CENTER FOR ALLIANCE-FOCUSED TRAINING
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Relational principles
In addition to our own research program, Alliance Focused Training has been strongly influenced by both relational theory and research on interpersonal and affective communication. There are a number of foundational principles worth keeping in mind:
All Interventions as Relational Acts
While there are many interventions that can be helpful, one of the more important principles is the recognition that the therapeutic relationship and technique are interdependent. All interventions are relational acts. The meaning and impact of the therapist's intervention is always shaped by who both the patient and therapist are, what they are both experiencing in any given moment, and how they are perceiving themselves and each other. An important task for therapists is to continuously reflect on how patients are experiencing their interventions and how their own feelings in the moment may be coloring their interventions.
Psychotherapy as a Dyadic Systems Process
The therapist is not an objective observer of the patient or the psychotherapy process. Psychotherapy takes place in the context of an interpersonal field that the therapist is part of. Patients and therapists are always influencing one another at both conscious and implicit levels. There is an ongoing process of implicit mutual influence that takes place partly through nonverbal communication. Therapists are typically only partly aware of the roles they are playing in shaping this interpersonal field, and one of the critical tasks is for them to work towards developing a better understanding of how they are influencing this field over time.
Rupture and Repair as a Natural Developmental Process
Observational research of nonverbal communication between infant-caregiver dyads finds that there is a process of mutual influence that involves ongoing cycles of affective attunement and misattunement. Ongoing cycles of attunement-misattunement and interactive repairs, play an important role in helping infants to develop a relational schema in which the other is represented as emotionally available in the context of the inevitable ruptures that take place, and the self is represented as capable of negotiating relationship ruptures.
Therapeutic Alliance as an Intersubjective Negotiation
At an explicit level, therapists and clients are purposefully collaboratively on what the tasks and goals of treatment will be, how they will work together and to what end: This is fundamental to a working alliance At an implicit level, they are continuously negotiating their respective underlying needs or desires: These include the fundamental needs for agency and communion. The dialectical tension between these needs are at the heart of ruptures. Related to this is the dialectic whereby humans invariably objectify the other (an effort to exert control over ambiguity) before recognizing the unique subjectivity of the other.
All Interventions as Relational Acts
While there are many interventions that can be helpful, one of the more important principles is the recognition that the therapeutic relationship and technique are interdependent. All interventions are relational acts. The meaning and impact of the therapist's intervention is always shaped by who both the patient and therapist are, what they are both experiencing in any given moment, and how they are perceiving themselves and each other. An important task for therapists is to continuously reflect on how patients are experiencing their interventions and how their own feelings in the moment may be coloring their interventions.
Psychotherapy as a Dyadic Systems Process
The therapist is not an objective observer of the patient or the psychotherapy process. Psychotherapy takes place in the context of an interpersonal field that the therapist is part of. Patients and therapists are always influencing one another at both conscious and implicit levels. There is an ongoing process of implicit mutual influence that takes place partly through nonverbal communication. Therapists are typically only partly aware of the roles they are playing in shaping this interpersonal field, and one of the critical tasks is for them to work towards developing a better understanding of how they are influencing this field over time.
Rupture and Repair as a Natural Developmental Process
Observational research of nonverbal communication between infant-caregiver dyads finds that there is a process of mutual influence that involves ongoing cycles of affective attunement and misattunement. Ongoing cycles of attunement-misattunement and interactive repairs, play an important role in helping infants to develop a relational schema in which the other is represented as emotionally available in the context of the inevitable ruptures that take place, and the self is represented as capable of negotiating relationship ruptures.
Therapeutic Alliance as an Intersubjective Negotiation
At an explicit level, therapists and clients are purposefully collaboratively on what the tasks and goals of treatment will be, how they will work together and to what end: This is fundamental to a working alliance At an implicit level, they are continuously negotiating their respective underlying needs or desires: These include the fundamental needs for agency and communion. The dialectical tension between these needs are at the heart of ruptures. Related to this is the dialectic whereby humans invariably objectify the other (an effort to exert control over ambiguity) before recognizing the unique subjectivity of the other.
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