Change during psychotherapy: the perspective of children and adolescents who have been sexually abused

Abstract

The aim of this research was to identify the meanings of psychotherapeutic change of children and adolescents who have suffered sexual abuse and were in psychotherapy. In order to do this, a qualitative study was carried out in which in-depth interviews complemented with drawings were conducted with 10 children and adolescents, aged between 6 and 16 years, who were taking part in psychotherapy due to sexual abuse. The interviews took place between 6 and 10 months after the start of the therapy and before it ended. Thematic narrative analysis was used for the interviews and visual narrative analysis for the drawings. The main findings showed that children and adolescents visualized psychotherapeutic change as a process in which gradual progress is made. The participants notice changes from an initial state of sadness and distress, mainly describing a positive shift in terms of emotional well-being. In addition, in this phase of the therapy only a few participants identified changes in their feelings regarding the abusive experience. The participants identified aspects of the therapy and supportive relationships with significant others as elements that foster these changes. In their view, hindering elements include changes of therapist, legal factors, and not being believed by their family. It is discussed the importance of knowing the children and adolescents' perspective regarding psychotherapeutic change while participating in therapy processes, using multiple methodologies, to generate interventions that suit the needs of this population and match the pace of children and adolescents' change.

Listening to the opinista? Relational understandings of voice and silence in a multiperspective narrative study of child psychotherapy

“…All participants were living in Santiago (Chilean capital). The study as a whole, reported elsewhere (see Capella et al, 2018), was focused on change over the psychotherapeutic process (normally 12-24 months). Qualitative interviews were conducted with children, their parents/caregivers, and their psychotherapists at different points of therapy (approximately 6 and 12 months from the start of therapy; if therapy continued for longer, an additional interview was conducted at the end of the process).…”

“…on the left and 'how are you now?' on the right (see Figure 1 and Capella et al, 2018). The drawing is used as a basis for open questioning, allowing the child to develop a freely structured narrative about their illustration, before more direct and focused questions are asked (Capella et al, 2015).…”

“…The drawing is used as a basis for open questioning, allowing the child to develop a freely structured narrative about their illustration, before more direct and focused questions are asked (Capella et al, 2015). Children were also shown a drawing of an 'emotional thermometer' (following Carlberg et al, 2009), which ranged from 0, very sad, to 10, very happy, and asked to report how they felt at various points in therapy (Capella et al, 2018). These methods aimed to afford possibilities for representing complex feelings that might be hard for children to express verbally.…”

La dimensión emocional de las teorías subjetivas

“…Corresponden a un tipo de creencia que se caracteriza por presentar una estructura argumentativa, permitiendo a las personas justificar sus acciones y orientar su comportamiento (Flick, 2018). La investigación de teorías subjetivas ha mostrado un aumento sostenido en diversas áreas de las ciencias sociales (ver e.g., Capella et al, 2018;Cuadra et al, 2017;Gómez & Haz, 2008;Koch et al, 2013;Krause et al, 2006). Esta línea de trabajo asume que una forma en la cual las personas comprenden, se representan, y se sitúan en el mundo, se basa en las explicaciones que elaboran sobre sí mismo y su entorno (Flick, 2018).…”

Cambio educativo: propuesta de un modelo de transformación de teorías subjetivas

“…Los estudios de TS han presentado avances importantes en la comprensión de la subjetividad en ámbitos como la psicoterapia (Capella, Gutiérrez, Rodríguez, & Gómez, 2018;Krause et al, 2006), los contextos sociales comunitarios (Gómez & Haz, 2008) y sobre todo en educación (Koch, Barkmann, Sundawati, & Bögeholz, 2013). Aun cuando su trayectoria puede ser considerada reciente, su desarrollo permite asignarle el estatus de programa de investigación (Groeben & Scheele, 2000;Kindermann & Riegel, 2016), en la medida que se observa una posición epistemológica constructivista (Catalán, 2010) o humanista (Groeben & Scheele, 2000), una propuesta metodológica para su estudio y un corpus de conocimiento en construcción (Catalán, 2016).…”