What is it about?

In this study, we examined the degree to which psychotherapists can accurately predict their own measurement-based strengths and weaknesses when treating their patients with specific types of presenting mental health concerns (e.g., depression, anxiety).

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Why is it important?

This study is important because mental health care patients often choose a psychotherapist based on the therapist’s self-assessed areas of expertise. If it turns out that therapists are inaccurate judges of these areas, then patients may not end up working with the most personally well-suited clinician.

Perspectives

This work showed that therapists can be inaccurate judges of their own measurement-based effectiveness domains, which underscores a significant public health issue. What's more, better performing therapists overall tended to underestimate their strengths, which suggests that therapist humility is adaptive. These results reinforce the importance of using an outcome measure to determine, and more accurately and transparently report to the public, therapists’ effectiveness strengths and weaknesses.

Michael Constantino
University of Massachusetts Amherst

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This page is a summary of: Therapist perceptions of their own measurement-based, problem-specific effectiveness., Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, April 2023, American Psychological Association (APA), DOI: 10.1037/ccp0000813.
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