Enhancement of self compassion in psychotherapy: The role of therapists’ interventions

Abstract

Aim: Self Compassion (SC) has been consistently linked to decreased emotional distress and is offered as a mechanism of change in several therapeutic approaches. The current study aimed to identify therapists’ interventions that enhance clients’ SC within individual psychodynamic psychotherapy. We examined a diverse set of interventions as predictors of clients’ SC, on treatment and session levels. We hypothesized that improvement in SC will be associated with greater use of directive or common factor interventions. Method: Client/therapist (N = 89) dyads from a university-based community clinic participated in the study. Therapists’ interventions and changes in clients’ SC level were monitored at each psychotherapy session. Results: Clients’ SC in a given session was not predicted by therapist use of interventions from any of the three clusters in the previous session. However, positive change in SC across treatment was predicted by greater use of directive interventions. Furthermore, among clients with low pretreatment SC, a positive change in SC across treatment was predicted by lesser use of common factor interventions. Discussion: The results highlight the importance of understanding clients’ pretreatment characteristics when selecting therapeutic interventions and suggest that the integration of directive interventions into the psychodynamic therapeutic practice may be beneficial in enhancing clients’ SC.