Evidence for Bidirectional, Cross-Lagged Associations Between Alliance and Psychological Distress in an Unguided Mobile-Health Intervention.

ABSTRACT: Bidirectional associations between changes in symptoms and alliance are established for in-person psychotherapy. Alliance may play an important role in promoting engagement and effectiveness within unguided mobile health (mHealth) interventions. Using models disaggregating alliance and psychological distress into within- and between-person components (random intercept cross-lagged panel model), we report bidirectional associations between alliance and distress over the course of a 4-week smartphone-based meditation intervention (n=302, 80.0% elevated depression/anxiety). Associations were stable across time with effect sizes similar to those observed for psychotherapy (βs=-.13 to -.14 and -.09 to -.10, for distress to alliance and alliance to distress, respectively). Alliance may be

SUBMITTER: Goldberg SB 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11164554 | biostudies-literature | 2024 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature