Experiential Therapies for Depression Running head: EXPERIENTIAL THERAPY AND RELAPSE PREVENTION Maintenance of Gains Following Experiential Therapies for Depression Jennifer A. Ellison, Leslie S. Greenberg, Rhonda N. Goldman, and Lynne Angus York University 1 Experiential Therapies for Depression 2 Abstract Follow-up data across an 18-month period are presented for 43 adults who had been randomly assigned and responded to short-term client-centered (CC) and emotion-focused (EFT) therapies for major depression. Long-term effects of these short-term therapies were evaluated using relapse rates, number of asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic weeks, survival times across an 18-month follow-up, and group comparisons on self-report indices at 6- and 18-month followup among those clients who responded to the acute treatment phase. EFT treatment showed superior effects across 18 months in terms of less depressive relapse and greater number of asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic weeks, and the probability of maintaining treatment gains was significantly more likely in the EFT treatment in comparison with the CC treatment. In addition, follow-up self-report results demonstrated significantly greater effects for EFT clients on reduction of depression and improvement of self-esteem, and there were trends in favour of EFT on reduction of general symptom distress and interpersonal problems, in comparison with CC clients. Maintenance of treatment gains following an empathic relational treatment appears to be enhanced by the addition of specific experiential and gestalt-derived emotion-focused interventions. Clinical and theoretical implications of these findings are presented. Keywords: Depression; Emotion; Experiential therapy; Follow-up; Relapse prevention Experiential Therapies for Depression 3 Maintenance of Gains Following Experiential Therapies for Depression Numerous researchers have investigated the effects of brief psychotherapies for the treatment of unipolar depression, and a number of treatments have been found to be generally effective in the treatment of Major Depressive Disorder (MDD; e.g., Dimidjian et al., 2006; Elkin et al., 1989; Hollon, DeRubeis, & Evans, 1996; Hollon et al., 2005; Jacobson et al., 1996; Shapiro, Barkham, Rees, Hardy, Reynolds, & Startup, 1994; Watson, Gordon, Stermac, Kalogerakos, & Steckley, 2003). While beneficial effects have been identified within various comparative outcome studies, earlier trials regarding enduring effects in the prevention of depressive relapse following the administration of evidence-based, short-term psychotherapeutic treatment packages have been variable and less promising (Agosti, 1999; Brown, Schulberg, Madonia, Shear, & Houck, 1996; Gortner, Gollan, Dobson, & Jacobson, 1998; Kupfer et al., 1992; McLean & Hakstian, 1990; Prien et al., 1984; Shapiro et al., 1994; Shapiro, Rees, Barkham, Hardy, Reynolds, & Startup, 1995; Shea et al., 1992; Thase & Simons, 1992). There has been more promising recent evidence of the long-term effects of cognitive-behavioral therapies (CBT; Dobson, Hollon, Dimidjian, Schmaling, Kohlenberg, & Gallop, 2008; Hollon et al., 2005; Hollon, Stewart, & Strunk, 2006). However, there has been relatively little or no investigation of the long-term effects of experiential therapies. Both client-centered therapy (CC; Greenberg & Watson, 1998; King et al., 2000) and emotion-focused therapy (EFT; Goldman, Greenberg, and Angus, 2006; Watson et al., 2003) have been showed to be efficacious in the treatment of MDD. These experiential approaches place the therapeutic focus on the empathic relationship, deepening exploration, and the facilitation of the moment-by-moment emotional experience of the client. In a randomized controlled trial (RCT) comparing 36 CC and 36 EFT clients, Goldman et al. (2006) found large Experiential Therapies for Depression 4 pre-post effect sizes for clients who received either CC or EFT, on the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), Global Severity Index (GSI) of the SCL-90-R (Symptom-Check-list-Revised), Rosenberg Self-Esteem Measure (RSE), and Inventory of Interpersonal Problems (IIP). In addition, EFT was found to have significantly larger effects on all of these indices, although there were no significant differences in proportion of treatment responders in each group at posttreatment. Watson et al. (2003) compared short-term treatment effects of EFT and CBT for depression in a RCT and found that EFT and CBT were equally effective in decreasing depressive symptomatology, and EFT clients, on average, showed significantly greater decrease in selfreported problems in interpersonal functioning. In this study, 19 clients (58%) in EFT and 17 clients (52%) in CBT met the reliable change index (RCI; Jacobson & Truax, 1991; Ogles, Lambert, & Sawyer, 1995) for the BDI, and there was not a significant difference between the treatment groups on this index. Experiential treatments of depression therefore have been shown to be effective. However, to date, there is no evidence of maintenance of gains following these short-term experiential treatments that focus on emotion as the primary site of change. In the present study, we compared the maintenance of gains in depression over 18 months following short-term CC and EFT treatments. In CC therapy for depression, the main therapeutic action is the therapeutic relationship in which core conditions of therapist empathy, acceptance and genuineness (Rogers, 1951, 1975) are paramount. Within such a relational environment, clients become more open to the exploration of emotional experiences and learn to appreciate and value the informative nature of their emotional experience. These processes are proposed to lead to a strengthening of the client’s resilience and a change in their self-concept. The CC therapist’s general stance is one of empathically following what is most poignant in the Experiential Therapies for Depression 5 client’s experience. In EFT for depression, emotion-focused, marker-guided interventions designed to help clients resolve depressogenic affective-cognitive problems, such as self-critical splits and unfinished business (Greenberg, Rice, & Elliot, 1993; Greenberg & Watson, 2006), are added to the client-centered relational conditions. The primary EFT interventions for depression are (a) focusing on an unclear bodily felt sense, (b) two-chair dialogue with one’s critical internal voice, (c) empty-chair dialogue with a significant other in an unfinished business situation, and (d) systematic evocative unfolding in response to problematic reactions. The EFT therapist guides clients, within the context of the core client-centered relational conditions, to be aware of, regulate, transform, and reflect upon emotions that underlie and influence how they feel, think, and (inter)act (Greenberg, 2002; Greenberg & Watson, 2006; Samoilov & Goldfried, 2000). The EFT therapist’s general stance is one of balancing following and leading the client’s experiential processes within the context of marker-guided interventions. The primary purpose of the present study was to determine the comparative rates of relapse in CC and EFT across an 18-month follow-up period. Based on previous findings of enhanced experiential process during EFT (Watson & Greenberg, 1996; Pos, Greenberg, Goldman, & Korman, 2003), in addition to EFT’s significantly greater efficacy at posttreatment when compared to CC (Goldman et al., 2006), our expectation was that EFT clients who responded to the acute phase of treatment would maintain gains more than CC clients. We hypothesized that clients who responded to the EFT treatment, when compared with those who responded to CC treatment, would : (a) experience significantly less depressive relapse during each follow-up period; (b) on average, experience a significantly greater number of “well weeks” (successive addition of weeks where clients reported minimal or no depressive symptoms) (c) would “survive,” or not experience first relapse of depression, for a significantly Experiential Therapies for Depression 6 longer cumulative period of time; and that (d) regardless of whether or not clients were treatment responders, those in EFT, when compared to those in CC therapy, would report significantly more change on self-report measures (BDI, SCL-90-R, RSE, and IIP) at follow-up evaluation compared to CC clients. Method Participants Original outcome study. Information regarding the original outcome study is summarized below. More detailed information regarding the original acute phase treatment sample from which the present pool of clients was derived (including therapist selection, manualized training, and treatment adherence) can be found in the original outcome study paper (Goldman et al., 2006). Potential clients were initially screened by phone on inclusion and exclusion criteria following recruitment through local referral and by means of radio and written media to the residents of a large metropolitan area.. They were provided with information about the treatment and gave their informed consent to participate in the assessment phase (treatment consent was obtained following determination of eligibility). The protocol was approved by the relevant institutional ethics review committees. Clients considered for randomization included those who met for met criteria for MDD based on the Structured Clinical Interview (Spitzer, Williams, Gibbon, & First, 1992) for the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders- third edition-revised (DSM-III-R; American Psychiatric Association, 1987). Exclusion criteria included current treatment (psychotherapy and/or medication) for depression, and/or a current diagnosis of any of the following: bipolar I; panic disorder; substance dependence; eating disorders; psychotic disorder; two or more schizotypical features; and paranoid, borderline, or Experiential Therapies for Depression 7 antisocial personality disorders. Clients were also excluded if they were regarded as in need of treatment focusing on others problems (e.g., recent suicide attempts or active suicidal state) or in need of immediate crisis intervention, had the loss of a significant other in the last year, had recently been or currently was a victim of incest or sexual abuse, or were currently involved in a physically abusive relationship. Research assistants independent of the primary investigators assigned code numbers to suitable clients, and clients were randomly assigned to receive either CC or EFT for depression at a psychotherapy research clinic at an urban university. Recruitment to follow-up occurred from 1993 to 2002. The total sample of clients reported in Goldman et al. (2006) consisted of 36 CC and 36 EFT clients (see Figure 1). None of these clients reported having been diagnosed with more than 3 previous depressive episodes, and none had a Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF) score less than 50. Clients, on average, fell within the moderate to severe range of depressive symptomatology on the BDI (Beck, Rush, Shaw, & Emery, 1979). Therapists provided treatment in both conditions and had at least 1 year of experience with both EFT and CC treatment approaches. Treatments Two brief (16-20 sessions) experiential therapies were implemented: CC and EFT. Both treatments aim to increase and deepen the client’s capacity for emotional processing within the context of a supportive therapeutic relationship. Client-centered treatment (CC). This approach was conducted according to a manual developed by Greenberg, Rice, and Watson (1994), in addition to supplemental readings by Rogers (1951, 1975). The three therapeutic relationship conditions that are most central in this orientation are empathy, acceptance, and genuineness. The mainstay of CC is empathic responding to promote deeper client experiencing (emotional and meaning-making processes) Experiential Therapies for Depression 8 within a supportive, nonjudgemental therapeutic environment. The therapist attends to what is most alive and poignant in the client’s experience and empathically understands the client’s internal frame of reference. Depression is hypothesized to result, in part, from incomplete processing of emotional experience (Greenberg & Paivio, 1997), and the facilitation of deeper experiencing is understood as the primary goal and vehicle of change in this treatment. This is seen as leading to change in the client’s self-concept in a way that is more congruent with the client’s growth-oriented organismic tendencies (Rogers, 1975). Emotion-focused treatment (EFT). This approach was conducted according to a manual developed by Greenberg et al. (1993) and further explicated by Greenberg & Watson (2006). EFT involves the essential elements of CC with specific supplementation of process-directive, marker-guided interventions derived from experiential and gestalt therapies applied at in-session intrapsychic and/or interpersonal targets. These targets are thought to play prominent roles in the development and exacerbation of depressive experience. The major emotion-focused interventions of EFT are: Gendlin’s (1996) focusing intervention at a marker of an unclear bodily felt sense; gestalt empty-chair dialogues at markers of unfinished business where clients imagine a significant other in an empty chair and communicate unresolved feelings to them; gestalt twochair dialogues at conflict split markers where clients engage in a dialogue with their critical inner, often introjected, voice; and systematic evocative unfolding at points of problematic reactions where clients are imaginally guided back to the problematic situation so that they may re-experience and make sense of their reactions (Greenberg et al., 1993; Rice, 1974). These specific interventions are hypothesized to facilitate the creation of new meaning from bodily felt referents, letting go of anger and hurt in relation to another person, increasing acceptance and Experiential Therapies for Depression 9 compassion for oneself, and developing a new view and understanding of oneself (Greenberg, 2002; Watson & Greenberg, 1996). The first three sessions of the treatment focus on establishing a therapeutic alliance and providing a facilitative therapeutic relationship. During this phase, only the three CC relationship conditions are implemented. Thereafter, the EFT active interventions are implemented, within the context of the facilitative conditions, when depressogenic affectivecognitive problem markers arise. The primary aims are: facilitating the client’s symbolization of particular aspects of subjective emotional experience, facilitating new emotional responses to old situations, and making new meaning of one’s experience based on new information that becomes available through the reprocessing of emotional material (Greenberg & Watson 2006). Outcome Measures The Longitudinal Interval Follow-up Evaluation (LIFE-II; Keller et al., 1987) for depression was administered at the beginning of each 6-, 12-, and 18-month interview to obtain retroactive evaluations of the 6-month period prior to each follow-up evaluation (6-, 12-, and 18month periods). Four self-report questionnaires were administered at 6- and 18-month follow-up periods: BDI, SCL-90-R, RSE, and IIP. Longitudinal Interval Follow-up Evaluation (LIFE-II). The LIFE-II (Keller et al., 1987) is a semi-structured interview and integrated rating system developed to assess the longitudinal course of psychiatric disorders along various dimensions, such as depression, anxiety, and psychosis according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders- third editionrevised (DSM-III-R; American Psychiatric Association, 1987) over the previous 6 months. The interview provides retroactive information regarding psychosocial and psychopathologic status and any return to treatment. The weekly psychopathology measures, or psychiatric status ratings Experiential Therapies for Depression 10 (PSR), are ordinal symptom-based scales with categories consistent with levels of symptoms used in the DSM-III-R for each particular disorder being assessed. Retroactive weekly PSR ratings for depression during the previous 6 months were collected ranging from meeting criteria for the index episode (rating of 5 or 6) to no residual symptoms (rating of 1). A total of 5 advanced PhD student clinical evaluators, each whom had been trained by a senior clinician with expertise in LIFE-II administration and who were blind to treatment condition during the administration of the LIFE-II, conducted an equivalent number of interviews. Queries regarding the client’s experience of the treatment to which they had been assigned occurred after LIFE-II administration, and no evaluator interviewed the same client on more than one occasion during the outcome and follow-up periods. Audiotape interrater reliability of the LIFE-II was conducted. Clinical evaluators were not informed which interviews would be used for reliability purposes. A senior clinician with previous experience in administering the LIFE-II and who was blind to treatment condition provided reliability ratings. One-third of the interviews of treatment responders (N = 43) were randomly selected from the 18- month follow-up period and were rated by the senior clinician to obtain agreement on whether depressive episodes had occurred. The average kappa coefficient (Cohen, 1960) for these assessments was .87. Beck Depression Inventory-Long Form (BDI). The BDI (Beck et al., 1979) is a 21-item selfreport measure that measures severity of depression. Responses are scored on a four-point likert scale, with higher scores indicating greater severity of depression (scores may range from 0-63). Internal consistency for the BDI ranges from .73 to .92 with a mean of .86 and the measure correlates highly with other self-report measures of depression (Beck, Steer, & Garbin, 1988),. Experiential Therapies for Depression 11 Symptom Check-List-Revised (SCL-90-R). The SCL-90-R (Derogatis, 1983) is a self-report measure used to assess general symptom distress. On a five-point likert scale, clients indicate to what extent they experienced each of 90 distress symptoms in the past week. The measure provides a Global Severity Index (GSI) that indicates overall current symptomatology distress level. Internal consistency for the SCL-90-R ranges from .77 to .90 and test-retest reliability between .80 and .90 over a one-week period (Derogatis, Rickels, & Rock, 1976). Rosenberg Self-Esteem Measure (RSE). The RSE (Rosenberg, 1965) was used to assess client level of self-esteem. This is a 10-item measure which yields a total score with a higher score indicating higher self-esteem. High internal reliability (.89 to .94) and test-retest reliability (.80 to .90) have been reported (Bachman & O’Malley, 1977). Inventory of Interpersonal Problems (IIP). The IIP (Horowitz, Rosenberg, Baer, Ureño, & Villaseñor, 1988) is a 127-item self-report measure of current difficulties in interpersonal functioning. A total score is obtained to determine overall level of interpersonal difficulties. High internal consistency, validity, and reliability have been reported, and this measure is reported to be sensitive to clinical change (Horowitz, Rosenberg, Baer, Ureño, & Villaseñor, 1988). Procedure Follow-up Follow-up interviews were conducted at 6, 12, and 18 months posttreatment. Each interview began with administration of the LIFE-II followed by open-ended questioning regarding the 6 months prior to the interview and progressively focused on more specific areas of interest within the following domains: (a) the client’s experience of therapy; (b) changes in relation to feelings, behaviors, view of self, and/or interactions with others that have occurred as Experiential Therapies for Depression 12 a result of therapy; (c) life events or challenges that they have encountered; (d) the role of social support in their lives; and (e) whether they took part in continued treatment for depression. In addition to the interview component, clients completed self-report outcome measures at 6- and 18-month follow-up evaluation. Operational Criteria for Treatment Response and Relapse Treatment responders were identified as client who had a minimum of 8 consecutive weeks with minimal or no depressive symptoms (PSR of 1 or 2 on the LIFE-II) directly following the end of the treatment phase. Treatment responders were considered to have relapsed if they met criteria for a Major Depressive Episode on the LIFE-II (PSR of 5 or 6) for a minimum of two consecutive weeks during the follow-up period. Relapse was also defined as having occurred at the time of returning to treatment for depression (psychotherapy for depression and/or antidepressant medication) during the follow-up phase, regardless of reported depressive symptoms on the LIFE-II. Data Analysis The data analyses on relapse were conducted on all treatment responders. The statistical tests in the follow-up sample of treatment responders must be interpreted with caution given the follow-up sample no longer benefited from randomization as in the original sample. Post-hoc power estimates were observed to be medium to large, depending on the analysis being conducted. An alpha level of .05 was used for all statistical tests except the repeated measures comparative analyses in which Bonferroni adjustment for multiple comparisons was used. Chisquare tests were used to compare treatment conditions for proportions of clients in the original sample who responded to treatment and did not relapse across the follow-up period. Analyses of variance were used to compare treatments in cumulative number of well weeks among treatment Experiential Therapies for Depression 13 responders across follow-up. Survival analysis was conducted to compare the time to first relapse among treatment responders by condition. Lastly, we conducted repeated measures comparative analyses, with treatment group (CC and EFT) as the between-subjects factor and time (pretreatment, 6-month follow-up, and 18-month follow-up) as the within-subjects factor, at each follow-up period on self-report outcome measures (BDI, SCL-90-R, RSE, and IIP). Clients in the treated groups for whom complete self-report follow-up data had been obtained, regardless of whether or not they were responders during the acute treatment phase, were included in these analyses. An exception to this was the exclusion of treatment responders who has returned to treatment for depression during the follow-up phase given that their responses on self-report measures were expected to have been effected by intervention during follow-up and would not have been reflective of experimental treatment effects. Results Sample Characteristics and Participant Flow Figure 1 provides detail of participant flow. Fifty-two (25/36 CC and 27/36 EFT) clients responded to the acute phase treatment and were considered for follow-up analyses. Two treatment responders (1 CC and 1 EFT) declined taking part in the follow-up stage of the trial. Four EFT and 3 CC treatment responders were lost due to attrition during the follow-up phase. Three treatment responders (2 CC and 1 EFT) returned to treatment for depression during the follow-up period. As noted, self-report data collected at 6- and 18-month follow-up evaluation for these clients were excluded from the follow-up comparative analyses of outcomes measures as these symptom reports would likely have been impacted by the return to treatment and would not have been reflective of experimental treatment effects. Experiential Therapies for Depression 14 Only those clients for whom complete data had been collected were included in the relapse analyses. Complete relapse data across the 18-month follow-up period were obtained for 43 (83%; 21 CC and 22 EFT) of 52 treatment responders, and these clients were compared on relapse rates, number of asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic weeks, and survival times across the 18-month follow-up period. Demographic and clinical characteristics for the acute phase treatment responders upon whom the relapse results are based are presented in Table 1. There were no significant differences in demographic and clinical characteristics between the CC and EFT responder groups who were compared across follow-up (all ps > .05). There were also no significant differences in demographic and clinical characteristics between clients who started the acute treatment phase and those who entered the follow-up phase, regardless of treatment response (ps > .05). For comparative analyses on outcome indices after removing those lost due to attrition and those who returned to treatment for depression, 56 treatment responders (29 CC and 27 EFT) who had completed all self-report follow-up data were compared on 6- and 18month self-report measures. Attrition Analyses Analyses were conducted to investigate potentially significant differential rates of attrition between treatments across the entire follow-up period. Clients declining participation or lost due to attrition during the 18-month follow-up period were all treatment responders (5 EFT and 4 CC). Chi-square comparisons of differential attrition rates within the two treatment groups during the 18-month follow-up period revealed no significant difference in the number of clients lost due to attrition during the follow-up period, χ 2 (1, N = 9) = 0.50, p = .48. In addition, there were no significant differences between clients who were lost due to attrition and clients who Experiential Therapies for Depression 15 were retained across follow-up on demographic characteristics, including sex, age, ethnicity, education, and marital status (all ps > .05). Combined sample pre- and posttest comparison on all self-report outcome measures showed that there were no significant differences (all ps > .05) between those lost due to attrition and those retrained across the entire follow-up period. In addition, within-group comparisons on pre- and posttest comparisons showed that there were no significant differences (all ps > .05) between those lost due to attrition and those retained across the entire follow-up period. Treatment Response and Relapse Rates Table 2 summarizes the rates of clients (a) entering treatment, (b) completing treatment, and (c) responding to treatment according the LIFE-II criteria. Table 3 presents the percentage of treatment responders in each condition who relapsed across the 6- and 18-month follow-up periods. There was no significant difference in relapse between the two treatment groups across 6-month follow-up. During the 18-month follow-up period, there was a significant difference between groups in the proportion of treatment responders who relapsed, χ 2 (1, 43) = 4.04, p = .044. A significantly greater proportion of the EFT treatment group did not relapse during the entire follow-up period in comparison with the CC treatment group. By the end of the 18-month follow-up period, approximately 52% (11/21) of CC clients and 23% (5/22) of EFT clients had experienced depressive relapse. Well Weeks Table 4 shows the mean cumulative number of well weeks (successive addition of weeks where clients experienced no or minimal depressive symptoms) during each follow-up period by treatment condition. Clients included in these analyses were treatment responders for whom complete LIFE-II follow-up data had been attained. Experiential Therapies for Depression 16 There was no significant difference between the two treatment conditions in well weeks on the LIFE-II across the 6-month follow-up period, F(1, 43) = 3.147 p = .083, although there was a trend indicating that EFT clients, on average, experienced a longer period free from depression in comparison with CC clients. In fact, no EFT clients reported any or more than minimal depressive symptoms across the 6-month posttreatment period. There was a significant difference between the two treatment conditions in well weeks on the LIFE-II across the entire 18-month follow-up period, F(1, 43) = 5.183 p = .024 with EFT clients, on average, experiencing a longer period of time with minimal or no depressive symptoms in comparison with CC clients. Survival Time to First Relapse Survival analyses, a method of regression analysis used for analyzing longitudinal data and the timing of events, were conducted to compare the mean survival time in terms of weeks before first depressive relapse on the LIFE-II for the two treatment conditions. Clients included in this analysis were those for whom complete follow-up data on the LIFE-II were obtained. Clients lost due to attrition were excluded from this analysis due to violation of the independence assumption and because when they were included in the analysis, the result was extreme rightcensoring where these clients erroneously pulled the survival functions to the right, leading to overestimates of the benefits of each treatment condition cumulative function. Figure 2 shows the survival functions of time to first depressive relapse for treatment responders in each treatment condition. Median survival times for the CC and EFT treatment groups were 66 and 72 weeks, respectively. Mean survival times for the CC and EFT treatment groups were 53 and 68 weeks, respectively. A Log-Rank test using the Kaplan-Meier productlimit method comparing the survival distributions between the two treatment conditions was significant, 2 (1, N = 43) = 4.18, p = .041, indicating that the probability of surviving, or not Experiential Therapies for Depression 17 experiencing depressive relapse during the 18-month follow-up period, was significantly greater for clients in EFT than for those in the CC treatment. Comparative Analyses on Outcome Indices Longitudinal analyses were conducted for each self-report outcome measure. All clients in the treated groups for whom complete self-report follow-up data had been obtained, regardless of whether or not they responders during the acute treatment phase, were included in these analyses (with the exception of those who had returned to treatment for depression). In the repeated measures analyses of variance (ANOVA), there was a significant main effect of time on all self-report measures (all p < .001). For the BDI, the main effect of time was qualified by a significant time by group interaction, , F(2, 108) = 4.84, p = .015. For the SCL, the main effect of time was qualified by a significant time by group interaction, SCL-90-R, F(2, 108) = 4.16, p = .018. For the RSE, the main effect of time was qualified by a significant time by group interaction, F(2, 108) = 4.96, p = .009. For the IIP, the main effect of time was qualified by a significant time by group interaction, F(2, 108) = 3.80, p = .025. As each of the time by group interactions was statistically significant, a series of planned comparisons were conducted with Bonferroni adjustments on post-hoc planned contrasts. Table 5 displays the means and standard deviations by treatment group at each time point for each selfreport measure. Repeated measure plots by instrument can be found in Figures 3, 4, 5, and 6. For the BDI, planned comparisons revealed no significant difference between the groups at 6month follow-up, F(1, 54) < 1, and a significant difference in favour of EFT at 18-month followup, F(1, 54) = 6.76, p = .010. For the SCL-90-R, planned comparisons revealed no significant difference between the groups at 6-month follow-up, F(1, 54) < 1, and there was a trend in favour of EFT at 18-month follow-up, F(1, 54) = 4.80, p = .027. For the RSE, there was again Experiential Therapies for Depression 18 no significant difference between the groups at 6-month follow-up, F(1, 54) = 1.56, p < .05, and there was a significant difference in favour of EFT at 18-month follow-up, F(1, 54) =5.89, p = .012. Lastly, for the IIP, there was no significant difference between the groups at 6-month follow-up, F(1, 54) < 1, and there was a trend in favour of EFT at 18-month follow-up, F(1, 54) = 4.39, p = .035. Discussion This study provides the first evidence of differential long-term effects in CC and EFT treatments. Overall, there was support for the hypothesis that the addition of emotion-focused interventions of EFT to the relational conditions of CC during the acute treatment phase would lead to increased maintenance of gains across follow-up. While the two treatment groups were not significantly differentiated during 6-month follow-up in terms of depressive relapse, EFT were significantly more likely to not experience depressive relapse in comparison with clients in the CC treatment when the entire follow-up period was taken into account. In addition, while the treatment groups did not differ significantly across 6-month follow-up on average number of weeks with minimal or no depressive symptoms, EFT clients maintained treatment gains of minimal or no depressive symptoms for a significantly longer period of time across the entire follow-up period compared to CC clients. On self-reported symptomatology, CC and EFT clients did not differ significantly at 6month follow-up evaluation where both treatment groups appeared to maintain gains to a similar degree. By the 18-month follow-up evaluation, clients in the EFT treatment showed, on average, more improvement on self-report measures of depressive symptomatology and self-esteem. Trends were found in favour of EFT over CC at 18-month follow-up in general symptom distress and interpersonal problems. Experiential Therapies for Depression 19 The overall pattern of convergence of the treatment conditions on many criteria at 6month follow-up and the divergence at 18-month follow-up may be due to a number of factors. Before 6-month follow-up, CC clients may have been benefiting from the prior relational support and from an ability to self-mobilize as a benefit of a less directive form of therapy that aims to mobilize the client’s growth-oriented or actualizing tendency. Self-mobilization is conceptualized by CC theorists as taking place during treatment and operating and potentially developing after treatment (Rogers, 1961). However, the mobilization of the client’s growth tendency, while beneficial in terms of sustained improvement to 6 months posttreatment, may not have endured nor served CC clients as well as the deeper emotional processing and emotional transformation acquired by EFT clients (Watson & Greenberg 1996). From clients’ self-reports EFT appears to have led to more active and effective ways of dealing with emotional distress in the follow-up period. In follow-up interviews, EFT clients talked about exercising emotional processing skills that they had learned in therapy to help deal with distressing life events. These emotion processing skills may have increased awareness of and the ability to deal with potential depressogenic emotional events that emerged during the follow-up period. Clients may have become better able to recognize vulnerable periods, approach emotions, and self-initiate tools that acted as protective factors against the emergence of a new depressive episode. This study suggests that the addition of EFT interventions at appropriate markers to the core relational conditions in CC and promotes greater depressive relapse prevention for periods greater than 6 months posttreatment. A limitation of the present study was the absence of a control group. Although the absence of change in untreated depressed clients has been reported (for example, see Nietzel, Russel, Hemmings, & Greeter, 1987), a control group would have provided a useful comparison. Experiential Therapies for Depression 20 In addition, as with many outcome and follow-up studies, the generalizability of the findings is limited by the overrepresentation in the sample of European clients. A common problem in follow-up studies of differential sieve among treatment conditions and across follow-up (Klein, 1996) is also noteworthy. Also, clients were extensively screened, and the present sample may not be representative of the population seeking treatment for depression given the stringent exclusion criteria used, thereby limiting the generalizability of the present findings to potentially “more troubled and difficult-to-treat patients” (Westen & Morrison, 2001, p. 880). Lastly, specific factors (e.g., number of previous MDD episodes) beyond treatment control that could have accounted for sustained remission and/or relapse rates across follow-up were not identified and/or controlled. While the present study provides evidence of the generally superior effects of EFT in comparison with CC in terms of long-term maintenance of gains, it does not allow for identification of the nature of change processes that occurred within each treatment that led to this effect. Intensive process analyses of both acute treatment and follow-up periods are needed to identify change processes that contribute to maintenance of gains and relapse following treatment. In addition, comparing treatment groups on the frequency of discrete depressive episodes (beyond first recurrence) across follow-up, and the duration of relapse episodes, are important directions for future study. Lastly, replication of this study by other researchers is important given that, as with most outcome and long-term efficacy studies, the current study involved only one site where investigators and therapists, although claiming allegiance to both approaches, may be argued to have shown greater allegiance to EFT over CC. Accordingly, further investigation at various sites with investigators from differing theoretical orientations promises to be revealing. Experiential Therapies for Depression 21 References Agosti, V. (1999). 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A multidimensional meta-analysis of treatments of depression, panic, and generalized anxiety disorder: An empirical examination of the status of empirically supported therapies. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 69, 875-899, Experiential Therapies for Depression 27 Author Note Jennifer A. Ellison, Leslie S. Greenberg, Rhonda N. Goldman, and Lynne Angus, Department of Psychology, York University, Ontario, Canada. Rhonda N. Goldman is now at Department of Psychology, Illinois School of Professional Psychology at Argosy University, Schaumburg, Illinois. This research was supported in part by grants from the National Institute of Mental Health and from the Ontario Mental Health Foundation, both granted to the second author. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Jennifer A. Ellison, Department of Psychology, York University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. E-mail: jennifer@alumni.yorku.ca Experiential Therapies for Depression 28 Table 1 Demographic and Clinical Characteristics For Treatment Responders Treatment Condition CC EFT Total (n= 21) (n = 22) (N = 43) Female, n (%) 13 (61.9) 12 (54.5) 25 (58.1) European, n (%) 17 (81.0) 16 (72.7) 33 (76.7) 38.76 (11.62) 37.64 (7.27) 38.19 (9.54) 22-58 22-49 Single 9 (42.9) 7 (31.8) 16 (37.2) Married 5 (23.8) 9 (40.9) 14 (32.6) Divorced/Separated/Widowed 7 (33.3) 6 (27.3) 13 (30.2) Axis II Diagnosisa, n (and %) 7 (33.3) 6 (27.3) 13 (30.2) BDI Pretreatment, M (and SD) 25.10 (7.34) 27.32 (6.64) 26.23 (7.00) BDI Postreatment, M (and SD) 6.19 (3.79) 5.23 (4.85) 5.70 (4.34) Variable Age M (and SD) Range (n) Marital Status, n (and %) Note. CC = client-centered; EFT = emotion-focused therapy. BDI = Beck Depression Inventory. a Axis II diagnosis at pretreatment. Experiential Therapies for Depression 30 Table 2 Intent-To-Treat, Completed Treatment, and Treatment Responder Rates Treatment Condition Variable CC EFT Total Intent-to-treat, n 41 42 83 Completed, n 36 36 72 Responders, n 25 27 52 %a 60.9 64.3 62.7 %b 69.4 75.0 72.2 Note. Intent-to-treat included those participants who where randomized to a treatment condition. Completed included those participants who completed at least 11 treatment sessions. Responders included those participants who reported minimal or no depressive symptoms (Psychiatric Status Rating of 1 or 2) for at least 8 consecutive weeks posttreatment on the LIFE-II interview. CC = client-centered; EFT = emotion-focused therapy. b Percent of all clients completing treatment. a Percent of all clients entering treatment; Experiential Therapy for Depression 30 Table 3 Rates of Relapse Among Treatment Responders During Follow-Up Treatment condition Variable CC EFT 21 22 No Relapse, n (%) 18 (85.7) 22 (100.0) Relapse, n (%) 3 (14.3) 0 (0) 21 22 No Relapse, n (%) 10 (47.6) 17 (77.3) Relapse, n (%) 11 (52.4) 5 (22.7) χ2 6-month follow-up Responders, n χ2 (1, N = 43) = 3.38, p = 108. χ2 (1, N = 43) = 4.04, p = .044* 18-month follow-up Responders, n Note. Responders included those participants who reported minimal or no depressive symptoms (Psychiatric Status Rating of 1 or 2) for at least 8 consecutive weeks posttreatment on the LIFEII interview. CC = client-centered; EFT = emotion-focused therapy. *p < .05. Experiential Therapy for Depression 31 Table 4 Mean Number of Well Weeks Among Treatment Responders During Follow-up Treatment Condition CC Well Week M Responders, n EFT SD M 21 SD F 22 6 months 23.05 2.52 24.0 0 F(1, 43) = 3.15, p = .083 18 months 47.43 20.97 60.18 15.47 F(1, 53) = 5.18, p = .024* Note. Responders included those participants who reported minimal or no depressive symptoms (Psychiatric Status Rating of 1 or 2) for at least 8 consecutive weeks posttreatment on the LIFEII interview. CC = client-centered; EFT = emotion-focused therapy. *p < .05. Experiential Therapy for Depression Table 5 Means and Standard Deviations of BDI, SCL-90-R GSI, RSE, and IIP by Treatment Group at Each Follow-Up Period For All Acute Phase Treatment Completers Treatment Condition CC (n = 29) Follow-up period EFT (n = 27) M SD M SD Pretreatment 24.62 6.80 26.30 6.96 6 months 8.72 7.01 7.58 5.41 18 months 11.76 8.32 6.74* 5.81 Pretreatment 1.26 0.47 1.38 0.45 6 months 0.57 0.50 0.50 0.36 18 months 0.75 0.60 0.45 0.33 Pretreatment 21.76 6.46 20.43 6.17 6 months 27.97 5.50 29.87 5.91 18 months 27.10 5.97 31.00* 6.04 Pretreatment 1.49 0.58 1.54 0.40 6 months 0.99 0.54 0.97 0.53 18 months 1.23 0.61 0.91 0.49 BDI SCL-90-R GSI RSE IIP 32 Experiential Therapy for Depression 33 Note. CC = client-centered; EFT = emotion-focused therapy; BDI = Beck Depression Inventory; SCL-90-R GSI = Symptom Checklist-90-Revised Global Severity Index; RSE = Rosenberg SelfEsteem; IIP = Inventory of Interpersonal Problems. * p < .0125 (adj. for multiple comparisons). Experiential Therapy for Depression 34 Figure Captions Figure 1. CONSORT flow chart. CC = client-centered therapy; EFT = emotion-focused therapy. Figure 2. Survival curves for time to first relapse among treatment responders across follow-up (N = 43). CC = client-centered therapy; EFT = emotion-focused therapy. Figure 3. BDI by Treatment Group Across Follow-up (N = 56). CC = client-centered therapy; EFT = emotion-focused therapy. Pre = pretreatment; 6-Month = 6-month follow-up; 18-Month = 18-month follow-up. Figure 4. SCL-90-R by Treatment Group Across Follow-up (N = 56). CC = client-centered therapy; EFT = emotion-focused therapy. Pre = pretreatment; 6-Month = 6-month follow-up; 18Month = 18-month follow-up. Figure 5. RSE by Treatment Group Across Follow-up(N = 56). CC = client-centered therapy; EFT = emotion-focused therapy. Pre = pretreatment; 6-Month = 6-month follow-up; 18Month = 18-month follow-up. Figure 6. IIP by Treatment Group Across Follow-up (N = 56). CC = client-centered therapy; EFT = emotion-focused therapy. Pre = pretreatment; 6-Month = 6-month follow-up; 18Month = 18-month follow-up. Experiential Therapy for Depression 35 Randomized (N = 83) Allocated to client-centered therapy (CC; n = 41) Completed treatment (n = 36) Did not complete treatment (n = 5) Therapist nonadherent; transferred to EFT at client request following session 3 (n = 1) Began other psychotherapeutic treatment (n = 1) Client-initiated treatment termination before session 11 and not followed (n = 2) Unable to contact (n = 1) Treatment responders according to the LIFE-II at posttreatment (n = 25) Follow-up analyses LIFE-II for treatment responders (n = 21) Unable to contact (n = 3) Client declined participation in follow-up period (n = 1) Self-report for treatment completers (n = 29) Unable to contact (n = 4) Declined participation in follow-up period (n = 1) Return to treatment excluded (n = 2) Allocated to emotion-focused therapy (EFT; n = 42) Completed treatment (n = 36) Did not complete treatment (n = 7) Serious medical illness (n = 1) Sudden move (n = 1) Began other psychotherapeutic treatment (n = 2) Client-initiated treatment termination before session 11 and not followed (n = 1) Unable to contact (n = 2) Treatment responders according to the LIFE-II at posttreatment (n = 27) Follow-up analyses LIFE-II for treatment responders (n = 22) Unable to contact (n = 4) Client declined participation in follow-up period (n = 1) Self-report for treatment completers (n = 27) Unable to contact (n = 5) Declined participation in follow-up period (n = 1) Return to treatment excluded (n = 3) Experiential Therapy for Depression 36 Experiential Therapy for Depression CC EFT 37 Experiential Therapy for Depression CC EFT 38 Experiential Therapy for Depression EFT CC 39 Experiential Therapy for Depression CC EFT 40