RESEARCH ARTICLE
The Importance of Reflection: An Exploratory Analysis on How Prospective Psychotherapists Learn Self-Determination
Bo Nurmi1, 2, Clive S. Michelsen3, Torsten Norlander2, 3 , *
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2019Volume: 12
First Page: 197
Last Page: 204
Publisher ID: TOPSYJ-12-197
DOI: 10.2174/1874350101912010197
Article History:
Received Date: 24/03/2019Revision Received Date: 22/06/2019
Acceptance Date: 20/08/2019
Electronic publication date: 30/09/2019
Collection year: 2019
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Background:
Learning to become a psychotherapist is a complicated process. Research on this topic has been limited and there is little consensus on how to assess therapeutic skills. SP/SR (Self-Reflection/Self-Practice) has emerged as a theory and method for learning psychotherapy. In this article students' reflections on how to become a psychotherapist has been studied from a phenomenological perspective.
Objective:
The aim of the present exploratory study was to generate preliminary hypotheses for future investigations in order to elucidate the complicated processes that occur during the therapist training programs.
Methods:
Five prospective psychotherapists were recruited to the present investigation, who all studied at the penultimate semester at Evidens University College, Gothenburg, Sweden. Unstructured qualitative in-depth interviews were used followed by phenomenological analysis.
Results:
Analysis yielded 252 meaning units and 12 categories which in turn led to four overarching themes: Learning as a visit to the dentist (when learning becomes painful because certain issues are not resolved); Learning as theatre (when the students just perform what is expected in order to pass); Learning as post-training soreness (when the learning process is challenging on a relevant level); Learning as reflections (when the students seek the intrinsic meaning).
Conclusion:
The study provided a basis for preliminary hypotheses for future investigations: reflections are helpful for managing the challenges described in the four themes. This, in turn, led to the formulation of some proposals for research questions for future investigations.