ABSTRACT
With effectiveness, this chapter emphasizes the need for the treatment to be registered in the consciousness of the patient. With duration, it notes that the consequence of psychoanalytic treatment is cumulative, leaving its imprint over time. With frequency of sessions, the chapter underscore the idea of therapeutic intensity. And, with treatment relationship, the chapter affirm that the therapeutic effort is an intrinsically dialogic undertaking. Effectiveness of psychoanalytic therapy depends on an incremental treatment effect, with longer treatment exposure yielding incremental gains. The Positive Relationship and Optimal Responsiveness Indexes added most to that treatment outcome. It has been our belief that increased therapeutic exposure contributes to the experience of greater affective intensity in treatment, and that such intensity facilitates a perception of the therapist as optimally responsive to the patient. This chapter concludes that increased sessions make a difference and this is a finding which has specific relevance to psychoanalytic psychotherapy.
