Contribution of therapist experience and personal characteristics to the working alliance.

Abstract

The authors hypothesized that level of experience and selected personal characteristics of therapists would predict clients' perceptions of the working alliance early in treatment. Therapists (N = 73) in university settings completed measures that assessed level of self-directed hostility, perceived social supports, and degree of comfort with attachment, and their clients completed a measure that estimated the working alliance between the 3rd and 5th sessions of therapy. As predicted, level of self-directed hostility, perceived social support, and degree of comfort with closeness in interpersonal relationships were significantly predictive of the bond component of the working alliance. Contrary to predictions, experience level was not uniquely predictive of clients' alliance ratings on the goal and task components of the alliance.

Respective Contributions of Therapist and Client Adult Attachment Orientations to the Development of the Early Working Alliance: A Preliminary Growth Modeling Study

“…ment anxiety therapists endorsed, the more client ratings of the working alliance decreased over time. This finding is congruent with attachment theory (Bowlby, 1969(Bowlby, / 1982(Bowlby, , 1988, as well as with other clinical studies reporting that therapists' own attachment orientations influence the process of psychotherapy or the early working alliance (Dozier et al, 1994;Dunkle & Friedlander, 1996;Tyrrell et al, 1999). However, the current study extends this literature by moving beyond single-time-point assessments of the working alliance.…”

“…Dunkle and Friedlander (1996) reported that, early in treatment (between the 3rd and 5th sessions), therapists who reported comfort with intimacy were more likely to perceive more positive alliances with their clients. Elsewhere, Dozier, Cue, and Barnett (1994) found that clinical case managers' attachment style classifications were related to their clinical intervention strategies.…”

A thematic analysis of therapists' perspectives on therapeutic alliance rupture moments

“…Some therapists have been found to be more effective and better in alliance development than others (Lutz et al, 2007). Findings have pointed out that therapist experience alone is not significantly associated with the alliance (Dunkle & Friedlander, 1996;Kivlighan et al, 1998).…”

Exploring the role of therapy process and outcome in interventions that target adolescent identity and intimacy

“…In the literature there are conflicting findings on therapy outcomes and the relationship to therapist experience level with some studies (e.g., Burlingame et al, 1989;Church, 1993;Gold & Dole, 1989) finding that experience does influence outcome and some studies (e.g., Clementel-Jones, Malan, & Trauer, 1990;Dunkle, 1996;Propst, Paris, & Rosberger, 1994) concluding that it does not influence outcome. In addition to including more therapists, perhaps as suggested by Elliot & Wexler (1994) future studies could be done that focus on therapists who regularly receive high ratings and their characteristics in order to shed more light on this debate.…”