OBJECTIVES: The present paper describes a study on the intake interview narratives of psychotherapy patients with assisted content analysis methods.

METHODS: 47 psycho-dynamic diagnostic interviews of patients suffering from depression or anxiety disorders were analysed using a Gottschalk-Gleser technique with the Dresdner Angstwörterbuch (DAW) as well as with the Affektives Diktionär Ulm (ADU).

RESULTS: Comparisons between different subgroups of this sample were made: Anxiety vs. depression patients, East Germans (Magdeburg) vs. West Germans (Düsseldorf) and men vs. women. The comparisons showed that feelings of anxiety were important in all subgroups. Depressed patients not only spoke more often about depressed feelings in comparison with the other subgroups, but also seemed more able to express emotions of other kinds. Among the differences according to the diagnostic dichotomy there were also significant results which demonstrated the influence of cultural background and sex of the interviewees on the contents of the intake interviews.

CONCLUSIONS: The results confirm our hypothesis that the psychotherapist-patient-interaction sequences, which are the basis of diagnostic categorization, consist of elements specific for the disorders under study as well as elements specific for sex and culture (east vs. west). Some content analysis markers of these elements are identified in our study.