Reliability of Therapist Effects in Practice-Based Psychotherapy Research: A Guide for the Planning of Future Studies

Abstract

Sample size tables, including varying sample size conditions, were constructed and study examples given. This study gives an insight into the potential size of the TE and provides researchers with a practical guide to aid the planning of future studies in this field.

Associations between therapists' occupational burnout and their patients' depression and anxiety treatment outcomes

“…Therapists who treated less than 20 cases within 1 year after completing the survey were excluded (N = 7; 12.5%), in line with minimum sample size recommendations for multilevel modeling (MLM) (Schiefele et al, 2017). Patients who attended only one session (N = 726) or did not provide pre-and post-therapy outcome measures (N = 402) were excluded.…”

Client and therapist match on gender, age, and income: Does match within the therapeutic dyad predict early growth in the therapeutic alliance?

“…Because therapist effects on the therapeutic alliance have been reported to be significant in the literature (Baldwin & Imel, ; Baldwin, Wampold, & Imel, ; Del Re, Flückiger, Horvath, Symonds, & Wampold, ), we first conducted an examination of the magnitude of between‐therapist variability on the trajectories of the therapeutic alliance. Also, since initial patient severity has been found to contribute to the magnitude of therapist effects (Saxon & Barkham, ; Schiefele et al., ), we included baseline symptom severity in our multilevel models to estimate therapist effects. A three‐level growth curve model analysis was estimated where clients represent the within‐subject variation part of the model and therapists represent the clustering affect (Muthen & Satorra, ).…”

“…These large effects are in line with research showing that therapist effects on the alliance may be even larger than effects on outcomes (Dinger, Strack, Leichsenring, Wilmers, & Schauenburg, ). Our study may be adequately powered to detect large therapist effects on alliance (Schiefele et al., ) when using the aggregated sample. However, our main design scheme requires a further subdivision of therapist–client match levels which is in all likelihood not adequately powered for a systematic estimation of therapist effects at all levels of therapist–client match.…”

“…Also, since initial patient severity has been found to contribute to the magnitude of therapist effects (Saxon & Barkham, 2012;Schiefele et al, 2016), we included baseline symptom severity in our multilevel models to estimate therapist effects. A three-level growth curve model analysis was estimated where clients represent the within-subject variation part of the model and therapists represent the clustering affect (Muthen & Satorra, 1995).…”

What Is Individually Tailored Mental Health Care?

“…En adición, los terapeutas obtienen información sobre casos similares que han sido tratados exitosamente. Esto permite a los estudiantes contactar a los terapeutas de estos pacientes para la supervisión de pares (Schiefele et al, 2017;Zimmermann, Rubel, Page, & Lutz, 2017;Lutz et al, 2018).…”