The form of the story: Measuring formal aspects of narrative activity in psychotherapy

摘要

Objective: We ask which are the clinically relevant qualities of narratives in psychotherapy and how they can be measured. Method: On the background of psychoanalytic assumptions and narrative theory, we propose to measure formal narrative processes which stay close to the linguistic surface, because these escape conscious control. Results: We propose five aspects of narratives to be especially sensitive to distortions and therefore prone to change in successful therapies: (1) Theactual chronological, stepwise narrating of events, (2) the intentional structuring of events, or emplotment, (3) the immediate evaluation, (4) the reflected interpretation of events, and finally (5) the consistency and completeness of the narrative. For each aspect we discuss ways to measure them. Finally the aspects are illustrated with excerpts from a series of diagnostic interviews. Discussion: Implications for the analysis of the co-narrative role of the therapist are suggested.