Alliance, Negotiation, and Rupture Resolution

Abstract

(from the chapter) Psychotherapy research over the last several decades found the therapeutic alliance to be one of the most important elements of the therapeutic relationship. The therapeutic alliance has been consistently shown to be a robust predictor of positive outcome [4]. Building and maintaining good therapeutic alliance appears to be essential for the success of treatment. At the same time, ruptures in the alliance have been conceptualized as important change events and have become a subject of empirical investigation [5], This emphasis on the importance of repairing alliance ruptures was of course anticipated by Kohut [6] among others. The literature review that follows will discuss the existing body of literature on the therapeutic alliance, including the history of the concept, measurement of the alliance, empirical research on the relationship between the alliance and the outcome, the concept of the ruptures in the alliance, and the research on the ruptures and their resolution. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved).