Miguel M. Gonçalves

University of Minho · Centro de Investigação em Psicologia (CIPsi)

The growing demand for mental health services, exacerbated by long waiting lists and high psychotherapy dropout rates, highlights the urgent need for brief and effective approaches. The aim of this study was to analyse the presence and impact of change markers in online narrative single‐session therapy (NSST) and a change interview 1 month later. T...

Background Complementing the development of evidence-based psychological therapies, practice-based evidence has developed from patient samples collected in routine care, addressing questions relevant to patients and practitioners, and thereby expanding our knowledge of psychological therapies and their impact. Implementation of assessments in routi...

Background: Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is a prevalent mental health condition, affecting 1.1% to 2.3% of the population. Existing data support Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) and Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) as the most effective OCD treatments. However, when the notable dropout rates, particularly in ERP, are con...

Objective: Focusing on client’s strengths while addressing the difficulties that brought them to therapy has been shown to positively impact psychotherapy outcomes. Innovative Moments (IMs) are client strength-based events with the potential of being capitalized on psychotherapy. This phenomenon is present in different types of dialogue-centered ps...

Introduction: Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is characterized by the dynamic nature of its symptoms, necessitating innovative assessment approaches. This presentation integrates findings from a systematic review of Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA) studies in OCD with insights from a pilot study aimed at developing an EMA tool tailored to...

Objectives Although psychotherapy research suggests that clients’ resources are related to positive outcomes, there is a lack of clinical tools available to consider their integration into psychotherapy. In this exploratory research, we studied the feasibility of a semi-structured interview to identify resources reported by clients at the onset of...

Alcohol consumption and Internet use are highly prevalent behaviours among young adults and previous research has suggested that different addictive behaviours might be distinctly associated with personality. This study examined the role of big-5 personality traits in alcohol consumption and Internet use. Alcohol consumption, internet use, and pers...

Background: Complementing the development of evidence-based psychological therapies, practice-based evidence has developed from patient samples collected in routine care, addressing questions relevant to patients and practitioners, and thereby expanding our knowledge of psychological therapies and their impact. Implementation of assessments in rout...

For a minority of the bereaved, the loss of a significant other can trigger an overwhelming emotional reaction and impaired functioning across life domains, known as prolonged grief disorder (PGD). Hence, ongoing efforts have been made to refine existing treatments to increase their efficacy and to accommodate the idiosyncrasies of grief reactions....

Objective: This observational study aims to analyze the reliability of the innovative moments coding system for groups (IMCS-G), developed to respond to the need for reliable measures to detect markers of change in group interventions. The IMCS-G represents an adaptation of the innovative moments coding system, which is used in individual psychothe...

Die kontinuierliche Erhebung psychometrischer Daten vor, während und nach einer psychotherapeutischen Behandlung kann als Qualitätssicherungsmaßnahme Therapeut:innen in ihrer klinischen Arbeit unterstützen und zugleich eine belastbare Datengrundlage für die Psychotherapieforschung schaffen. Im Rahmen der Qualitätssicherung können die erhobenen Date...

This special section contains studies in which innovative moments are used as markers of changes in meaning in psychotherapy. Innovative moments, as an empirical operationalization of the concept of “unique outcomes” from narrative therapy, have been used as a strategy to evaluate changes in meaning in psychotherapy sessions and interviews. Innovat...

Introduction: Innovative moments (IMs) pinpoint new and more adaptative meanings that emerge in clients' discourse during psychotherapy. Studies with adult clients have found a greater proportion of IMs in recovered compared to unchanged cases, but similar studies have yet to be conducted with adolescents. Aims: The paper aims (1) to study retro...

According to the Dialogical Self Theory, the Self can move along the imaginal landscape of the mind and adopt different I-positions, endowing each position with a voice and enabling dialogical relationships (e.g., agreement, disagreement) among each other. Internal dialogues may have an important role regarding identity construction, self-regulatio...

This study tests an add‐on procedure to foster change in Career Construction Counseling by eliciting reconceptualization innovative moments. After the career counseling intervention with 42 participants, 21 participants were allocated to the add‐on procedure, consisting of two additional sessions focused on eliciting reconceptualization innovative...

Working outside of the employer’s physical space using information and communication technology can be labeled as telework. With the Covid-19 pandemic, telework assumed an unprecedented relevance with substantial impact for the future. Therefore, the development of assessment scales that allow a better comprehension of telework is essential. In thi...

Introduction. In group psychotherapy research, there are few reliable measures for tracking members’ change. This study proposes a further adaptation of the Innovative Moment Coding System for Groups (IMCS-G), a reliable method previously developed in one format of group intervention for detecting innovative moments (IMs). IMs are exceptions to the...

At the beginning of the therapeutic process, clients frequently feel immersed in their problems, and demoralized, with a negative perspective of different areas of their lives. The clients´ discourse is specially focused on difficulties and previous ineffective attempts to overcome their problems. Even though positive aspects of the clients’ life c...

High levels of ambivalence are associated with poor outcomes and therapeutic abandonment. The objective of this study was to conduct a cross-cultural adaptation and assessment of the psychometric properties of the Ambivalence in Psychotherapy Questionnaire (APQ). After cultural adaptation of the instrument, we assessed 181 individuals undergoing ps...

Recently, Goldfried suggested that one main reason for the underdevelopment of psychotherapy as a scientific enterprise was the lack of acknowledgment of past contributions. In this article, this issue is illustrated by analyzing the particular case of acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT). ACT has clear overlaps with therapies from the systemic...

Emotion regulation (ER) has been increasingly recognized as an important transdiagnostic mechanism of change. Therefore, recent CBT interventions directly target ER as one of the main components of the treatment. The Unified Protocol for the Transdiagnostic Treatment of Emotional Disorders (UP) is a manualized CBT-based treatment which focuses on a...

Background There are a plethora of studies on expressive writing and positive writing interventions, but few have addressed the combination of both paradigms. Additionally, research on the role of ambivalence toward change in the context of writing-based interventions is lacking. Ambivalence toward change is a natural movement of approaching and av...

Patient ambivalence towards change is a central therapeutic target in the Unified Protocol for Transdiagnostic Treatment of Emotional Disorders (UP). However, we do not know if and how patients resolve ambivalence across the sessions and modules of the UP. Previous studies have identified two types of ambivalence resolution-dominance and negotiatio...

In psychotherapy, ambivalence may be conceptualized as a conflict between two distinct motivations: one that is favorable to change (pro-change) and another that favors the maintenance of a problematic pattern (pro status quo). Previous studies identified two processes by which clients resolve this conflict: imposing the innovative part and silenci...

Online Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) is a promising intervention for reducing alcohol consumption among the population. However, due to the lack of studies in the area, the present study aims to evaluate the effects of the therapeutic process of online CBT for alcohol addicts in a Brazilian sample. Thirty-six recordings of six male participan...

Ambivalence toward change is an expected, recurrent process in psychological change. However, the prolonged experience of ambivalence in psychotherapy contributes to client disengagement, which could result in treatment dropout. Considering the negative effects of premature termination of therapy and the convenience of the identification of clients...

Objective Innovative moments (IMs) are moments in which the previous problematic pattern of meaning is challenged. Studies have shown that IMs are associated with good psychotherapy outcomes. A three-level hierarchy of IMs was observed in recent studies, with level 1 IMs being more elementary and levels 2 and 3 being more complex and associated wit...

Objective: Prior research, mainly conducted on depression, observed that clients' improved capability to process their emotions predicted better therapeutic outcomes. The current comparative study aimed to investigate whether emotional processing was related to therapeutic change in complicated grief. Method: We analyzed two contrasting cases (g...

Ambivalence toward change is a patient variable characterized by an inner tension that results in movements towards and away from change and in a subjective feeling of inability to change coupled with distress. In session, it should be successfully managed by the therapist otherwise ambivalence can result in resistance/reactance to therapist’s inte...

Research suggests that when ambivalence towards change emerge in psychotherapy, the probability of interpersonal tensions between patient and therapist increases. Given the harsh consequences that could result from the inability to identify and appropriately manage these conflicts during therapy, empirical studies about interpersonal complementary...

Os momentos de inovação emergem quando o paciente constrói exceções ao padrão problemático responsável pelo seu sofrimento, constituindo um processo relevante na mudança em psicoterapia. Estes indicadores de transformação narrativa foram estudados em diversos modelos de psicoterapia breve, tendo sido identificados padrões de ocorrência muito semelh...

Reasoning may help solving problems and understanding personal experiences. Ruminative reasoning, however, is inconclusive, repetitive, and usually regards negative thoughts. We asked how reasoning as manifested in oral autobiographical narratives might differ when it is ruminative versus when it is adaptive by comparing two constructs from the fie...

Worry is a phenomenon that is present in multiple psychopathologies. Given the widely accepted transdiagnostic role that worry plays in psychopathology, reliable measures for this construct are pivotal for clinical practice. The Penn State Worry Questionnaire (PSWQ) is one of the most widely used and established measures of worry in both clinical a...

Sudden gains (SG) are large and rapid symptom improvements experienced by clients that are related to positive effects on the outcome. However, little is known about why SGs happen or what are the mechanisms that underlie them. Ambivalence towards change is a client’s variable related to outcome that has not been previously studied in the context o...

Nesta obra reúnem-se cerca de meia centena de textos que retratam, a partir de diferente experiências, perspetivas e olhares disciplinares, a forma como a pandemia provocada pelo vírus SARS-CoV-2 foi sentida na Universidade do Minho, a primeira universidade portuguesa a ser atingida pelos seus efeitos, a partir de 7 de março de 2020. Os contributos...

This case study of an undecided university student has two aims: to assess the effect of life design career counselling on autobiographical reasoning and career variables, and to analyse the client’s narrative transformation using the innovative moments coding system. Results show improvement in career development and organization of autobiographic...

Emotional processing is an empirically established predictor of pre–post therapy improvement in depression. However, its relationship to symptom alleviation over time requires clarification. To clarify the contribution of emotional processing to gradual symptom improvement, we explored both (1) the effect of emotional processing on pre–post therapy...

Portugal is one of the European countries that implemented early protective measures in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. Portugal declared a state of emergency on 18 March, and a set of regional and national preventive public health measures was progressively implemented. Studies on the psychological impact of pandemics show evidence of the ne...

Ambivalence toward change is an important dimension of patient’s engagement and a relevant process in both poor- and good-outcome cases. In session, it should be successfully managed by the therapist otherwise ambivalence can result in resistance/reactance to therapist’s interventions. Research suggests that when not overcome, these interpersonal t...

Research emphasizes that individuals’ engagement with change process is a significant predictor of therapeutic outcomes. Ambivalence is a natural phenomenon in change processes, but when individuals cannot overcome it, their problems may intensify. Ambivalence toward change, a client variable characterized by an intrapersonal conflict between two p...

This paper explores a dialogical operationalization of identity fusion in the context of football firms. An in-depth life story interview with a longstanding member of a football firm involved in several violent episodes was qualitatively analyzed. The variety of positions of the self (I-positions) as well as the dialogical relations established by...

This paper aims to describe the Innovative Moments (IM) Coding System (IMCS), an idiographic and transtheoretical methodology that allows the identification of IMs—markers of changes in the client's initial maladaptive framework of meaning—throughout psychotherapy. The present study introduces the theoretical background underlying this methodology,...

Objectives: Innovative moments (IMs) are exceptions to the maladaptive framework of meaning that causes distress. Dialogically, IMs can be seen as new, neglected or silenced I-positions that can prompt an alternative, more satisfying self-narrative to emerge. Research has suggested that IM production is associated with recovery in psychotherapy and...

Career Construction Counseling fosters client change by evoking and elaborating innovative moments in client narratives. In this article, we describe four types of dialogues that counselors may use to prompt narrative novelty and foster client change: (a) identify and evaluate the effects of innovative moments, (b) highlight contrasting self-positi...

The FIND (Feedback Initiated Narrative Development) protocol was designed to foster the availability of clients’ resources in psychotherapy. This protocol consists of two brief interviews and an observation of an early psychotherapy session, centered on the elicitation of the client’s personal resources. The contents of both the interviews and the...

Momentos innovadores y el impacto de sesión en la psicoterapia integradora breve: un estudio exploratorio El estudio presente examino la emergencia de momentos innovadores en la psicoterapia integradora breve basada en el modelo de 3 estados de Hill, en un muestrea pequeña de clientes. Los momentos innovadores son marcadores de cambio en clientes e...

This article advances understanding of career construction counseling (CCC) by viewing it through the lens of the innovative moments model (IMM) of how clients construct change. The IMM conceives clients’ narrative transformations as resulting from counselors prompting and clients reflecting on exceptions to a problematic self-narrative (i.e., inno...

Career Construction Counseling (CCC) is a narrative intervention that supports individuals in the elaboration of narrative identity and career construction. The theory, research, and practice of this approach to career counseling has benefited from the Innovative Moments Model (IMM) to explain client change. Similar to CCC, the IMM is grounded on a...

Background: The identification of poor outcome predictors is essential if we are to prevent therapeutic failure. Ambivalence – defined as a conflictual relationship between two positions of the self: one favoring change and another one favoring problematic stability – has been consistently associated with poor outcomes. However, the precise relatio...

Previous studies have found an association between therapeutic alliance and treatment outcome, but only recently have researchers begun to analyze time-lagged relationships between session-to-session measures of alliance and outcomes with hierarchical linear modeling (HLM). HLM assumes simple correlation structures between any two measurements from...

Existing models of deradicalisation, countering violent extremism (CVE), and counter-terrorism (CT) have lacked a clear theory of change, as well as robust empirical methodologies. This paper proposes an empirically-based systematic and transparent methodology – the Innovative Moments Coding System (IMCS) – which is empirically sensitive, ethically...

Innovative moments are alternative meanings to the problems expressed by clients and are organized into three levels. This study analyzes if these levels are not only change markers related to symptomatology outcomes, but also gradual steps in meaning development. A thematic analysis was carried out in a case of depression treated with narrative th...

Ambivalence, resistance, and alliance ruptures are three terms commonly used in psychotherapy, across different theoretical approaches and modalities. However, it is still not clear how those terms are related and how the connection can be used to maintain a therapeutic alliance while addressing clients’ ambivalence. This paper aims to briefly desc...

The present study examined the emergence of innovative moments in a successful case of Brief Integrative Psychotherapy (BIP) based on Hill’s 3-stage model. Hill’s model suggests that optimally therapeutic processes involve exploration (based on client-centered therapy), insight (based on psychoanalytic therapy), and action (based on behavioral ther...

Change is indisputably one of the main goals of psychotherapeutic work. From a dialogical perspective, psychotherapeutic change entails a transformation in the transactional and communicative relationships established in the client’s “inner society of I-positions”. In the present chapter, we summarize the main findings of our narrative-dialogical r...

Several studies have suggested that narratives play a central role in different domains of the individual’s life. People make sense of their lives by creating life stories and self-narratives which may be conceived as a set of rules that guide the construction of meanings and behaviors. In this chapter, we discuss the relevance of self-narratives i...

The majority of the existing research dedicated to the mother–child narrative interaction has focused on biological families during the co-construction of autobiographical narratives and has consistently shown that the mothers’ narrative support has an important influence on children’s narrative participation and overall development. The current st...

The association between clients’ higher capability of emotional processing and good therapeutic outcome has been consistently observed in different therapeutic approaches. Despite previous studies that have reported an association between emotional processing and pre- to posttherapy change in symptoms, the session-by-session relation between emotio...

This case study explores the collaboration that occurs between therapist and client when reconceptualization innovative moments emerge. Reconceptualization innovative moments are exceptions to the problematic self-narrative that brought the client to therapy and are associated with successful psychotherapy. Reconceptualization innovative moments ha...

Clients’ engagement with therapy has been consistently associated with treatment outcomes. Ambivalence in psychotherapy is a client variable characterized by an intrapersonal conflict between “I want to change” vs. “I don’t want to change”. This inner tension results in movements towards and away from change and in a subjective feeling of inability...

Objectives In previous studies, reconceptualization innovative moments were associated with successful psychotherapy. Reconceptualization has two components—(a) a positive temporal contrast between the past self and the present self (contrasting self [CS]) and (b) a description of how and/or why this change has occurred (change process [CP])—from t...

Client ambivalence toward change has been shown to be a central influence on outcomes in psychotherapy, as higher levels of ambivalence can result in limited engagement in therapy. Furthermore, research has consistently demonstrated the importance of the therapeutic alliance, which can be impacted by alliance ruptures, or moments of tension or mis...

Objectives: To empirically study both processes of ambivalence resolution in a successful case of emotion-focused therapy. Method: Sessions were independently coded with three coding systems-the IMs, the return to the problem and the ambivalence resolution. Results: Ambivalence tended to be resolved from the initial to the final sessions. Alth...

The number of studies analyzing the emotional interference based on communicational prosody is reduced. This gap is due to the complexity of auditory stimuli, and the difficulty to ensure that every word that is said triggers a congruent emotional response. This study aimed to constitute a database of emotional words in audio format. 120 visual for...

This article applies a dialogical analysis to the change processes involved in moving from engagement with to disengagement from an armed militant group, as well as from radicalisation to deradicalisation. The findings underline the interplay between different push and pull factors at individual, organisational and societal levels which played a ro...

Ambivalence in the process of psychotherapeutic change should be addressed and resolved if we are to avoid psychotherapeutic failure and promote sustained change. In this context, ambivalence can be defined as the cyclical conflictual relation between two opposed positions of the self: one expressed as an innovation, and a subsequent one expressed...

Bereavement, understood as the loss of a significant person through death, can challenge the mourner’s self-narrative in a way that requires active meaning reconstruction to revise or reinstate a sense of significance and security. When this natural process of making sense of the death and one’s life in its aftermath is complicated, meaning-oriente...

Objective:: A large proportion of psychotherapy patients remain untreated, mostly because they drop out. This study compares the short- and long-term outcomes of patients who dropped out of psychotherapy to those of therapy completers. Methods:: The sample included 63 patients (23 dropouts and 40 completers) from a controlled clinical trial, whi...

In the past decade, researching what we refer to as innovative moments (IMs) has produced interesting results with regard to change in self-narratives during psychotherapy. Building upon the concept of “unique outcomes” (White & Epston, 1990) and “exceptions” in therapy (de Shazer, 1991), a coding system was developed for tracking moments of innova...

Objectives: Innovative moments (IMs) are exceptions to the maladaptive framework of meaning that typically motivates clients to seek psychotherapy, and previous studies have shown that IMs are associated with psychotherapy outcomes. While IMs are exceptions that occur at the level of the therapeutic conversation, relational schemas are more stable...

The innovative moments model was used in a pilot study that aimed to explore the change processes involved in everyday change outside psychotherapy. According to this model, the emergence and development of innovative moments (IMs) as exceptions to a problematic pattern are closely associated with psychological change. A longitudinal design coverin...

The aim of this case study is to demonstrate how an innovative group counseling method, the narrative mediation path, promotes reflective mirroring in a group of underachieving university students. We used an adaptation of the innovative moments coding system, a reliable method for studying change by tracking narrative innovations throughout the in...