[Mastery of conflictual relationship patterns in the course of a psychodynamic focal therapy]

Mastery is a psychological construct rooted in the psychodynamic psychotherapy research. The Mastery Scale provides a reliable content analytic method to measure the mastery of maladaptive interpersonal conflicts. With the help of model-sentences verbatim transcripts of relationship episodes are assessed regarding to six hierarchical so-called levels: lack of impulse-control, introjection and projection of negative emotions, difficulties in understanding and cognitive control, interpersonal consciousness, understanding of the self and self control. Further, mastery capabilities can be quantified by a mastery score. For the first time, the instrument is introduced in German by a study of a rather well known successful psychodynamic short-term psychotherapy which previously has been investigated with several empirical methods. The results verify the possibilities of the Mastery Scale in subtly describing changes in the course of a psychotherapy.