Cover not available
Article published In:
Metaphor in Mental Healthcare
Edited by Dennis Tay
[Metaphor and the Social World 10:2] 2020
► pp. 273–291

Surveying views of metaphor vs. literal language in psychotherapy

A factor analysis

| Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Five key therapeutic functions of metaphors are often discussed by psychotherapists. They (i) help clients express emotions and experiences, (ii) help therapists and clients explain difficult concepts, (iii) introduce new frames of reference, (iv) help work through client resistance, and (v) build a collaborative relationship between therapists and clients. Research on how these functions are enacted in psychotherapy talk tends to assume that they are indeed perceived as such by clients, and that metaphorical language is preferred to comparable literal language in performing them. This paper reports a survey study (N = 84) to critically interrogate these assumptions. Participants read two constructed therapy dialogues, controlled and counterbalanced for presentation sequence, where therapist and client discuss an issue using metaphorical and literal language respectively. Each dialogue is followed by a 15-item questionnaire to rate how well the presumed functions were performed (e.g. the therapist and client can work effectively together, the therapist is able to explain difficult concepts). A combined Confirmatory (CFA) and Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) suggests that, instead of the five distinct functions proposed in the literature, participants discerned three functions which reflect a more holistic view of what metaphors can do. A second EFA conducted on literal responses yielded only two factors. This contrast in factor structure further suggests that (i) literal language is less functionally nuanced, and (ii) metaphors are not simply perceived as an ‘add-on’ to literal language, but are evaluated across an extended narrative in fundamentally different ways. Within-subjects metaphor vs. literal ratings of the items under the emergent three-factor structure were then compared. Metaphor ratings were significantly higher in all factors (p < 0.01), suggesting that metaphorical language is indeed perceived as more effective than literal language when discussing clients’ issues. Implications, limitations, and future directions are discussed.
Keywords: confirmatory factor analysis, exploratory factor analysis, metaphor functions, experimental survey
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Method
    • 2.1Survey construction
    • 2.2Survey procedure
    • 2.3Analytical procedures
  • 3.Results and discussion
    • 3.1Factor analyses
    • 3.2Comparative analysis
  • 4.Conclusion
  • References
Published online: 13 November 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/msw.00007.tay
References (30)
References
Angus, L. E., & Rennie, D. L. (1989). Envisioning the representational world: the client’s experience of metaphoric expression in psychotherapy. Psychotherapy, 26(3), 372–379. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Aronov, N. E., & Brodsky, S. L. (2009). The river model: a metaphor and tool for training new psychotherapists. Journal of Contemporary Psychotherapy, 391, 187–195. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cardillo, E. R., Schmidt, G. L., Kranjec, A., & Chatterjee, A. (2010). Stimulus design is an obstacle course: 560 matched literal and metaphorical sentences for testing neural hypotheses about metaphor. Behavior Research Methods, 42(3), 651–664. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Caruth, E., & Ekstein, R. (1966). Interpretation Within the Metaphor: Further Considerations. Journal of the American Academy of Child Psychiatry, 5(1), 35–45. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cirillo, L., & Crider, C. (1995). Distinctive therapeutic uses of metaphor. Psychotherapy, 321, 511–519. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Claiborn, C. D., & Goodyear, R. K. (2005). Feedback in psychotherapy. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 61(2), 209–217. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Costello, A., & Osborne, J. (2005). Best practices in Exploratory Factor Analysis: Four recommendations for getting the most from your analysis. Practical Assessment, Research & Evaluation, 10(7), 1–9.Google Scholar
Dwairy, M. (2009). Culture analysis and metaphor psychotherapy with Arab-Muslim clients. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 65(2), 199–209. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gibbs, R. W. (2010). The wonderful, chaotic, creative, heroic, challenging world of Researching and Applying Metaphor: A celebration of the past and some peeks into the future. In G. Low, Z. Todd, A. Deignan, & L. Cameron (eds.), Researching and Applying Metaphor in the Real World (pp. 1–18). Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Goldberg, R. M., & Stephenson, J. B. (2016). Staying with the Metaphor: Applying Reality Therapy’s Use of Metaphors to Grief Counseling. Journal of Creativity in Mental Health, 11(1), 105–117. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Greenberg, R. P., Constantino, M. J., & Bruce, N. (2006). Are patient expectations still relevant for psychotherapy process and outcome? Clinical Psychology Review, 26(6), 657–678. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hill, C. E., & Regan, A. M. (1991). The use of metaphors in one case of brief psychotherapy. Journal of Integrative and Eclectic Psychotherapy, 101, 56–67.Google Scholar
Hooper, D., Coughlan, J., & Mullen, M. R. (2008). Structural Equation Modelling : Guidelines for Determining Model Fit. The Electronic Journal of Business Research Methods, 6(1), 53–60.Google Scholar
Jarosz, A. F., & Wiley, J. (2014). What Are the Odds? A Practical Guide to Computing and Reporting Bayes Factors. Journal of Problem Solving, 71, 2–9. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kline, R. B. (2016). Principles and Practice of Structural Equation Modeling (4th ed.). New York and London: Guilford Press.Google Scholar
Kopp, R. R. (1995). Metaphor Therapy: Using Client-Generated Metaphors in Psychotherapy. New York: Brunnel/Mazel.Google Scholar
Kopp, R. R., & Craw, M. J. (1998). Metaphoric language, metaphoric cognition, and cognitive therapy. Psychotherapy, 35(3), 306–311. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lakoff, G. (1993). The contemporary theory of metaphor. In A. Ortony (ed.), Metaphor and Thought (2nd ed., pp. 202–251). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lyddon, W. J., Clay, A. L., & Sparks, C. L. (2001). Metaphor and change in counselling. Journal of Counseling & Development, 79(3), 269–274. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
McMullen, L. M. (1996). Studying the use of figurative language in psychotherapy: the search for researchable questions. Metaphor and Symbolic Activity, 11(4), 241–255. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mead, N., & Bower, P. (2000). Patient-centredness: A conceptual framework and review of the empirical literature. Social Science and Medicine, 51(7), 1087–1110. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Norcross, J. C. (1990). An eclectic definition of psychotherapy. In J. K. Zeig & W. M. Munion (eds.), What is Psychotherapy? Contemporary Perspectives (pp. 218–220). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.Google Scholar
Ponterotto, D. (2003). The cohesive role of cognitive metaphor in discourse and conversation. In A. Barcelona (ed.), Metaphor and Metonymy at the Crossroads: A Cognitive Perspective (pp. 283–298). Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Revicki, D. A., Cook, K. F., Amtmann, D., Harnam, N., Chen, W. H., & Keefe, F. J. (2014). Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis of the PROMIS pain quality item bank. Quality of Life Research, 23(1), 245–255. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Stine, J. J. (2005). The use of metaphors in the service of the therapeutic alliance and therapeutic communication. Journal of the American Academy of Psychoanalysis and Dynamic Psychiatry, 33(3), 531–545. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Stott, R., Mansell, W., Salkovskis, P., Lavender, A., & Cartwright-Hatton, S. (2010). Oxford Guide to Metaphors in CBT. Building Cognitive Bridges. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Suit, J. L., Paradise, L. V., & Orleans, N. (1985). Effects of metaphors and cognitive complexity on perceived counselor characteristics. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 32(1), 23–28. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Tay, D. (2013). Metaphor in Psychotherapy. A Descriptive and Prescriptive Analysis. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Törneke, N. (2017). Metaphor in Practice. A Professional’s Guide to Using the Science of Language in Psychotherapy. Oakland, CA: New Harbinger.Google Scholar
Cited by (6)

Cited by six other publications

Sela, Tal & Michal Bat-Or
2024. Cutting and pasting in adults’ descriptions of experiences of secrets in childhood. International Journal of Art Therapy 29:2 ► pp. 97 ff. DOI logo
Shakoury, Kayvan & Frank Boers
2024. Metaphors for multiculturalism in the Canadian context. Metaphor and the Social World DOI logo
Xiao, Deming
2024. Review of Tay (2022): Navigating the realities of metaphor and psychotherapy research. Metaphor and the Social World 14:1 ► pp. 163 ff. DOI logo
Tay, Dennis
2022. Metaphor Types as Strategies for Teaching Regression to Novice Learners. Journal of Statistics and Data Science Education 30:1 ► pp. 3 ff. DOI logo
Tay, Dennis
2022. Navigating the Realities of Metaphor and Psychotherapy Research, DOI logo
Tay, Dennis
2023. Turning metaphor on its head: a “target-to-source transformation” approach in statistics education. Frontiers in Psychology 14 DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 5 july 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.