Psychoanalysis and the Ideologies of Science

CBT Meets Process: Assimilative Integration with Reference to Group Psychotherapy

This paper offers a brief overview of the historically predominant form of psychotherapy research both for individual and group psychotherapies, the randomized control trial (RCT), and its surrounding controversies and critiques as the backdrop from which new directions in both clinical theory building and research are being pursued, including efforts at building integrative models of treatment. The paper explores one promising integrative model, namely the incorporation of process and dynamic orientations into the province of group cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and identifies challenges in implementing this model.

The Research-Practice Psychotherapy Wars: The Case of Group Psychotherapy in the Treatment of PTSD

In light of two recent meta-analyses of the efficacy of group psychotherapy in treating posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), this article critically reviews the randomized control trial (RCT) generated findings as well as two of its outgrowths-the production of a variety of clinical practice guidelines for treating PTSD and the dissemination efforts to transfer laboratory findings to clinical practice. All three of these activities have received considerable pushback from experienced clinicians and Boulder-identified scientist practitioners, creating an ongoing and entrenched gap or split between researcher and clinician. The article also reviews the various suggestions that have been offered to heal this gap and ending the hegemony of RCT outcome research as the only game in town for declaring what constitutes evidence. Specifically, the literature suggests two primary strategies for helping to realize the scientist-practitioner model and thus advancing the cause of psychotherapy, in general, and group psychotherapy, in particular: (a) leveling the playing field so that both researcher and practitioner have real authority and voices for shaping the field; and (b) shifting the research priority away from a purely outcome focus, asking only does it work, and moving to a more sophisticated, theoretically guided empirical study of process-outcome, examining the how, why, when, and for whom it works.

Beyond Clinical Case Studies in Psychoanalysis: A Review of Psychoanalytic Empirical Single Case Studies Published in ISI-Ranked Journals

Single case studies are at the origin of both theory development and research in the field of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy. While clinical case studies are the hallmark of psychoanalytic theory and practice, their scientific value has been strongly criticized. To address problems with the subjective bias of retrospective therapist reports and uncontrollability of clinical case studies, systematic approaches to investigate psychotherapy process and outcome at the level of the single case have been developed. Such empirical case studies are also able to bridge the famous gap between academic research and clinical practice as they provide clinically relevant insights into how psychotherapy works. This study presents a review of psychoanalytic empirical case studies published in ISI-ranked journals and maps the characteristics of the study, therapist, patient en therapies that are investigated. Empirical case studies increased in quantity and quality (amount of information and systematization) over time. While future studies could pay more attention to providing contextual information on therapist characteristics and informed consent considerations, the available literature provides a basis to conduct meta-studies of single cases and as such contribute to knowledge aggregation.