General · EdgepediaSeptember 17, 20267 min read

Therapy

Therapy is the attempted remediation of a health problem, usually after a diagnosis, and the word covers both physical treatments such as medication, surgery, radiation, physical therapy, and speech therapy, and psychological treatments in which a trained professional works with a person through conversation to change emotions, thoughts, and behaviors.¹^•² In everyday use, "therapy" is often a shortened form of "psychotherapy" (also called talk therapy), which specifically addresses mental, emotional, and behavioral issues; other kinds of therapy target different conditions, such as physical therapy after a stroke or radiation therapy for cancer.²

Key fact	Detail
Definition	Psychotherapy (talk therapy) is a variety of treatments that aim to help a person identify and change troubling emotions, thoughts, and behaviors¹
Goals	Relief from symptoms, maintaining or enhancing daily functioning, and improving quality of life¹
Benefit rate	About 75% of people who participate in psychotherapy experience some type of benefit and can function better day to day²
Measured effect size	Across 61 meta-analyses of 852 trials and 137,126 participants, the mean effect size for pharmacotherapy or psychotherapy in adult psychiatric disorders was 0.50 (95% CI, 0.41–0.59)³
Combined treatment	Combined psychotherapy plus pharmacotherapy beat either monotherapy with SMD 0.31 (95% CI 0.19–0.44)⁴
Regulation	There is no formal approval process for psychotherapies like there is for medications by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration¹
Duration	Psychotherapy can last a few weeks or months for short-term issues, or several months to years for complex situations or chronic conditions²

Major forms of therapy

Psychotherapy is delivered by licensed mental health professionals such as psychologists, psychiatrists, psychiatric nurses, social workers, and counselors, either one-on-one or in a group setting.¹^•² The most common types include:

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT): a structured, goal-oriented approach in which the therapist helps a person examine how thoughts affect actions, unlearn negative patterns, and adopt healthier thinking habits.²
Dialectical behavior therapy (DBT): adapted from CBT for people who experience emotions very intensely; it balances acceptance of who a person is with the benefits of change and teaches emotion-regulation skills through both individual and group sessions.²
Interpersonal therapy (IPT): a short-term form that addresses underlying interpersonal problems such as unresolved grief, role changes, and conflicts, and teaches healthier ways to express emotions and communicate.²
Psychodynamic therapy: based on the idea that behavior and well-being are influenced by childhood experiences and unconscious repetitive thoughts or feelings; it works to improve self-awareness and change old patterns.²

Psychoanalysis, which originates from the work of Sigmund Freud, is a more intensive form of psychodynamic therapy that aims to make unconscious thoughts, feelings, and memories conscious.² Within CBT, exposure therapy is used for anxiety disorders: a person spends brief periods in a supportive environment learning to tolerate distress caused by specific items, ideas, or imagined scenes, until the associated fear declines over time.¹

Physical and rehabilitation therapies form a separate branch. Rehabilitation is provided by physiotherapists, occupational therapists, speech and language therapists, audiologists, orthotists and prosthetists, clinical psychologists, physical medicine and rehabilitation doctors, and rehabilitation nurses, in inpatient or outpatient settings, physiotherapy or occupational therapy practices, and community settings such as a person's home, school, or workplace.⁵ Rehabilitation complements medical and surgical interventions and is an essential part of universal health coverage alongside health promotion, disease prevention, treatment, and palliative care.⁵

What therapy treats and how it is chosen

The treatment approach is tailored to the specific disorder; the approach for obsessive-compulsive disorder differs from the approach for bipolar disorder, and therapists may use one primary approach or combine elements of several depending on their training and the person's needs.¹ People seek therapy for severe or long-term stress from work or family situations, loss of a loved one, relationship problems, symptoms with no physical explanation such as changes in sleep or appetite, low energy, persistent irritability, excessive worry, or a sense of hopelessness, and for diagnosed mental disorders.¹ A physical examination first can help rule out a medical condition behind symptoms such as mood change or trouble concentrating.¹

Psychotherapy can be used as an alternative to or alongside medication and other treatments; even when medication relieves symptoms, therapy can address specific issues such as self-defeating thinking, irrational fears, interpersonal problems, or difficulty coping at home, school, or work.¹ For substance use, therapy and counseling are part of most treatment plans and focus on developing coping skills, and a person may need more than one type of treatment.⁶

Where therapy is delivered

Care settings vary in intensity. Standard outpatient care resembles a doctor's visit, with frequency depending on the care needed; intensive outpatient or partial hospitalization programs include one-on-one appointments, group sessions, and coping-skills training and usually last at least a few hours.⁶ Outpatient programs can be in person or by telehealth, meaning care online or over the phone.⁶ Interim care provides daily medicine and emergency counseling to keep a person safe while they wait for an outpatient, inpatient, or residential opening, and peer recovery support groups connect people with similar experiences.⁶

How well does therapy work?

Research supports many therapies, with important qualifications about measurement. In a systematic overview of 61 meta-analyses covering 21 psychiatric disorders, 852 trials, and 137,126 participants, the mean effect size was medium (0.50; 95% CI, 0.41–0.59); effect sizes of psychotherapies versus placebo tended to be higher than those of medication, but direct head-to-head comparisons did not reveal consistent differences.³ The same review found that psychotherapy trials had lower dropout rates and provided follow-up data, while pharmacotherapy trials more often had large samples, blinding, control groups, and intention-to-treat analyses, and that wait-list designs in psychotherapy studies showed larger effects than comparisons with placebo.³

A 2022 umbrella review that excluded weak comparators and formally assessed risk of bias found the SMD for combined treatment versus either monotherapy was 0.31 (95% CI: 0.19–0.44), and concluded that after more than half a century of research the effect sizes of psychotherapies and pharmacotherapies are limited, suggesting a ceiling effect for treatment research as presently conducted.⁴ A multiverse meta-analysis of psychotherapies for depression found the overall effectiveness robust, but noted that the effect size reported in any given meta-analysis depends less on the type of psychotherapy, format, or diagnosis than on comparison with wait-list control groups, inclusion of high-risk-of-bias studies, and correction for publication bias.⁷ In real-world service data from the 2nd UK National Audit of psychological therapies, patients above the clinical cut-off on the PHQ-9 showed a pre-post effect size of 1.59 for CBT with 46.6% meeting reliable and clinically significant change criteria, versus 1.55 and 44.3% for generic counseling.⁸ A network meta-analysis of acute-phase strategies for adult depression based on 2019–2024 evidence found that psychotherapy, pharmacotherapy, and physical therapy showed no significant differences in treatment response and remission rates as monotherapies.⁹

Mechanisms remain unsettled. Mechanisms remain unsettled. In psychotherapy research, mechanisms of change that have been suggested are typically conceptual rather than functional in character, and Alan Kazdin has contended that, despite decades of investigation and thousands of published studies, science still lacks an evidence-based account of how or why even the interventions studied most intensively bring about change.¹⁰ A 2026 systematic review of 34 randomized trials of full-model acceptance and commitment therapy against other bona fide psychotherapies found ACT was not superior on mental or behavioral health symptoms or functioning variables.¹¹

Course of treatment and what predicts benefit

In one classic study, half of the people who participated in psychotherapy improved after eight sessions, and 75% improved after six months.² Therapy is more likely to work when a person is open and honest with the therapist, committed to making changes, follows the agreed treatment plan, and completes homework assignments where applicable; the trust and relationship between client and therapist are essential to benefiting.² Rapport and trust matter from the start: NIMH advises a preliminary conversation about a therapist's credentials, approach, evidence base, goals, session frequency, and confidentiality limits before beginning.¹

Confidentiality is part of mental health professionals' code of ethics, with defined limits: professionals must report plans to hurt oneself or others, and abuse, exploitation, or neglect of children, the elderly, or people with disabilities.² Many people participate in psychotherapy multiple times throughout their life, whether for the same issue or different ones.²

References

Topic: Encyclopedia › Life and health › Human health and medicine › Medicines and therapeutics

Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 21, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 21, 2026 · Last review: Oct 21, 2026

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