Co-construction of the therapeutic alliance in suicidal young women. Discourse analysis of the therapeutic dialogue: a case study

Abstract

This article explores the construction of the therapeutic alliance in young women who have experienced a suicide attempt through tha analysis of an episode taken from the psychotherapy treatment of a specific case. We are based on the conception of the therapeutic Alliance as a constant negotiation  between therapist and patient  and that can be appreciated en their therapeutic dialogue. Fort he analysis the selected methodology was discourse analysis based on the speech acts theory.; the used instrument was the David Liberman Algorythm .The results show the importance of linguistic complementarity in the construction of the Alliance and at the same time the speech acts that suggest it.  The article finishes with a series of conclusions to be taken into accout for the clinician wheh building Alliance in general and specifically with cases who have attempted suicide.