Enhancing working alliance through positive emotional experience: A cross-lag analysis

Although psychotherapy research has traditionally focused on decrease in distress, emotion research suggests the important role of positive emotional experience in healing and growing. Objective: The present study investigates the relationship between positive emotional experiences and working alliance. Method: We chose to investigate this relationship in accelerated experiential dynamic psychotherapy (AEDP), taking advantage of the modality's focus on both negative and positive emotional experiences. Fifty-eight clients receiving 16-sessions individual AEDP reported on their post-session levels of working alliance and positive emotions (enlivenment affect, positive relational affect, and peacefulness). The alliance-emotion relationship for each emotional categories was tested with separate disaggregated cross-lagged panel models. Results: Across the three categories, higher positive emotions at the end of the previous session were associated with higher working alliance at the end of the next session. On the other hand, working alliance did not contribute to any of the positive emotions in the next time point. Furthermore, the three emotion categories showed different patterns of development. Conclusion: The findings suggest that fostering positive emotions may be a promising venue to enhance working alliance. Furthermore, differentiating specific positive emotions is likely important both for research and practice.