Establishing a Therapeutic Alliance

Research has shown that a strong therapeutic alliance is necessary for establishing a beneficial contact between the therapist and the client. If the therapist does not encourage the creation of a reliable therapeutic alliance from the beginning of the treatment, it will be hard to develop a constructive relationship with the client later. Establishing the therapeutic alliance will increase the chances of achieving the goal of the treatment because the clients will be willing to cooperate if they trust and respect the therapist. Clients are not likely to cooperate with therapists who impose their authority aggressively. Instead of imposing their authority on the patient, therapists should develop work with their patients by building a mutual relationship based on trust, understanding, and respect for the client.

According to Jeremy Safran and Christopher Muran (2000), psychiatric research shows that the quality of the therapeutic alliance is the most important factor in determining the therapist's success. “Some therapists are consistently more helpful than others; differences in therapist ability seem to be more important than therapeutic modality, and the more helpful therapists appear better able to facilitate the development of a therapeutic alliance” (Safran & Muran, 2000). However, the main problem is that it is difficult to teach the skills necessary for the creation of a therapeutic alliance. In fact, psychotherapy research stresses the importance of the development of human qualities in the therapist. According to Safran and Muran (2000), the therapist need to constantly develop themselves and become involved in personal growth through inner work. Without this feature, the therapists will not be able to devel...

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...ate with their therapists. “A systematic relationship between the therapists' personal reactions to the patient and the quality of their communication, diagnostic impressions, and treatment plans” (Horvath & Greenberg, ). While positive attitudes from the therapists are more likely to result in a successful treatment, negative attitudes will not develop the necessary cooperation from the clients side to successfully reach the goal of the therapy.

Regardless of the treatment method, the findings of scientific research stress the importance of a relationship-based treatment which operates on trust and openness. All researchers claim that developing a strong therapeutic alliance in the beginning influences the course of the treatment and its success. The early development of this kind of relationship with the patients will improve the therapists' chances of success.