Suppressor effects in associations between patient attachment to therapist and psychotherapy outcome

Objective Several studies propose that patient attachment to therapist is associated with therapy outcome. However, the magnitude of the effect is diverse, which might be explicable by suppressor effects and the new concept of pseudo‐security. Method Associations between patient attachment to therapist (client‐attachment‐to‐therapist‐scale [CATS]) and psychotherapy outcome (“global severity index” of the Symptom Check List) were evaluated in N = 368 patients. Multilevel models were performed. Results When tested in separate models, secure attachment to therapist was associated with a more favourable outcome (p