Negative effects of psychotherapy

In evaluation of their own considerations with respect to the problem cases in psychotherapy and on the basis of a critical discussion of the literature, the authors analyse causes and forms of the phenomena of so-called negative effects in psychotherapy. They answer the question of the existence of negative effects in the affirmative and draw the conclusion that negative therapy results are due to problems of indication, the degree of the social involvement, the measurement of the changes and the research methods as well as to problems of the personality of the therapists and patients. The following negative effects are dealt with in detail: Aggravation of symptoms, occurrence of new symptoms and process-conditioned false interventions.