Psychotherapy and Moral Inquiry

Abstract

Psychotherapy is necessarily an investigation into questions concerning individual intentions, purposes and the pursuit of the good life. Therapeutic inquiries centre on the motives-implicit and explicit-that underpin clients' actions. The motives examined may be formulated by the therapist in terms of theoretical or everyday vocabularies of motive. Investigations of such motives for their moral and practical adequacy will constitute an apprenticeship in therapy for the client, leading to the pursuit of those virtues proposed by the therapeutic approach in question. In order to foster the therapeutic ideals of autonomy and personal decision, some hermeneutic reflection on the status of motive interpretations in therapy is desired. Gadamer's philosophical hermeneutics offer a means of reflecting on therapeutic method, making the moral thrust of psychotherapy more explicit, and avoiding premature constructions of the subject.