Change in Life Attitudes During Inpatient Psychosomatic Treatment.

This article investigates whether meaning-based life attitudes, measured by the Life Attitude Profile–Revised (LAP-R), change during inpatient psychosomatic treatment and identifies factors influencing such changes. In a naturalistic prospective study of 138 patients treated in a German psychosomatic unit, significant but modest improvements were observed in life attitudes alongside larger clinical improvements in psychological symptoms, self-efficacy, and life satisfaction. Neuroticism was negatively correlated with life attitudes at admission but positively associated with greater improvement in coherence and self-efficacy during treatment, while the quality of the therapeutic relationship also predicted positive changes in certain life attitude dimensions. The findings suggest that although life attitudes are relatively stable, they can be positively influenced by intensive inpatient psychosomatic treatment, with implications for integrating value-based approaches and therapeutic alliance considerations into psychotherapy.