Impact of interpretation on associative freedom.
Seventy hours from the psychoanalytic case of Mrs. C, covering the full course of treatment, were scored for associative freedom, number of interventions, and a variety of clinical phenomena such as clarifications, interpretations, different forms of resistance, transference manifestations, and the like. Associative freedom significantly increased over the course of treatment and was significantly related to the number of analyst interventions per hour. The relationship was particularly strong in the latter stages of treatment. Three specific types of interventions were found to increase associative freedom in the latter stages of treatment. The effect of each type was found to influence both the session containing the interpretation and the next 3 sessions. This carryover effect was specific to the latter stages of the analysis.
Spence
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Department of Psychiatry, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, Piscataway, New Jersey 08854.
Dahl
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Jones
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D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D005608:Free Association; D006801:Humans; D010043:Outcome and Process Assessment, Health Care; D011573:Psychoanalytic Interpretation; D011575:Psychoanalytic Therapy / Q000379:methods*; D014705:Verbal Behavior