Years of Clinical Experience and Therapist Professional Development: A Literature Review

The purpose of this article is to review the effect of years of clinical experience on aspects of therapist professional development. Themes within this specific literature were determined inductively as part of an all-inclusive review. Years of clinical experience were found to be positively associated with increased confidence and perceived mastery in clinical ability, increased flexibility in professional identity and therapeutic orientation, reduced stress and anxiety in clinical practice, and improvements in clinical judgment and decision-making. Although years of experience were found to relate to increased therapist focus on the therapeutic relationship, evidence does not suggest that it is associated with improved ability to increase its quality. It is unclear how years of clinical experience affect therapist usage of and attitude towards evidence supported treatments and evidence based practice given the interference of age cohort effects. This literature is limited by overly-proportionate psychodynamic samples and the use of primarily cross-sectional designs.