Background/Aim. Working alliance, as a collaborative part of the therapeutic
relationship has been proven to be one of the most powerful therapeutic
factors in psychotherapy in general, regardless many technical differences
between numerous psychotherapeutic modalities. On the other hand,
transference is the basic concept of psychodynamic psychotherapy, and,
according to the psychoanalytic theory and practice, it forms a major part of
the therapeutic relationship. The aim of our paper was to determine the
differences between the groups of patients with low, middle, and high working
alliance scores and the dropout group in transference patterns,
sociodemographic and clinical parameters, during the early phase of
psychodynamic psychotherapy. Methods. Our sample consisted of 61
non-psychotic patients, randomly selected by the method of consecutive
admissions and treated with psychoanalytic psychotherapy in the outpatient
clinical setting. The patients were prospectively followed during 5 initial
sessions of the therapeutic process. The working alliance inventory and Core
conflictual relationship theme method were used for the estimation of working
alliance and transference patterns, respectively. According to the Working
Alliance Inventory scores, four groups of patients were formed and than
compared. Results. Our results show a significant difference between the
groups of patients with low, middle, and high working alliance inventory
scores and the dropout group on the variable - transference patterns in the
therapeutic relationship. Conclusion. Disharmonious transference patterns are
more frequent in patients who form poor quality working alliance in the early
phase of psychotherapy, or early dropout psychotherapy. It is of great
importance to recognize transference patterns of a patient at the beginning
of the psychotherapeutic process, because of their potentially harmful
influence on the quality of working alliance.
Transference patterns and working alliance during the early phase of psychodynamic psychotherapy