DOES DEVELOPMENT DO THE DEED?: CLINICAL EXPERIENCE AND EPISTEMOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT TOGETHER ACCOUNT FOR SIMILARITIES IN THERAPEUTIC STYLE

Fielder's conclusions from the early 1950s regarding the relationships among theoretical orientation, clinical experience, and the conception of an ideal therapeutic relationship have been followed by mixed results. Nevertheless, they have been unwarrantedly generalized to the notion that all experienced therapists clinically behave in the same manner. The concept of epistemological development is introduced as a variable that may bring some clarity to previous results. Data are reported on the relationships among theoretical orientation, clinical experience, epistemological development on the one hand, and therapeutic styles on the other, for therapists ( N = 161) of six distinctive theoretical schools ( N = 161). Results suggest not only that orientation is far more responsible than experience for variation of therapeutic styles, but also that differences between more and less experienced therapists only arise when high levels of both experience and epistemological development are present. Results also suggest that a group composed of more experienced and more developed cognitive and psychodynamic therapists was more homogeneous in therapeutic style than the group composed of all other therapists of the same orientations.