David E Engle’s scientific contributions

Unlabelled: Self-criticism plays a key role in many psychological disorders and predicts poor outcome in psychotherapy. Yet, psychotherapy research directly targeting self-critical processes is limited. In this pilot study, we examined the efficacy of an emotion-focused intervention, the two-chair dialogue task, on self-criticism, self-compassion and the ability to self-reassure in times of stress, as well as on depressive and anxiety symptoms among nine self-critical clients. Results showed that the intervention was associated with significant increases in self-compassion and self-reassuring, and significant reductions in self-criticism, depressive symptoms and anxiety symptoms. Effect sizes were medium to large, with most clients exhibiting low and non-clinical levels of symptomatology at the end of therapy, and maintaining gains over a 6-month follow-up period. Although preliminary, these finding suggest that emotion-focused chair work might be a promising intervention addressing self-criticism. Key practitioner message: Self-criticism is an important process in a variety of clinical disorders and predicts poor outcome in brief therapy for depression. Yet, little is known about how self-criticism can be effectively addressed in psychological treatment. Practitioners can benefit from increasing their awareness of self-critical processes in their clinical work, and from directly working with emotions in addressing self-criticisim. Emotion-focused two-chair dialogue intervention can be effective in reducing self-criticism, increasing self-compassion, and decreasing depressive and anxiety symptoms, and these improvements are largely maintained six months after therapy.

Resistance to change is a problem that has long evaded easy solutions. In this article, the authors suggest the value of understanding and working with some forms of resistance as ambivalence. They describe resistant ambivalence in the context of an integrative and multivoiced understanding. A person who is ambivalent possesses a voice that moves toward change and a voice that struggles against change. The authors sought therapy methods that were consistent with the multivoiced integrative understanding of ambivalence and that could be useful in its resolution. Motivational interviewing and the two-chair method are described in this article, along with illustrative case material. These methods share a common spirit and therapist style that is accepting of the client's worldview and creates a strong partnership between the therapist and client. These methods can be used in conjunction with other therapy approaches and have a research base supporting their use.