| Course | NRNP 6624 Foundations of Psychotherapy |
|---|---|
| Week | Week 1 |
| Paper type | Discussion post with two peer replies |
| Length | About 570 words, 4 pages |
| Format | Discussion post, APA 7 citations |
| School | Walden University |
| Program | MSN Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner (PMHNP) |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for NRNP 6624 Week 1
Week 1 Discussion: Initial Post
An Alliance You Cannot Point to in the Record Has Not Been Assessed
My position: an alliance that cannot be pointed to in the session record has not been assessed, only hoped for. Saying that the alliance is good, without anything a colleague could read and check, is a feeling about the session, not a finding.
Bordin's account gives three parts that can each be observed (Bordin, 1979). Agreement on goals: the client and clinician can each say what they are working toward, in words the other would recognize. Agreement on tasks: the client accepts what will happen in and between sessions as a reasonable way to get there. The bond: enough trust and liking to carry the work through the hard parts. The Working Alliance Inventory turned these three components into a measure that client and therapist can each complete (Horvath & Greenberg, 1989), which is one way to put the alliance in the record.
A composite client, invented for this thread: a 38-year-old warehouse worker referred by his primary care clinician for low mood, who says in the first minute, "I'm only here because my doctor won't refill anything until I talk to someone." He is not resistant; he is reluctant, and he has told me why. In an early session the markers would look like this. Goals: he says he wants to "sleep through the night and stop snapping at my kids," and I write that goal in his words. Tasks: he agrees to track sleep for a week but declines homework about his feelings, which I record as a partial task agreement rather than as noncompliance. Bond: he returns for the second session and says the first was "less weird than I thought," which I quote.
The alliance matters for outcome across therapies: a meta-analysis of 295 studies covering more than 30,000 patients found an alliance-outcome correlation of about .28 in face-to-face psychotherapy, consistent across treatment approaches (Flückiger et al., 2018). That is the reason to document it, not just to feel it.
The prescriber who also listens. As a psychiatric nurse practitioner, I may also be the person who prescribes. The goal and task agreements then include the medication, and a client who agrees to therapy only to secure a prescription has an alliance built on a condition. I would name that condition openly in the first session and record the client's response, because an alliance that depends on a prescription is fragile in a specific, predictable way.
Reply to Samantha
Samantha, your client missed the third session after you suggested exploring her relationship with her mother. I would read that as a possible rupture in task agreement rather than as avoidance. In a meta-analysis, episodes of rupture repair were moderately associated with better outcomes, with a correlation of about .29 (Eubanks et al., 2018), which suggests the missed session is an opportunity if it is named. Asking her directly whether that suggestion felt like the wrong task might repair it.
Reply to Daniel
Daniel, you wrote that an alliance forms in the first session or not at all. I would disagree with the first-session limit. The bond in Bordin's model can grow as the goals and tasks become shared, and my composite client's second-session comment is an example of a bond forming after a reluctant start. What the first session does decide, I think, is whether the goals were written in the client's words or the clinician's.
References
Bordin, E. S. (1979). The generalizability of the psychoanalytic concept of the working alliance. Psychotherapy: Theory, Research & Practice, 16(3), 252-260. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0085885
Eubanks, C. F., Muran, J. C., & Safran, J. D. (2018). Alliance rupture repair: A meta-analysis. Psychotherapy, 55(4), 508-519. https://doi.org/10.1037/pst0000185
Flückiger, C., Del Re, A. C., Wampold, B. E., & Horvath, A. O. (2018). The alliance in adult psychotherapy: A meta-analytic synthesis. Psychotherapy, 55(4), 316-340. https://doi.org/10.1037/pst0000172
Horvath, A. O., & Greenberg, L. S. (1989). Development and validation of the Working Alliance Inventory. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 36(2), 223-233. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0167.36.2.223
What the NRNP 6624 Week 1 instructions ask for
The first NRNP 6624 thread usually asks what the therapeutic alliance is and how a psychiatric nurse practitioner builds and judges it. Faculty want more than praise of empathy and warmth; the stronger posts define the alliance with a recognized model and show how it could be observed or measured. Cite at least two sources in APA 7, ideally including a primary paper such as Bordin's. The initial post is due by midweek and usually runs a few hundred words. Two replies follow before the week ends, each adding a source or a practical point. Session dialogue is optional, and many sections prefer a brief described example over a script. Some instructors ask how the alliance differs in medication management visits. Keep the post focused on one claim rather than a survey of every factor in therapy.
How this NRNP 6624 Week 1 example is built
A single sentence states the position before anything else: an alliance that cannot be pointed to in the session record has not been assessed. It then sets out Edward Bordin's three components, agreement on the goals of therapy, agreement on the tasks that will pursue them, and the bond that holds the work together, giving each a line on what it looks like in an early session with a composite adult who arrived at the clinic reluctant. The Working Alliance Inventory is cited as the instrument that turned Bordin's idea into a measure. A short paragraph addresses the dual role of a clinician who both prescribes and provides therapy. One reply takes up rupture and repair as Safran and Muran described them; the other questions whether a first meeting can show a bond.
NRNP 6624 Week 1 rubric: what earns full marks
Credit in an opening thread on the alliance tracks how far the post moves from praise of empathy toward something a record could hold. A post agreeing that relationships matter in therapy, citing a textbook and stopping, collects the participation line and little of the analysis line, since nothing in it could be disputed. Bordin's components listed without an observable marker for each read as recall. Rubrics in this course also watch register: describing the composite client as resistant, rather than recording what she said about why she came, costs the professional language criterion. The dual-role question is optional in some prompts, and posts raising it without a source lose more than they gain. Replies thanking the author for an insightful post are counted, then scored as the agreement they are.
Common NRNP 6624 Week 1 mistakes, and how to avoid them
Alliance posts lose analysis credit when they agree that relationships matter and stop there. Take a position a classmate could question. Another common gap is defining the alliance without a framework, so goals, tasks and bond never appear. Name them. Writers also cite only the course textbook, though primary sources are easy to find for this topic. Add one. Avoid claiming that a good alliance guarantees outcome; the evidence shows a moderate link. Show what you would write in a note to show the alliance was checked. Mention a brief rating tool if your section allows it. In replies, raise rupture and repair or cultural fit with a source. Close with one habit you would use in your first sessions.
Get a NRNP 6624 Week 1 example written to your instructions
Forward the Week 1 discussion prompt with the rubric your section posted, and the desk returns the full thread as a finished example: an initial post on the alliance plus the replies your classroom requires. Your first custom sample is free and arrives within 24-48 hours, and its client is invented for the thread, never drawn from a session you sat in.
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NRNP 6624 Week 1 questions, answered
Why Bordin rather than Rogers for an alliance post?
Because Bordin's model divides the alliance into parts that can each be seen in a session, which is what makes it arguable in a thread. Rogers's conditions describe what the therapist offers; Bordin describes what two people agree on. Rogers is not ignored in the course, and many sections take up his work a few weeks later. Your own prompt may name a different model, and a sample follows it.
Does the example quote dialogue from a session?
Two short lines of invented dialogue appear, each placed to show one alliance component forming, and neither comes from a real encounter. Longer transcripts are avoided because a thread post is argued rather than transcribed, since long dialogue usually strikes markers as padding. Your own post might use none at all; whether illustrative dialogue is expected or merely tolerated varies by section and rubric.
How many sources does the initial post cite?
Three: Bordin's original account of the working alliance, a source on the Working Alliance Inventory, and one current article on combining prescribing with therapy. Every citation lands beside the claim it backs, never pooled in a closing line. Discussion rubrics in this program often fix a minimum count of scholarly sources for opening posts, and your section's figure governs whatever a custom sample carries.
Where can I find a free NRNP 6624 Week 1 sample paper?
The alliance post is on this page with Bordin's three parts applied, the brief rating tools and replies to Samantha and Daniel, plus margin notes.
How is the therapeutic alliance assessed in NRNP 6624 Week 1?
By checking agreement on goals and tasks and the quality of the bond, and recording it, sometimes with a short rating scale. The example shows what that record looks like.