Treatment response in couple therapy: Relationship adjustment and individual functioning change processes.

Summary & key facts

Researchers followed 125 heterosexual couples through the first eight sessions of a real-world couple therapy model. Couples filled out short questionnaires before each session about how their relationship was going and how they were doing personally. Most of the improvement happened in the first four sessions and then scores stayed about the same across sessions five to eight. Women started with lower relationship adjustment than men. For men only, feeling better about the relationship was linked to later improvements in their personal functioning. The study shows that relationship change and personal change can move together, but the link may work differently for men and women.

Key facts:

• The study followed 125 heterosexual couples and collected ratings before each of the first eight therapy sessions.
• Both partners showed most of their improvement during sessions 1 through 4, with scores largely stabilizing during sessions 5 through 8.
• At the start of therapy, women reported lower relationship adjustment than men.
• There were no gender differences in initial levels of individual functioning or in how individual functioning changed over the eight sessions.
• For men, higher relationship adjustment at one session was associated with better individual functioning at a later session.
• For women, researchers did not find that relationship improvement predicted later changes in individual functioning.
• Researchers did not find that changes in individual functioning predicted later changes in relationship adjustment for either men or women.

Abstract

This study, a naturalistic investigation of the process of change in relationship adjustment and individual functioning during conjoint therapy, examined the first 8 sessions of a multisystemic model of couple therapy, integrative problem-centered metaframeworks (Breunlin, Pinsof, Russell, & Lebow, 2011; Pinsof, Breunlin, Russell, & Lebow, 2011). The sample consisted of 125 heterosexual couples who reported on their relationship adjustment and individual functioning before every session using the Systemic Therapy Inventory of Change (Pinsof et al., 2009; Pinsof, Zinbarg, et al., in press). Data were analyzed using dyadic latent growth curve and cross-lagged models. For both men and women, relationship adjustment and individual functioning showed nonlinear change, increasing during Sessions 1-4 and stabilizing during Sessions 5-8. At pretreatment, women reported lower levels of relationship adjustment than men; no gender differences existed in initial levels of individual functioning or in the change trajectories of relationship adjustment or individual functioning. Higher relationship adjustment predicted positive change in individual functioning for men (but not for women). In contrast, there were no cross-lagged effects of individual functioning on relationship adjustment for men or women. The results demonstrate the importance of examining the processes by which relational and individual pathology respond to couple-based interventions.

Topics

Attachment and Relationship Dynamics Counseling, Therapy, and Family Dynamics Psychotherapy Techniques and Applications

Categories

Psychology Social Psychology Social Sciences

Tags

Clinical psychology Developmental psychology Latent growth modeling Psychiatry Psychological intervention Psychology Psychotherapist

Conditions & symptoms

Feeling disconnected from others