New Study Examines In-Session Immediacy
January 11th, 2012
“Immediacy is the act of discussing in the here-and-now how the therapist is feeling about the patient, about himself/herself in relation to the patient, or about the patient-therapist relationship,” said A. Jill Clemence of the Department of Psychiatry at Albany Medical College. Immediacy has been shown to be a critical component of the therapeutic alliance and can have a significant impact on the client’s ability to process emotions. “Immediacy is also conceptualized as a potent technique for managing an alliance rupture, for moving beyond a patient’s defenses, and for providing emotional support,” said Clemence, lead author of a recent study highlighting the effects of in-session immediacy.
Previous research has shown that clients respond better when a therapist readily identifies a disturbance in the therapeutic relationship and addresses it in a positive way. However, few studies have looked at immediacy as it occurs. “Because the act of disclosing alone is insufficient for facilitating change, the ways that timing, tact, and competent delivery of immediacy interventions impact the patient’s ability to process affective material and deepen personal exploration requires further investigation,” Clemence said, explaining the motivation for her study. Using the Therapeutic Environment Scale (TES) and the Therapist-Patient Interaction Rating Scale (TPIRS), Clemence examined the effects of immediacy in a session between a therapist (Dr. V) and client (Alice) as it occurred.
“Immediacy, when used in an active and acknowledging way by Dr. V, was found to deepen Alice’s exploration of affective and interpersonal material,” Clemence said. The alliance was ruptured from the onset, and when Alice’s attempts at immediacy were ignored, it worsened. “However, when Dr. V actively engaged Alice using immediacy during a later segment of the interview, this appeared to move the pair out of rupture and into a more effective working alliance.” Clemence added, “The ability and willingness of the interviewer to engage the patient on an affective level in active discussion of the here and-now relationship may create the opportunity for building a positive alliance and furthering exploration of relationship themes in the moment.”
Reference:
Clemence, A. J., Fowler, J. C., Gottdiener, W. H., Krikorian, S., Charles, M., Damsky, L., & Johnson, B. (2011, December 19). Microprocess Examination of Therapeutic Immediacy During a Dynamic Research Interview. Psychotherapy: Theory, Research, Practice, Training. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1037/a0026090
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4 Comments | Click here to leave a comment.
Comments
How can immediacy be deemed as so important when for most of us it takes a break or a step back from any given situation to be able to get a clear view of what we are feeling and whether or judgements are accurate or not?
good immediacy is like an encouragement for the therapist.it will help the therapist counsel the client in a better way.and when the therapist speaks and acts in a better way we know that it is definitely going to help the client open up and be in a better position with regard to the issue on hand.there you have it! :)
the state pf mind of the therapist is mightily influential on how the client would perceive the therapy session if you ask me.its just like an interactive classroom.if the teacher is not comfortable and is not really connecting then the students will have no interest either!
If the therapist can be honest about the way that he or she is feeling about the client, then that is going to make it even easier for the client to be honest about how he is feeling too.
There has to be that willingness on both parties to develop a good working relationship with one another.
Without that then really they are both wasting one another’s time.
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