Therapeutic Dialogue, Insight and Reduction of Anxious-Depressive Symptoms in Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy

Therapeutic Dialogue and Insights Occurrence

Abstract

Abstract

The objective of the study was to examine the characteristics of the therapeutic dialogue generating changes in the consultant's ability to obtain insights and its relationship with anxious-depressive symptoms, during the first 16 sessions of open-ended psychoanalytic psychotherapy, once per week. The transcripts of the recorded sessions of three consultants were encoded using checklists; and, the occurrences of cognitive and emotional insights, changes in anxious-depressive symptomatology, and "significant events" (Greenberg, 1986) where emotional insights occurred, were then analyzed. There was a reduction in symptoms, correlations between increased cognitive insights and decreased symptoms, and a sequence of the change process in the consultant’s ability to generate emotional insights. As a conclusion, it is highlighted the intertwining of intrapsychic and relational processes, in a sequence of phases (synchrony-elaboration-resolution) of the therapeutic dialogue, promoting the consultant's ability to accumulate and deepen his self-understanding of conflict themes, which is related to symptomatic relief.

Key words: Insight, change process, significant events, symptoms