ABSTRACT
Practitioners and researchers alike must accept the challenge of evidence-based practice, one result of which is that treatments which are shown to be ineffective are discontinued. Concurrently with the production of this document, the Department commissioned a review of psychotherapy research, entitled What Works for Whom, an aim of which was to consider whether there is research evidence that would help health care purchasers decide on the appropriate therapies for their populations. Surely psychotherapy research can display a similar methodological pluralism, employing not only methods rooted in the assumptions of the therapies concerned but also more traditional methods, which may provide results which are more meaningful to a wider audience. L. Luborsky, Singer, and Luborsky, reviewing comparative outcome studies of different therapies, concluded with the verdict of the dodo bird from Alice in Wonderland that "everybody has won and all must have prizes".
