Transformations in the autobiographical narrative of a patient with depression, during two moments of the therapeutic process: her conception of the world and her sense of personal identity

BUENOS AIRES

Conferencia; II CONGRESO MUNDIAL DE PSICOTERAPIA EXISTENCIAL; 2019

ASOCIOACION MUNDIAL DE PSICOTERAPIA EXISTENCIAL-ALPE

Different studies suggest that the strategies and narrative styles that people employ to construct their autobiographical accounts have repercussions on their self-organization, as well as on their identity experience and their conception of the world. These factors seem to condition the stages and the results of the psychotherapeutic process. Our assumption is that personal narratives come to function as an organ of integration. A consistent, complex and coherent narrative would allow the patient to integrate different aspects of his experience and personality. This in turn, would allow similar and meaning the events experienced at different times in his life. In this paper we will try to show, starting from a case study, and applying a method of narrative phenomenological analysis, which are the predominant strategies from which the patient configures his autobiographical narrative. Our objective is to analyze the different strategies employed by a patient with depression in her autobiographical narrative construction, during two moments of the psychotherapeutic process. We analyze the stories that emerged from the first and last interviews with the patient. It is an exploratory and qualitative study. For the analysis we apply a phenomenological narrative procedure. Our data suggest that the strategies for treatment change. Changes are observed in the plot and the structuring of the corresponding stories, as well as a differentiated aspect in the use of narrative functions. Specifically, we have found that after the process the patient has a deeper characterization of herself and others, appealing to subjective, interpretative and evaluative reflective predicates to refer to herself and others. It also uses proconclusive metacommunications more frequently and with greater integration capacity. The conclusive function is more clear but at the same time open. As we have seen after the therapeutic process, the patient´s story offers 1) a greater self-referentiality 2) thematic multiplicity mayor; 3) mayor relevance and thematic cohesion; 4) greater richness in the characterization of the characters; 5) greater perspectivism; 6) higher recursion; 7) greater conclusive activity; 8) Mayor harmony and balance between support functions. The previous thing would be associated with a transformation of his vital world