Interpersonal problems: self‐therapist agreement and therapist consensus

Abstract

This study investigated patient-therapist agreement and therapist consensus of patients' interpersonal problems. The sample comprised 199 patients, who answered a questionnaire addressing interpersonal problems. At the same time, each patient was rated by two therapists on an observer version of the same questionnaire. The participants came from 10 different treatment units within the Norwegian Network of Personality-Focused Treatment Programs. Interpersonal problems were measured by a short version of the Inventory of Interpersonal Problems-Circumplex (IIP-C). The results of both patient-therapist agreements and therapist consensus of patients' interpersonal problems was low to moderate. The therapists perceived the patients to have somewhat higher levels of interpersonal problems than the patients reported, although the profile similarity between self-reports and observer reports was high. Some gender differences were revealed, but in terms of self-therapist agreement, no interaction with the therapists' length of clinical experience or acquaintance with the patient was found.