Global trends: cultural grounding of psychotherapy without theoretical fragmentation

Abstract

Psychotherapy is evolving in low- and middle-income countries, where expanding access must be balanced with cultural relevance. This paper examines how culturally grounded adaptations preserve theoretical fidelity while enhancing contextual responsiveness. Drawing on the 2025 World Federation for Psychotherapy Regional Meeting in Manila, three vignettes – from the Philippines, Uganda and Indonesia – illustrate how constructs such as kapwa , pakikiramdam , ubuntu and intergenerational obligation are integrated into evidence-based models. These adaptations demonstrate how core psychotherapeutic elements, particularly common factors such as alliance and empathy, are operationalised through local meaning systems while addressing structural conditions and trauma. Cultural grounding therefore extends, rather than fragments, psychotherapy’s theoretical foundations.