Short-Term Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy (STPP) for adolescents is a model of psychoanalytic therapy that includes 28 individual psychotherapy sessions with adolescents or young individuals and 7 sessions with their parents or caregivers, supported by supervision.

As a treatment for young people with mild or severe depression, it has its roots in psychoanalytic principles and practices and stems from a long tradition of applying time-limited psychoanalytic models to adolescents in the United Kingdom.

The effectiveness of the model has been tested in the largest clinical trial conducted in Europe on adolescent depression (IMPACT study). The usefulness, or rather the necessity, of STPP is multi-faceted.

The time-limited nature of the model aligns with the developmental needs of adolescents and the processes of separation and individuation. Although many psychoanalytic psychotherapists may find the predetermined end to a time-limited therapy to be "depriving" and imposed, for adolescents and young people, the duration of 28 sessions can provide a sufficiently good experience of care and understanding of their unconscious anxiety, without worrying, as is often the case, that they will be "trapped" in a long-term commitment.

STPP can offer them a first experience of understanding their emotions, as well as facilitate their trust and investment in therapy, and inspire them towards a more long-term therapeutic process in the future.