Retraction of Rim et al. (2022)

Reports the retraction of "Changes in meaning in life, working alliance, and outcome in psychodynamic psychotherapy: What leads to what" by Katie L. Rim, Clara E. Hill and Dennis M. Kivlighan Jr. (Journal of Counseling Psychology, 2022[Nov], Vol 69[6], 835-844). The following article (https://doi.org/10.1037/cou0000636) is being retracted. This retraction is at the request of coauthors Kivlighan and Hill after the results of an investigation by the University of Maryland Institutional Review Board (IRB). The IRB found that the study included data from between one and four therapy clients of the Maryland Psychotherapy Clinic and Research Laboratory (MPCRL) who either had not been asked to provide consent or had withdrawn consent for their data to be included in the research. Rim was not responsible for obtaining and verifying participant consent but agreed to the retraction of this article. (The following abstract of the original article appeared in record 2022-87044-001.) We examined how meaning in life was associated with working alliance (WA) and outcomes, all from the client perspective. Random intercept lagged cross-panel analyses were used to analyze data from intake and after every eight sessions for the first 24 sessions of open-ended individual psychodynamic psychotherapy from 94 clients nested within 12 therapists. We found that, for all four time periods, working alliance in one 8-week time period predicted both Meaning in Life Measure-Experience (MILM-E) and Meaning in Life Measure-Reflectivity (MILM-R) in the subsequent time period, and MILM-R in one 8-week time period predicted client outcome in the subsequent time period. These findings suggest that having a strong working alliance is associated with clients developing more meaning in life, and reflectivity about meaning in life is associated with clients improving in psychotherapy. Implications for practice and research are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).