Relations between satisfaction with therapists and psychotherapy outcome

This study relates patients' satisfaction with their therapists to measures of outcome derived from patients, therapists, and an independent rater. After long-term psychoanalytically oriented psychotherapy, 23 medical student outpatients responded to the Therapist Satisfaction Scale. They reported greatest satisfaction with therapists they perceived as respectful, understanding, trustworthy, likeable, and encouraging and whom they saw as technically competent, giving good advice, and not 'too quiet.' These characteristics, plus patients' overall satisfaction with their therapists, correlated significantly with patients' ratings of improvement and with therapists' and an independent evaluator's ratings of outcome. Although no causal statements can be made, these data provide additional evidence of the importance of the patient-therapist relationship to psychotherapy outcome.