‘Interaction structures’ between depressed adolescents and their therapists in short-term psychoanalytic psychotherapy and cognitive behavioural therapy

Abstract

Objective:

Identify the core ‘interaction structures’ between therapists and depressed adolescents within and across two common forms of psychotherapy.

Method:

A total of 70 audio-recorded psychotherapy sessions representing short-term psychoanalytic psychotherapy (STPP) and cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) with youth aged 12–18 years old were coded with the Adolescent Psychotherapy Q-set (APQ), a newly developed instrument. Data included different therapist-patient dyads and stages in treatment and were analysed with cluster analysis.

Results:

Three distinct interaction structures between therapists and depressed adolescents: two influenced by the therapists’ techniques and one more influenced by the young people’s attitude to therapy.

Conclusion:

When there is a collaborative working relationship between therapists and depressed young people, the therapy process is influenced by the therapists’ techniques; while when there is a poor working relationship, the techniques used by therapists of different theoretical orientation become more similar with the aim of engaging the young person in the process.

Keywords

Adolescents youth psychotherapy process research Q-set psychoanalytic psychotherapy cognitive-behavioural therapy

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