The Long-Term Advantage

While short-term therapies provide benefits more quickly, research from the Helsinki Psychotherapy Study shows that long-term therapy becomes more effective over time, with superior outcomes appearing after the first year and continuing to grow throughout the follow-up period.

Long-term therapy provides additional benefits for psychosocial functioning and quality of life that emerge later in treatment and persist for years, including improvements in sense of coherence, perceived competence, and dispositional optimism.

The gains from therapy are markedly stable and endure several years after treatment ends, with long-term therapy showing particular benefits for improving perceived social support - a crucial factor for psychological well-being.