Collisions and collusions with new norms: Renegotiating time and space in a pre-pandemic digital era.

Abstract

As interpersonal boundaries have grown more flexible in a culture dominated by digital technology, traditional psychotherapeutic boundaries of time and space have become harder to maintain. In-depth interviews with 28 psychotherapists led to the emergence of a grounded theory to describe the challenges and changes that therapists have made to therapeutic boundaries and the frame of treatment: Collisions and collusions with new norms: Renegotiating time and space in a pre-pandemic digital era. It is argued that therapists are faced with somewhat unprecedented challenges to incorporate new norms into their clinical practices, including expectations of increased availability and access to people on-the-go; increased contact through text or email; and fewer boundaries between work and leisure/personal time. Meanwhile, there is little training or supervision to help therapists think through the implications of their actions on clinical encounters. Implications for the field and for training of future clinicians are discussed.

Online psychotherapy as a first clinical experience during the Covid-19 pandemic: A new generation of psychotherapists in the digital age

“…A generation that has grown up with the technical know-how and digital networks of the modern world, knowing the potential in clinical work, cannot be denied further exposure to online therapy [ 8 , 33 ]. The media age has already begun for psychotherapy [ 65 , 71 , 72 , 75 , 76 ]. For psychotherapists in training at the start of their career, in particular, this was not an upheaval but normality from the start, and they are now transferring it into their further practice.…”

The phone in the room: How technology is reshaping analytic space.

“…Among countless other dynamics, it lives in a world of blurred distinctions between public and private that has fundamentally altered the nature of intimacy and connection, and shifted our expectations as we tend toward immediate action, often at the cost of reflective, thoughtful communication (Balick, 2018; Trub & Magaldi, 2019; Turkle, 2016). These dynamics have been mirrored in changes to the psychoanalytic frame, which has become more porous, flexible, and difficult to maintain as separate from the outside world (Corbella, 2020; Gabbard, 2013; Trub et al, 2021).…”

“…This study presents one aspect of a large grounded-theory investigation of technology and psychotherapy that asked therapists to explore questions of how technology impacts psychotherapy (Magaldi & Trub, 2020; Trub et al, 2021; Trub & Magaldi, 2021). Findings from the qualitative investigation produced an enormous data set that was too unwieldy to introduce to the field in one comprehensive article.…”

The therapist's evolving public self in a digitally disrupted marketplace.

“…Findings produced a huge amount of data that was too unwieldy to introduce to the field in a single manuscript. In order to make a useful contribution based on the findings, multiple manuscripts were developed in the areas of online searching, the interaction between digital norms and therapeutic ones, and the impact of digital technology on the clinical process (see Trub & Magaldi, 2021, 2022; Trub et al, 2022).…”