4. common factors + therapeutic alliance

Question 1

what are common factors?

Answer 1

factors that characterize psychotherapy in general

Question 2

examples of common factors?

Answer 2

• therapeutic alliance
• empathy
• expectation for improvement
• therapist skills

Question 3

what’s the dodo bird verdict?

Answer 3

“everyone has won, they shall all have prizes”
don’t need to compare/contrast, all therapies are good

Question 4

according to jerome + julia frank, what’s the goal of the therapist? (4)

Answer 4

1. clarify sx + problems
2. inspire hope
3. encourage their success and mastery
4. stir patient’s emotions

Question 5

name the conclusions of jerome + julia frank

Answer 5

healing depends on the features shared by all schools of therapy – patient becomes “remoralized”

Question 6

what’s wampold’s contextual model?

3 elements

Answer 6

1. initial therapeutic relationship, “real” relationship
2. expectations
3. health promoting actions

Question 7

when do patients drop out the most of therapy? why?

Answer 7

after the 1st session, because of first impressions

Question 8

what are important elements of the therapeutic alliance?

Answer 8

• affective bond (mutual liking + respect)
• agreement on end goals (long + short, assuring realism)
• agreement on session tasks (not everone knows what therapy looks like, alignment on how sessions will be structured

Question 9

how is the therapeutic alliance measured?

Answer 9

working alliance inventory (WAI)

Question 10

statistics break!

the r: what’s a small, medium, and large correlation?

Answer 10

small: 0.1
medium: 0.3
large: 0.5

Question 11

stats break!

what’s the difference between cohen’s d and r?

Answer 11

cohen: comparison
r: not experimental

Question 12

how does one manipulate the therapeutic alliance?

Answer 12

…you can’t. it’d be very unethical lol

Question 13

what’s empathy?

Answer 13

process by which an individual can be affected by and share emotional state of another, adopting the position of others

Question 14

what are some related constructs of empathy?

Answer 14

positive regard/affirmation
congruence/genuineness

Question 15

what’s a limitation of rating empathy of therapists by clients?

Answer 15

they might correlate how well they’re doing to therapists’ empathy

Question 16

anderson et al studied therapist effects. what were the outcomes?

Answer 16

higher FIS therapists had clients with better outcomes
effect was present when therapy was shorter

Question 17

evidence favouring common factors over specific factors?

Answer 17

1. any therapy is better than no therapy
2. therapies don’t differ when pitted against each other
3. adherence to specific therapy techniques unrelated to outcome

Question 18

downside of common factors?

Answer 18

no controlled studies exist to demonstrate that common factors are causing therapeutic change

Question 19

common vs specific factors

according to mulder et all, what are the 3 things we need to do moving forward?

Answer 19

1. prioritize tx process over tx outcome
2. remember that evidence for efficacy doesn’t mean validity
3. train students in therapeutic principes of CBT