ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the process by which psychotherapy research is conducted, and the controversies surrounding the proper nature and role of such research. Comparisons of psychotherapy with medication and with the combination of medication and psychotherapy are frequently conducted. Psychotherapy research is a broad field encompassing a number of streams of research. Outcome research focuses on the effects of psychotherapy, both immediate and long-term changes in the problems for which a person seeks or is referred for treatment, as well as improvement on broader variables such as quality of life or interpersonal functioning. The amount of information that must be processed in psychotherapy is enormous and taxes the cognitive capacity of humans as information processors. Cognitive-behavioral researchers have been at the forefront of developing treatment manuals and protocols, and the preponderance of empirically supported treatment research has been in cognitive-behavioral treatments.
