Exploring the relationship between therapists’ personal and professional characteristics and the events they report as significant in their clinical practice

Details

Supervisors

Zech, Emmanuelle ; de Condé, Hubert

Faculty

Faculté de psychologie, logopédie, sexologie et des sciences de la famille

Degree label

Master [120] en sciences psychologiques, à finalité spécialisée

Abstract

Context. Recent research has highlighted how therapists as persons have a considerable impact on therapy outcome. It is highly relevant to better understand the events that influence therapists’ way of being. The current dissertation is part of a larger ongoing research project at the Université Catholique de Louvain-la-Neuve focussing on this personal and professional development of therapists. A circular model of the reflexive therapist has been developed by de Condé, Zech, and Willemsen (in prep.). Current study: The abovementioned model was presented, and two variables were explored: therapists’ personal and professional characteristics (TC) and therapists’ significant events (SE). Methodology: 230 participants answered an online questionnaire collecting their TC and SE. Participants were asked to describe an event that they believed had an impact on their current practice through open-ended question. Level of endorsement towards different therapeutic approaches (TA) was measured through Likert scales. Qualitative analysis: Eleven themes emerged from the analyses of the open-ended question: academic life, extracurricular trainings, internships, personal therapy, supervision, spirituality, patients, romantic life, family, health, and death. We observed that psychology university curriculum should improve in order to include more practice and a larger spectrum of theoretical approaches. In addition, we found reflexivity can take other forms than personal therapy or supervision sessions such as, for instance, spirituality. Moreover, we suggest that the integrated and compartmentalised view of the Self can co-exist. Finally, we highlight how feelings of self-doubt can impact young therapists and put forward a few solutions to this matter. Quantitative analysis: MANOVA revealed that people who share private SE score higher on the psychoanalytical and humanistic endorsement scale than those who report professional SE, which could suggest a more integrated Self and high levels of reflexivity. Discussion: we considered the marginalisation of psychoanalytical approaches and reflect on future research.