Abstract: To review the theoretical viewpoints on the functioning mechanisms of psychotherapeutic relationship. It is found that there are three major ones. The first, social influence theory, considers that the therapeutic relationship enhances the reliability of a counselor, and thereby enhances the influence of the information given by the counselor on the client respect to attitude change. The second, psychodynamic view, claims that transferential relationship makes it easy to recognise the attachment style of a client, and thereby is helpful to the analysis work. The third, client-centered approach, holds that a good therapist-client relationship reduces the defense of a client, and thereby facilitates the client in getting higher congruency. The author argues for a new approach to the studies in this field, which takes a “ cross-theory ” standpoint on constructing a theoretical model

Key words: Therapeutic relationship, Therapeutic mechanism