Publication details
The structure and dynamics of client session reactions : An exploratory longitudinal network analysis
| Authors | |
|---|---|
| Year of publication | 2024 |
| Type | Article in Periodical |
| Magazine / Source | Journal of Psychotherapy Integration |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Web | https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Fint0000331 |
| Doi | http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/int0000331 |
| Keywords | session reactions; session impacts; client experience; longitudinal network analysis; psychotherapy |
| Attached files | |
| Description | This study aimed to explore the structure and dynamics of clients’ session reactions using longitudinal network modeling. Data from three samples were combined: two general outpatient samples of emotion-focused therapy and one sample of clients suffering from crime-related posttraumatic stress disorder. All clients were treated with emotion-focused therapy. One hundred and twenty-three clients answered the Revised Session Reactions Scale on a session-by-session basis. Data collected after Sessions 1–5 (Mdn = 5, M = 3.9, SD = 1.5 observations per client) were used to fit a Lag-1 dynamic latent variable model for panel data. The temporal, contemporaneous, and between-person networks were obtained and analyzed exploratively. Session reactions that played the most central role in the temporal prediction of other reactions included new discoveries related to the self and distancing from one’s thoughts, feelings, or memories. Both types of experience predicted, among others, the therapeutic relationship and a sense of relief. Feeling involved in therapy had a marginal role in the network. Longitudinal network modeling proved to be a promising approach to the exploration of clients’ session experience and, in a broader sense, to the analysis of psychotherapy process data. It yielded innovative and clinically meaningful findings about the interrelatedness of complex session-by-session processes. |
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