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Therapist experiences with religion and spirituality in treatment: a qualitative study
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Bier, Aliza Lasky. Therapist experiences with religion and spirituality in treatment: a qualitative study. Retrieved from https://doi.org/doi:10.7282/t3-1pq1-0f64

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TitleTherapist experiences with religion and spirituality in treatment: a qualitative study
NameBier, Aliza Lasky (author); Cain, Nicole (chair); Kelly, Shalonda (member); Rutgers University; Graduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology
Date Created2022
Other Date2022-08 (degree)
SubjectClinical psychology, Religion, Grounded theory, Psychology, Religion, Spirituality, Therapy, Training
Extent128 pages
DescriptionDespite research suggesting that approximately 72% of Americans self-identify as religious, there is evidence that religion and spirituality (r/s) are not sufficiently addressed in mental health treatment. However, the reasons for this are not well understood. The current study sought to identify barriers in addressing r/s in treatment by interviewing psychologists about their experiences navigating r/s with clients. This study explored both general barriers as well as therapist-specific factors that might serve as barriers. Eight doctoral-level psychologists were interviewed using a semi-structured format. A Grounded Theory analysis was conducted to identify themes present in the data. Findings in the current study did not support the notion that therapists avoid addressing r/s in treatment. However, some barriers and challenges in addressing r/s in treatment were identified: client guardedness, client assumptions about the therapist, therapist lack of knowledge and training, therapist difficulty maintaining a clinical role and withholding personal r/s beliefs, and r/s differences between client and therapist. Regarding therapist-specific barriers, several factors emerged as potentially impacting the ways therapists address r/s in treatment: gender, race, r/s identity, changes in r/s identity over time, therapeutic modality, and years in practice. The Grounded Theory analysis revealed eight global themes; limited supervision and training, r/s as a resource, attention to maladaptive r/s beliefs, increased comfort with r/s over time, following the client’s lead with areas of identity, r/s as a shared language, looking at the relevance of r/s for the specific client, overlap between r/s and relationships, and an “I’m not the judge” mentality. From these themes, a tentative model for incorporating r/s into therapist training, supervision, and clinical work was developed. Additional implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.
NotePsy.D.
NoteIncludes bibliographical references
Genretheses
Persistent URLhttps://doi.org/doi:10.7282/t3-1pq1-0f64
LanguageEnglish
CollectionGraduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Organization NameRutgers, The State University of New Jersey
RightsThe author owns the copyright to this work.
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