Psychotherapeuten und ihre psychischen Probleme: Forschungsstand zu einem Klischee

Leaving the stigma to the patients? Frequency of crisis experiences among mental health professionals in Berlin and Brandenburg and how they cope with it

BACKGROUND

Although mental health professionals' mental health problems are gaining increased attention, there is little systematic research on this topic.

AIMS

This study investigated the frequency of crisis experiences among mental health professionals and examined how they approach these experiences in terms of their personal and social identities.

METHODS

An online survey was conducted among mental health professionals in 18 psychiatric hospital departments in the German federal states of Berlin and Brandenburg (N = 215), containing questions about personal crisis experiences, help sought, service use, meaningfulness of lived experiences, causal beliefs of mental illness and psychotherapeutic orientation. Social identification was assessed via semantic differential scales derived from preliminary interview studies. To investigate relationships between the variables, explorative correlation analyses were calculated.

RESULTS

Results showed a high frequency rate of crisis experiences, substantial rates of suicidal ideation and incapacity to work and high service use. Most participants regarded their experiences as meaningful for their personal identity. Meaningfulness was positively related to a psychosocial causation model of mental illness, to psychodynamic psychotherapeutic orientation and to a high degree of disidentification with users and crisis experienced colleagues.

CONCLUSION

The (paradoxical) disintegration of personal and social identity of may be understood as a strategy to avoid stigmatization. A more challenging coping style among professionals is discussed.

Personality Styles of German-Speaking Psychotherapists Differ from a Norm, and Male Psychotherapists Differ from Their Female Colleagues

Variables pertaining to the person of the psychotherapist have been neglected in psychotherapy research for some time. Concerning personality in particular, however, research has mostly focused on its relation with the psychotherapist's choice of method, or differences between the various major therapy approaches. That is, psychotherapists were compared to each other without specifying how exactly psychotherapists are in comparison to "ordinary people." We wanted to know: Are there specific personality styles that distinguish psychotherapists from the norm? A sample of 1,027 psychotherapists from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland filled out the short version of the Personality Style and Disorder Inventory (PSDI-S) via online survey. The PSDI-S is a self-report questionnaire that assesses 14 personality styles, partly related to the non-pathological equivalents of classifiable personality disorders. The psychotherapists were compared to a normative sample of 3,392 people of different professions. The results could be divided into three groups: (1) Large differences in four personality styles that might contribute to relationship skills and may enable psychotherapists to put their own personal opinion aside, show empathy and appreciation, open themselves to the emotional experience of the patient, and provide a trusting relationship. (2) Moderate differences in seven personality styles that are equally indicative of the professional social skills of the psychotherapists, i.e., they were neither submissive nor passive, not excessively helpful, but also not too self-assertive. (3) Hardly any or no differences regarding a charming (histrionic) style, optimism, and conscientiousness. Gender-specific results revealed that male psychotherapists differed from their female colleagues, but they did so differently than men and women in the normative sample do. The main limitations were that we relied on self-report and did not statistically control for gender, age, and education, when comparing to the norm. As a conclusion, German-speaking psychotherapists show personality styles that we interpret as functional for psychotherapeutic practice but this needs corroboration from studies that use different methods and measures.

Sekundäre Traumatisierung bei Traumatherapeutinnen

Zusammenfassung. Theoretischer Hintergrund: Traumatherapeutinnen sind durch ihre Arbeit mit traumatisierten Patientinnen einem erhöhten Risiko sekundärer Traumatisierung (ST) ausgesetzt. Insbesondere wird hierbei die empathische Reaktion als möglicher Risikofaktor diskutiert. Fragestellung: Weder der Zusammenhang von Empathie und ST, noch mögliche schützende Copingfähigkeiten wurden jedoch eingehend untersucht. Insbesondere akkommodative Copingfähigkeiten (z. B. Umdeutung belastender Problemlagen), sollten das Risiko einer ST verringern. Methode: An einer Stichprobe von N = 312 Traumatherapeutinnen wird untersucht, ob die Empathiefähigkeit einen Risikofaktor für ST darstellt und akkommodative Copingfähigkeiten diesen Zusammenhang abmildern können. Ergebnisse: Es zeigt sich ein positiver Zusammenhang zwischen Empathiefähigkeit und ST, sowie eine moderierende Wirkung der Akkommodationsfähigkeit. Schlussfolgerungen: Empathiefähigkeit kann als Risikofaktor einer ST angesehen werden, dieser schädliche Zusammenhang kann jedoch durch Schutzfaktoren (akkommodative Copingfähigkeiten) abgemildert werden.