Patient personality and therapist countertransference

Purpose of reviewThe purpose of this review is to provide a comprehensive and critical examination of the empirical literature about the relation between patient personality and therapist countertransference.Recent findingsThe therapist's countertransference can play a crucial role in psychotherapy outcomes, especially in the treatment of personality disorders. The therapist's emotional responses to patients can accomplish the following: inform the clinician about the patient's personality, impact therapy outcome, influence patient resistance and elaboration, mediate the influence of the therapist's interventions and influence therapeutic alliance.SummaryIn the last years, several studies have empirically demonstrated the presence of a specific pattern of therapist responses that are related to different patient personality disorders. Other works showed how the effects of the therapist's technique depend on the emotional context in which they are delivered and in particular countertransference experiences. Moreover, researchers suggest that the therapist's emotional responses occur across all kinds of therapy and are independent of the therapist's theoretical preferences. Keywords