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The Therapeutic Relationship: Inexperienced Therapists' Affective Preference and Empathic Communication

Veterans Administration Medical Center, Indianapolis, Indiana, USA

Joseph F. Rychlak

Loyola University of Chicago, USA

The subjects of this study are third-year male medical students who rated videotaped male psychiatric patients for likeability before role-playing a `therapeutic' contact with them. Both liked and disliked patients were confronted in the role-play. Each patient said something positive and something negative about himself. The subjects, who are not trained psychotherapists, were instructed to reply to these self-characterizations in a therapeutic manner. Their replies were blindly rated for empathic quality. It was predicted and substantiated (p < 0.02) that subjects would be more empathic in replying to positive than negative self-characterizations of a liked patient, and vice versa for a disliked patient. A restricted range on the empathy ratings qualified these results. Subjects also attributed higher prognostic expectations and more favourable interpersonal skills to their liked than to their disliked patients (p < 0.01).

Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, Vol. 3, No. 3, 267-274 (1986)
DOI: 10.1177/0265407586033001


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