The social mandate of psychotherapy in media representation: a text analysis of the Italian press

This paper aims at exploring the social mandate of psychotherapy in media representation from an analysis of the Italian press. The ‘social mandate’ refers to the professional function of psychotherapy and the forms of demand for it that are socially recognised. For this purpose, an Emotional Text Analysis (Carli & Paniccia, 2002) has been conducted on a body of 157 articles of the major national newspapers produced in 2010. This methodology allows one to detect the emotional and unconscious dimensions running through the text, apart from its intentional structuring. The analysis has identified 5 clusters, called Cultural Repertoires, seen as the main symbolic areas that shape the social mandate of psychotherapy: (1) “scientism” research, (2) moral redemption, (3) individual/context integration, (4) emotional comfort, and (5) behaviour correction. Results suggest a development of the social mandate towards a de-medicalisation of the psychotherapeutic intervention, which needs to acquire new theoretical models on the relationship between an individual and their social context.