The conversational model of psychotherapy was devised by the English psychiatrist Robert Hobson, and developed by the Australian psychiatrist Russell Meares. Hobson listened to recordings of his own psychotherapeutic practice with more disturbed clients, and became aware of the ways in which a patient's self—their unique sense of personal being—can come alive and develop, or be destroyed, in the flux of the conversation in the consulting room.

The conversational model views the aim of therapy as allowing the growth of the patient's self through encouraging a form of conversational relating called 'aloneness-togetherness'. This phrase is reminiscent of Winnicott's idea of the importance of being able to be 'alone in the presence of another'. The client comes to eventually feel recognised, accepted and understood as who they are; their sense of personal being, or self, is fostered; and they can start to drop the destructive defenses which disrupt their sense of personal being.

The development of the self implies a capacity to embody and span the dialectic of 'aloneness-togetherness'—rather than being disposed toward either schizoid isolation (aloneness) or merging identification with the other (togetherness). Although the therapy is described as psychodynamic, and is accordingly concerned to identify activity and personal meaning in the midst of apparent passivity, it relies more on careful empathic listening and the development of a common 'feeling language' than it does on psychoanalytic interpretation.