[New media - new prospects in psychotherapy process research: feedback of text-based processes in internet chat...

Group psychotherapy via Internet-chat offers not only an optimisation of therapeutic service provision but also new prospects for process research. The communication content could be analysed automatically and therefore text-based process variables could be fed back to the therapist immediately. In a former study , different text-based process variables in therapeutic Internet-chat aftercare groups were validated and the best concurrent validity with psychometric group evaluations was found for the text-based process variable "Activity", operationalised by the number of words and statements that a patient writes during a chat session. Based on this result, Activity was used in this study for the development of a feedback given to the therapist. The feedback was given after the first half of the chat session to alert the therapist to inactive patients and to encourage him to a reflection of his therapeutic strategy. The feedback was given in four different Internet-chat aftercare groups and evaluated in a randomised controlled trial comprising 86 group sessions where the patients' group evaluations were compared between feedback and non-feedback sessions. In addition it was examined whether inactive patients from the first half of the group session were addressed more often by the therapist during the second half of the session and whether they were more active during the second half of the session. Even though the feedback was evaluated by the therapists as helpful in 68 % of the sessions and it resulted in therapeutic modifications in 40 % of the feedback-sessions, no effect on the patients' group evaluations or their activity during the second half of the session could be examined. The results and alternative feedback strategies are discussed.