
- Developing more accurate alternatives
- Behavioural experiments to test what’s actually true
- Behavioural activation (deliberately scheduling things that build energy)
Queer adaptation. A queer-affirming CBT therapist works with you to distinguish thoughts that are actually distorted (where CBT helps) from accurate appraisals of a hostile environment (where the answer isn’t to challenge the thought). See How long does CBT take to work?.
What is ACT?
Acceptance and commitment therapy adds something CBT doesn’t always do: working with your relationship to thoughts and feelings, not just their content. ACT teaches that struggle against painful internal experience often makes it worse, and that the work is to accept those experiences while still acting in line with your values.
What it’s good at. Chronic depression, anxiety with strong avoidance components, complex emotional reactions, anything where the struggle to feel less of something has become its own problem.
Core techniques in Kalda courses.
- Defusion (creating distance from thoughts so they don’t dictate behaviour)
- Acceptance of difficult feelings rather than fighting them
- Values clarification (what genuinely matters to you)
- Committed action (behaviour that aligns with values, even with difficult feelings present)
- Self-as-context (a stable sense of self that holds varying experience)
Queer adaptation. Particularly powerful for people working through internalised stigma, identity-related grief, or the long-term work of building a life around queer identity.
What is DBT?
Dialectical behaviour therapy was developed originally for borderline personality disorder but has since been shown effective for a wider range of conditions involving intense emotion. DBT teaches concrete skills in four areas: mindfulness, distress tolerance, emotion regulation, and interpersonal effectiveness.
This is where Jake’s research focus sits. Jake’s clinical and research work on DBT for queer lives directly shapes how DBT shows up in Kalda’s courses.
What it’s good at. Intense emotional dysregulation, chronic crisis patterns, eating disorders, trauma-related symptoms, relationships that involve high emotion or repeated conflict.
Core techniques in Kalda courses.
- Mindfulness foundations (observing experience without judgement)
- Distress tolerance skills (getting through crisis without making it worse)
- Emotion regulation (understanding and shifting emotional patterns)
- Interpersonal effectiveness (asking for what you need, holding boundaries)
Queer adaptation. Particularly well-suited to working with the heightened emotional load of minority stress, dysphoria-related distress, and identity-related interpersonal conflicts.
Why this combination?
Most queer mental wellbeing needs benefit from more than one approach. A few examples:
- Anxiety. CBT for the thought patterns; ACT for the relationship to anxious experience; DBT for the acute moments. Overcoming Anxiety integrates all three.
- Depression. CBT for unhelpful thinking and behavioural activation; ACT for values-based action when motivation is gone; DBT for moments of crisis. Overcoming Depression does the same.
- Identity exploration. ACT for values clarification and self-as-context work; CBT for internalised-stigma patterns; DBT for handling family or relationship strain.
- Dysphoria. All three contribute, depending on which aspect.
The aim isn’t to be pure to any one tradition. It’s to use what works for the specific work the course is doing, anchored in clinical leadership that knows the queer population.
What Kalda doesn’t do
Worth being explicit about the limits:
- Deep trauma processing (EMDR, somatic experiencing, sensorimotor psychotherapy), needs a therapeutic relationship, not a self-guided course. See a trauma-trained therapist.
- Psychodynamic exploration: doesn’t translate to course format. Long-term exploration with a therapist serves this better.
- Crisis intervention: Kalda is not a crisis service. See our safeguarding page.
- Diagnosis: see a GP or qualified mental health professional.
- Couples or family therapy: Kalda’s courses are individual.
We’re clear about this for the same reason we’re clear about everything else: a tool is most useful when you know what it’s for.
Where to next
- Browse the course library
- Meet the Kalda clinical team including Jake’s bio
- Behind the scenes: how Kalda courses are made
- How long does CBT take to work?
- Read more from Inside Kalda
CBT, ACT, and DBT, three approaches that, used together, cover most of the territory queer mental wellbeing work needs. Anchored in Jake Camp’s research and practice on DBT for queer lives. That’s the foundation.