Narrative in psychotherapy: Patients' reports on personal story (part II)

The results of the empirical study of psychotherapeutic transcripts based o n the previously published ("Psychological journal", 1998, No 5) theoretica l considerations are reported. The following hypotheses were formulated: (a ) narratives involve personally more meaningful information than other type s of therapeutic discourse, and (b) narratives serve as a communicative mea ns to convey immediately emotional states of the speaker and to stimulate r esponses of the listener. The empirical data confirm the hypotheses and pro mote further development of the proposed psychotherapy process model.