Sequential path of psychoanalytic interpretations

ROUSSOS, ANDRES; ETCHENBARNE, IGNACIO; WAIZMANN, VANINA

Edimburgo, Escocia

Congreso; 37th Annual Meeting of the Society for Psychotherapy Research. From Research to Practice; 2006

Society for Psychotherapy Research

Interpretations are the key intervention in psychoanalytic treatments, but represent only a minimum proportion of the interventions used in a treatment. The aim of this study was to analyze how the interpretations work together with the rest of the interventions used in a psychoanalytically oriented psychotherapy. 29 sessions from a two years audio-recorded treatment were transcribed, in order to analyze the sequence of interventions. A total of 3355 interventions were analyzed independently by trained judges using the classification of interventions developed by Roussos, Waizmann & Etchebarne (2003). The interventions were studied in their session context, taking into account both the patient and the therapist’s speech, but only categorizing the therapist’s utterances. Transition probabilities between the different types of interventions were estimated using a markovian model. In particular we focused in the interpretation, analyzing in detail the subsequent and previous intervention. Results suggest that is possible to detect patterns of interventions. Before interpretations, closed interrogations, signaling and advices prevailed. After interpretations, signaling and closed interrogations are still present, but asseverations and suggestions are added to the sequence. Also, it was possible to observe a sequential string of interpretations, when three or more interpretations were associated with a peculiar structure of interventions clustered inside the string. Explanations, metha-interventions and asseverations are the interventions included in the string.