According to a randomized-controlled trial published in The Lancet Psychiatry, patients with schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorders who receive a modified psychodynamic psychotherapy alongside routine psychiatric care experience significant improvements in daily functioning and enduring reductions in negative symptoms compared to those receiving standard care alone.
MPP-S Study Details and Long-Term Findings
The multi-year MPP-S study, which Deutsches GesundheitsPortal reports spanned 11 years of research, evaluated 130 outpatient participants aged 18 to 64. Investigators randomly assigned patients diagnosed with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorders into two distinct cohorts. One group received standard psychiatric treatment coupled with a specialized manualized psychodynamic psychotherapy framework consisting of a minimum of 30 individual sessions. The control group received standard psychiatric treatment alone (treatment as usual, or TAU).
According to study leaders Prof. Dorothea von Haebler of the International Psychoanalytic University Berlin, Prof. Christiane Montag of Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, and Dr. Günter Lempa of Munich, the trial addresses a long-standing scientific gap. While psychotherapeutic interventions for psychoses are broadly established, systematic validation of psychodynamic procedures under contemporary scientific standards had previously been missing.
Psychosocial Functioning and Negative Symptom Relief
Participants receiving the specialized psychodynamic therapy demonstrated statistically significant enhancements in their psychosocial functional level. This metric measures a patient’s capacity to independently organize daily life, manage interpersonal relationships, and sustain societal participation. Researchers noted that this functional divergence became clearly identifiable at the two-year mark and grew even more pronounced during the three-year follow-up assessment.
Furthermore, the therapy cohort showed a notable reduction in negative symptoms such as social withdrawal, diminished emotional expression, and lack of drive. These specific symptoms are notoriously difficult to treat and severely restrict daily living. By contrast, the data revealed no statistically significant differences between the two treatment arms regarding positive symptoms such as delusions and hallucinations, depressive symptoms, or the total number of inpatient hospital treatment days.
Methodological Rigor and Therapeutic Approach
To maintain objective evaluation standards throughout the trial, independent assessors who were blinded to patient group allocations measured treatment outcomes. The participating therapists possessed specialized clinical experience treating psychosis and received continuous supervision throughout the duration of the study.
The investigation builds upon decades of clinical practice within psychodynamic frameworks.
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