Tracking our Tears: Research on Therapist Crying in Therapy

Blume-Marcovici, Amy; Stolberg, Ronald A.; Khademi, Mojgan; Mackie, Anthony; Lam, Catelijne ‘t

doi:10.4324/9781315673059-3

Cited by 5 publications

(16 citation statements)

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“…All the items of this measure derive from the Adult Crying Inventory (ACI; Vingerhoets, 2001), a measure of crying behavior in daily life both in general and related to the most recent episode, and from the Therapist Crying in Therapy Survey (T-CIT; Blume-Marcovici, 2012), a measure of therapist’ crying behavior in treatment. More specifically, the questions of the second and the third sections are identical to those of ACI or T-CIT, except for the fact that, in the third section, the author simply added the words “ in therapy ” for specifically exploring patient crying behavior in a clinical setting as opposed to questions worded for nonclinical experiences (ACI) or from the therapist perspective (T-CIT).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The ACI (Vingerhoets, 2001) was found to be valid and reliable in previous studies (Peter, Vingerhoets, & Van Heck, 2001; Rottenberg, Cevaal, & Vingerhoets, 2008; Scheirs & Sijtsma, 2001), and it has been used widely in crying research (Laan, van Assen, & Vingerhoets, 2012; Millings, Hepper, Hart, Swift, & Rowe, 2016; Peter et al, 2001; Rottenberg et al, 2008; Van Tilburg, Unterberg, & Vingerhoets, 2002; Zingaretti et al, 2017). Similarly, the T-CIT has shown good psychometric properties (Blume-Marcovici, 2012), and it has been used by previous studies (Blume-Marcovici, Stolberg, & Khademi, 2013; Blume-Marcovici, Stolberg, Khademi, & Giromini, 2015). Therefore, all previous work on ACI as well as on T-CIT psychometric properties (Blume-Marcovici, 2012; Peter et al, 2001; Rottenberg et al, 2008; Scheirs & Sijtsma, 2001) are consistent with this measure.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Similarly, the T-CIT has shown good psychometric properties (Blume-Marcovici, 2012), and it has been used by previous studies (Blume-Marcovici, Stolberg, & Khademi, 2013; Blume-Marcovici, Stolberg, Khademi, & Giromini, 2015). Therefore, all previous work on ACI as well as on T-CIT psychometric properties (Blume-Marcovici, 2012; Peter et al, 2001; Rottenberg et al, 2008; Scheirs & Sijtsma, 2001) are consistent with this measure. In addition, this same version was previously used in a recent research study on patients’ crying experience by Zingaretti et al (2017) showing good reliability and validity.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Patients’ crying experiences in psychotherapy and relationship with working alliance, therapeutic change and attachment styles.

Genova¹,

Zingaretti²,

Gazzillo³

et al. 2021

Psychotherapy

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Crying may be a beneficial experience and reflect a patients' involvement in the therapeutic work, as well as a potential indicator of the healing process. This study explored the relationships between patients' crying experience in therapy, their perception of working alliance and therapeutic change, as well as considering the role of attachment styles. One hundred six patients completed a survey about crying in psychotherapy and self-report measures for assessing working alliance, therapeutic change, and attachment styles. Concerning general crying experiences, results showed that when patients' crying (even if painful) was followed by more positive or less negative emotions (i.e., a sense of relief), they perceived the working alliance more positively and therapeutic change as enhanced. Similarly, regarding their most recent crying episode, patients' feeling of crying as a positive (albeit often painful) experience was related with a better perception of working alliance and therapeutic change. In relation to variance explained by patient attachment style, our results are quite limited and secondary to the findings on crying-related experiences, working alliance and therapeutic change. However, when attachment style did contribute significantly to a regression model, results indicated that for patients with high dismissing attachment concerns, crying in a context of a good working alliance may represent both a useful process for reducing negative emotions and an indicator of good therapeutic outcome. Clinical and empirical implications are discussed in terms of the relevance of the therapeutic crying experience on the quality of working alliance and therapeutic change. Clinical Impact StatementQuestion: This article aims to investigate how and whether there is impact of patients' crying on their mood as well as on their internal experience according to the quality of working alliance, therapeutic change, and the patients' attachment style. Findings: Patients' experiences after crying were significantly related to both the quality of working alliance and the degree of therapeutic change. Meaning: There is clinical and empirical relevance to exploring patients' experience of crying in therapy with regard to therapeutic process and outcome. Next Steps: Future investigations should attempt to replicate these findings on additional, larger, and more diverse samples.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Patients’ crying experiences in psychotherapy and relationship with working alliance, therapeutic change and attachment styles.

Genova¹,

Zingaretti²,

Gazzillo³

et al. 2021

Psychotherapy

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show abstract

“…Interestingly, the patients’ responses to therapist tears are much more likely to be perceived as positive when these tears are discussed although only 39% of therapists report discussing their tears with patients (Blume-Marcovici et al, 2015; Blume-Marcovici et al, 2017). In a qualitative study with doctoral student therapists-in-training, Knox et al (2017) reported that, in retrospect, therapists often wished they had discussed their tears more with their patients when they did occur.…”

Section: Tears In the Clinical Settingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Not surprisingly, crying is commonplace in the context of psychotherapy. Based on primarily self-report research (Benecke, 2009; Blume-Marcovici, Stolberg, Khademi, Mackie, & ’t Lam, 2017; Robinson, Hill, & Kivlighan, Jr, 2015; Trezza, Hastrup, & Kim, 1988; Zingaretti, Genova, Gazzillo, & Lingiardi, 2017), it is estimated that crying occurs at least once in ∼15%–30% of therapeutic sessions. This high prevalence is not surprising, as this unique and universal human emotional expression occurs relatively frequently across a wide variety of emotional situations, including loss, interpersonal conflict, and personal failure, which are all situations typically addressed in a therapeutic setting.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

A clinical practice review of crying research.

2021

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The goal of this clinical practice review is to assess the current state of the theoretical and empirical literature on emotional crying (i.e., crying in response to an emotional stimulus), a topic that has received surprisingly limited attention of behavioral scientists and clinicians. Although the empirical research on emotional crying remains in a nascent state, we draw upon the existing scientific knowledge to provide preliminary suggestions for clinicians on how to interpret and respond to crying in clinical contexts. We also identify research gaps and provide recommendations for further research to improve our understanding of this intriguing and still poorly understood human behavior. We suggest that a better understanding of individual differences in crying behavior and the postulated intraindividual and interindividual functions of crying is of critical importance for clinicians, given its frequent occurrence and notable associations with emotional and social functioning. An improved characterization of this important phenomenon will lead to improvements in clinical assessment, treatment planning, and psychotherapy interventions.

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Crying in psychotherapy among Israeli patients and its relation to the working alliance, therapeutic change and attachment style

Katz

Ziv-Beiman

Rokah

et al. 2021

Couns and Psychother Res

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Patients' crying in psychotherapy can, at times, be an indicator of a healing process and reflect patients' engagement. This study explored the relationships between Israeli patients' crying in therapy, the working alliance, therapeutic change and attachment styles, using similar procedures to the ones used by Genova et al. (2020; Psychotherapy, 58, 160) in a recent investigation of Italian patients. One hundred and thirteen patients completed an online survey in Hebrew about crying in therapy and self-report measures assessing the working alliance, therapeutic change and attachment styles. Our findings revealed that self-reported working alliance was related to the patients' perceptions of their therapist responding to their most recent crying episode with support and compassion. Therapeutic change was associated with a tendency to cry in therapy and higher instances of crying in therapy during the last year. Patients with anxious-preoccupied attachment styles had more faith that crying would lead to being understood by their therapist. Dismissive-avoidant attachment style was related to higher likelihood of feeling like the most recent crying episode helped the patient understand things that they did not understand before and feel like their tears expressed things that words could not. Further, fearful-avoidant, anxious-preoccupied and dismissive-avoidant attachment styles were all related to stronger faith in the therapy relationship strengthening after crying. These findings are in line with, and expand on, Genova et al.'s (2020; Psychotherapy, 58, 160) findings regarding the therapy alliance, crying in therapy and attachment styles. Implications for the relationships between patient attachment style, therapy alliance, therapeutic change and crying in therapy are discussed.

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Tracking our Tears: Research on Therapist Crying in Therapy

Cited by 5 publications

References 0 publications

Patients’ crying experiences in psychotherapy and relationship with working alliance, therapeutic change and attachment styles.

Patients’ crying experiences in psychotherapy and relationship with working alliance, therapeutic change and attachment styles.

A clinical practice review of crying research.

Crying in psychotherapy among Israeli patients and its relation to the working alliance, therapeutic change and attachment style

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