WCP 2025

Introduction The demand for accessible mental health care has created unique opportunities for psychotherapists to gain practical experience while addressing underserved populations. Since April 2022, 135 psychotherapists from diverse modalities volunteered with Safe Space, providing free online psychotherapy under dual supervision. This initiative not only supported clients but also allowed therapists to collect hours, refine their skills, and progress toward licensure. This study examines the methodologies, psychotherapeutic techniques, and professional development outcomes of this voluntary framework, with an emphasis on the comparative dynamics of online and traditional psychotherapy.

Methodology / Approach A mixed-methods approach was employed:
1. Quantitative Analysis: Data from 64 active psychotherapists (as of December 2024) were analyzed, focusing on session volumes, supervision hours, and professional milestones.
2. Qualitative Analysis: Semi-structured interviews with 20 participating psychotherapists explored their experiences with voluntary online practice, supervision, and the application of specific psychotherapeutic techniques.
3. Comparative Review: Case studies highlighted adaptations in therapeutic methods, comparing online and in-person therapy to understand the benefits and challenges unique to each modality.

Results / Findings Psychotherapists engaged in Safe Space reported significant growth in their professional capabilities. Techniques commonly utilized included the empty chair dialogue from Gestalt therapy, which was adapted to the virtual environment to help clients externalize inner conflicts; the use of automatic thought restructuring from cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) to address anxiety and depression; and somatic awareness techniques from body psychotherapy to reconnect clients with their physical sensations. Additionally, emotion focused techniques were widely used to help clients process unresolved feelings. Participants emphasized the value of supervision in refining these techniques for online settings, with 85% noting that guidance from supervisors helped them address challenges such as maintaining therapeutic presence and navigating cultural sensitivities in a multilingual client base. Despite initial concerns, 76% of therapists reported that their ability to establish a strong therapeutic alliance was equivalent or superior in the online format compared to traditional in-person sessions.

Conclusion / Perspective This study highlights the role of voluntary online psychotherapy in advancing psychotherapist training and professionalization. The integration of diverse psychotherapeutic techniques, supported by dual supervision, created a robust framework for experiential learning and skill development. Findings suggest that online therapy is not only a practical avenue for reaching underserved populations but also an e ective training ground for psychotherapists, providing opportunities to innovate and refine modalities for digital delivery. Future research should explore the long-term impacts of such programs on therapist competency and client outcomes, with an emphasis on the evolving nature of psychotherapy in the digital age.

This presentation introduces the concept of epistemic trust—the fundamental human capacity enabling us to learn from others who are trustworthy and collectively establish shared beliefs and ideas, which we recognize as ‘culture’. The talk will highlight emerging evidence underscoring the critical role of epistemic trust in social learning and examine research demonstrating its vulnerability to adversity, particularly during childhood. Emphasis will be placed on understanding the extensive developmental and adult-life consequences resulting from disruptions in epistemic trust. Further, exploring the link between epistemic trust and mental disorders sheds light on one of the key mechanisms mediating trauma's lasting impact, notably in the onset of mental health difficulties and impairments in personality functioning. We will discuss therapeutic approaches aimed at addressing epistemic mistrust and epistemic hypervigilance, alongside recent findings on how mistrust disrupts human social communication systems.

Background. Recent advances in algorithmic content generation hold promise and controversy in many areas, including work, education, art, research, and psychological assessment and intervention. Drawing on Higgins’s Self-Discrepancy Theory, we explore how AI-generated images can be used to assist in expressing people’s thoughts about their self as they see it, desire it to be, and feel others expect them to be.
Method. Participants used the software Midjourney to generate images representing actual/own, ideal/own, and ought/other self-states by providing a list of verbal prompts as input, iteratively modifying the results, and selecting a single image to illustrate each state. The images were used within the same session as visual anchors for semi-structured interviews to derive verbal accounts of self-states and discrepancies, complemented by psychometric assessment.
Results. Participants found it feasible to depict their self-states and the resulting images helpful in describing and contrasting their actual/own self-concept with their ideal/own and ought/other self-guides. The protocol fits within a single session and, beyond conventional verbal transcripts, yields a record of verbal prompts and images for subsequent analysis. We describe the protocol and provide an analysis of verbal accounts alongside their pictorial anchors.
Conclusions. Text-to-image generation as an assistive interview tool promises to be engaging for clients and useful in addressing the long-standing difficulty of qualifying and quantifying discrepancies between self-states by allowing the rapid creation of highly descriptive images without reliance on artistic ability. We interpret the interaction process within Vygotsky’s Sociocultural Theory, where AI is used as a tool or interactive artefact in a mediated action aimed at a more complex and accurate self-expression through the facilitation and visualisation of ideas.