Conflicts of values between psychotherapists and patients in psychotherapy

• Grant number: 24/02485-6
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: June 01, 2024
• End date: May 31, 2025
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Psychology - Psychological Treatment and Prevention
• Principal Investigator: Laura Vilela e Souza
• Grantee: Luca Nomizo Rodrigues
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Ciências e Letras de Ribeirão Preto (FFCLRP). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Ribeirão Preto , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Contrary to a dated understanding of psychotherapy, the clinical process is not marked by a suspension of values, and there may be moments of clash and conflict between psychotherapist and patient. Complete neutrality is impossible and undesirable: patients identify their psychotherapists' communication of values, whether they are aware of it or not, and the very structure of psychotherapy reflects and reproduces cultural contexts composed of moral traditions rooted in political structures. Clinical practice, therefore, must be understood as a moral process, which reproduces values in a way that, at certain times, can generate clashes between patients and therapists. For example, cases of racism from white professionals towards black patients and homophobia from heterosexual patients towards homosexual patients are reported in the literature. The reproduction of these discourses is the result of a process of historical construction which are reflected in marks in psychological epistemologies themselves. This project, therefore, seeks to understand the meanings produced about the moral conflicts between therapist and patient, as well as the social discourses that support the different moralities in dispute. To this end, participants will be recruited using the Snowball Method, and will be interviewed about their therapeutic experiences. The transcription of the interviews will be carried out using the qualitative method of Discourse Analysis, based on the epistemological understanding in research from the social constructionist perspective.