The effectiveness of personal construct psychotherapy in clinical practice : a systematic review and meta-analysis

Abstract

This study updates a systematic review of the effectiveness of personal construct psychotherapy and refines a previous meta-analysis by focusing on studies conducted in clinical settings. Twenty-seven studies satisfied the criteria for the systematic review, including 20 in clinical settings. Meta-analysis of the latter provided strong evidence of an advantage of personal construct psychotherapy over a no-treatment control; this benefit was maintained at follow-up. Meta-analysis of studies with an active treatment control group provided no evidence of the superiority or inferiority of personal construct psychotherapy. The available research justifies the practice of personal construct psychotherapy with clients in clinical practice, but conclusions must be tempered by the small number of studies and their methodological shortcomings