Abstract

Walter and Ross rightfully argue that healthcare providers need to employ a less authoritarian, more empowering approach if they want to support patients’ behavioral changes. They show how motivational interviewing (MI), informed by self-determination theory, engages patients and thus may inspire enduring changes. They ground these interventions in an important, new model of relational autonomy, emphasizing the patient’s self-respect and self-cohesion as well as self-determination, and they show how patient–provider interactions influence these three aspects of autonomy. It may be surprising then, that in the first part of this essay, I argue that it is problematic for them to ground their empowerment model in the ..