In the current master thesis, the author is exploring a therapists’ perception of psychotherapy process through the lens of attachment. The theoretical part consists of precise description of ontogeny of the attachment theory from his beginner, John Bowlby. The author follows the history and etiology of the mentioned concept. The other part of the master thesis consists of presentation of the working alliance concept and its indication for therapeutic work. Author tries to get an overall understanding about the concept, its origins and current implications.
In the current master thesis, the author was interested in therapists’ perception of psychotherapy relationship through the attachment perspective. To enquire about it she divided the attachment process on three main stages – the preattachment stage, characterized by first contact and establishment of communication, second stage, namely attachment in the making stage, where the trust and therapy framework is already established and clients can see first changes, and last, third phase that is the attachment phase, where therapist and clients have high level of trust, good communication and good working alliance. Author interviewed eight therapists and analyzed the information from the interviews via phenomenological research.
Results have shown that the way therapists from the research see their relationships folds well with the current theory from the field. In the preattachment stage the therapist spoke about the way the relationship has yet to be built, the trust has yet to be gained and communication is still on shaky grounds. In the second, attachment in the making phase, therapists observe deeper trust, clients start seeing changes in their lives and in the last, attachment phase they describe the relationship as of one of strong attachment. With continuation of the relationship the relationship itself become more of an equal one and is, as such, slowly transcending into the conclusion phase.
The research work enabled the author to see the depth of the therapists’ experiencing of the relationships they make with their clients, she get to know the challenges of the therapeutic relationships and also the benefits of it. As a conclusion, the author exposes the lack of information available on research done of exploring the therapists’ perspective.
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