My focus is on psychotherapy and psychotherapy training research. For years I have been working on measuring and training therapeutic relationship skills (Alliance Ruptures, Facilitative Interpersonal Skills), on mediators of change in psychotherapies and personal therapies, on the role of linguistic and paraverbal characteristics in psychotherapies.
Together with my research group, I work closely on these topics with scientific cooperation partners, training institutes and practitioners of all approved therapy approaches.
In our Practice Research Network, we offer accredited lecture series for colleagues, present ongoing projects, invite participation in our research.
Here are central topics:
Alliance ruptures
Alliance ruptures inevitably occur in any psychotherapy. When successfully resolved, they offer the opportunity for corrective emotional experience and therapeutic progress. However, we often fail to deal constructively with such challenges in everyday clinical practice.
Therapists’ competencies, interpersonal skills
Therapists vary in their effectiveness. They differ in terms of symptom improvement their patients achieve, in the likelihood of premature therapy terminations, or the basic ability to establish a good therapeutic relationship. What underlies this?
Mediators of change in psychotherapies and personal therapies.
An important concern of psychotherapy research is to understand more precisely the differential significance of factors contributing to change in psychotherapy. In cooperation with 14 training institutes, we are engaged in qualitative and quantitative studies on the question of how talking cures in psychotherapy.
Role of linguistic and paraverbal characteristics in psychotherapies
Language is our tool. Verbal techniques are a central medium in psychotherapies. Linguistic, paraverbal and relationship characteristics are closely intertwined. The linguistic surface reveals how interaction unfolds and how content, emotions and relationship change.