| Summary: | This study was conducted in order to investigate the manner in which
female therapists describe a moral experience in therapy and to
investigate what facilitates or hinders a moral experience in therapy. The
study was set up to avoid the usual moral dilemmas, legalities or
puritanical ponderings that have come to be associated with
investigations of moral behaviour. Rather, a moral experience in therapy
is defined as a relationship experience between a therapist and client
which could be described as upright, good, wholesome and clear and
one that involves care and concern. Eight female therapists who had
been in practice for at least five years were asked to share two
experiences that they had had with clients. The first experience was an
experience that they would describe as clear, wholesome and caring,
that is 'moral'. The second experience was one that would provide a
contrast to the first experience: that is, one that was less clear, caring,
wholesome and moral than the first. The interviews were examined
using Tappan's hermeneutic model for interpreting lived moral
experience. This model looks at the interrelationships among thinking
feeling and action that accompany all experience. Where possible it
attempts to separate these processes but, more importantly, it
emphasizes the difficulty of separating these processes and the
influences and interdependencies among them. The results of the study
show that while all three processes enter into the therapist's moral
presence, the emotional process is most influential in determining
relationship outcome. The therapist's 'feelings' while in relationship with
her client can, if intense enough, undermine her clearest 'thinking' about
how to form a clear and caring relationship. I conclude by stating that it is
a myth to believe that teaching ethics assures moral practice.
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