Agreement between therapists and clients in evaluating therapy and its outcomes: Literature review

This paper reviews 41 studies published since the 1950s that deal with agreement between therapists and their clients in their evaluation of problems, process, and outcomes of therapy. The results indicate that there is great variability in the extent to which clients and therapists agree in evaluating various dimensions of therapy. The extent of agreement reported depended primarily on how agreement was measured. Future research should standardize the definition and measurement of client-therapist agreement. Studies should be conducted to test the different hypotheses about reasons for agreement and disagreement and to help understand the meaning of client- therapist agreement in the therapeutic context.