The Great Psychotherapy Debate 2.0

What is psychotherapy? Does it work? If so, how? Is it a diagnostic-specific treatment like an antibiotic, or is it more like an aspirin?
Nearly 70 years after Eysenck's claim that psychotherapy not only did not work but made people worse, the debate continues.
In this conversation, two of the world's leader researchers, Bruce Wampold and John Christopher Muran examine and debate the evidence. They agree on some issues and disagree on others. The discussion was organized and led by Helene Amundsen Nissen-Lie, practicing psychotherapist and professor in clinical psychology at University of Oslo (Norway).
What is clear is that a new way of understanding of the work psychotherapists do is desperately needed. Indeed, the future of the field depends on it.

[@margaritakozhevnikova2080]

Thank you very much for this debate.
I practice a dance form called Contact Improvisation where people use touch to explore movement, sometimes slow and meditative, sometimes dynamic and acrobatic. As the name implies it is both a relational and a spontaneous form of dance practice. In our circles we often have the debate whether we should just stay with the unknown, be guided by it and be curious as to what happens or whether we can practice physical, coordinational and co-attunment skills to be able to continue and enjoy our practice
In my experience both are skills. I sometimes have to both drill and get feedback in order to improve a movement skill or a the way I perceive, feel and connect with another. And then when a structured skill is improved, I let go into the unknown. In that sense, personally, I do not see a conflict between having a structure in place and then being flexible within the structure or in being taken beyond the structure. Or sometimes just choosing to be in the unknown free jam space when I dance, I stumble upon a structure.

[@kirstinstrand6292]

They should have interviewed you instead of the dolt they selected.

[@williamjames3995]

1:11:39 As a Bruce fanboy I am a bit triggered by Chris statements here. :) The decontextualized books he talks about is not what Bruce Wampold, Scott Miller, Daryl Chow and others intended with deliberate practice. Chris is thinking about the APA series by Rousmaniere and Vasz, which I have criticized for the same reason as Chris: They are like a cookbook and in that sense are similar to manuals which have not moved our field forward in years. For trainees they may be helpful to grasp a specific model and become more convincing. But for the average practitioner, DP needs to be highly individualized to sustain development over the lifespan.

[@fingerskateborads9769]

Well put!

[@dagonluke]

Totally agree with you.

[@ACDelRe]

Bruce!!