USING CLIENT POSITIONS AS A TECHNIQUE FOR INCREASING THE ACCEPTABILITY OF MARRIAGE THERAPY INTERVENTIONS

This study investigated the use of intervention rationales that matche d the participant's positions or beliefs in marriage therapy. Position s were conceptualized as the implementation of a constructivist stance by making use of the participant's beliefs. Positions were investigat ed by comparing 3 rationale conditions. The rationales either matched a participant's positions or mismatched his or her positions, or no ra tionale was provided. Couples were instructed to role play a marital p roblem. The participants completed a questionnaire that allowed the ex perimenters to identify their positions, that is, their beliefs and fe elings about their identified problem. Experimenters designed individu alized treatment rationales that matched and mismatched the participan ts' positions. Three standard interventions were paired with an indivi dually constructed matching rationale, a mismatching rationale, and a no-rationale control condition to form 3 treatment recommendations. Pa rticipants rated each treatment recommendation for acceptability. The interventions paired with the rationales that matched participant posi tions were rated significantly more acceptable than the mismatched and no-rationale conditions.