Therapeutic Factors: What Makes Therapy Groups Effective

1. Therapeutic Factors: What Makes Therapy Groups Effective • Instillation of hope • Universality • Imparting of information • Altruism • Corrective recapitualization of the primary family group • Development of socializing techniques • Imitative behavior

2. Therapeutic Factors: What Makes Therapy Groups Effective (cont.) • Interpersonal learning • Group cohesiveness • Catharsis • Existential factors

3. Overview: Interpersonal Learning as a Therapeutic Factor • Described in the discussion of: • The importance of interpersonal relationships • The corrective emotional experience • The group as a social microcosm

4. Overview: Interpersonal Learning Sequence • Psychological symptomology emanates from disturbed relationships • Psychotherapy group evolves into a social microcosm • Group members become aware of significant aspects of their interpersonal behavior (e.g., strengths, limitations, distortions, maladaptive behavior)

5. Overview: Interpersonal Learning Sequence (cont.) • Regular interpersonal sequence occurs in group • Pathology display: member displays behavior • Through feedback and self-observation, patients • Become better witnesses of own behavior • Appreciate impact of that behavior upon • Feelings of others • Opinions others have of them • Opinions they have of themselves

6. Overview: Interpersonal Learning Sequence (cont.) • Awareness of sequence leads to patient awareness of personal responsibility for it • Acceptance of personal responsibility leads to struggle with notion “if they created their social-relational world, then they have the power to change it” • Depth and meaningfulness of understandings are directly proportional to amount of affect associated with the sequence

7. Overview: Interpersonal Learning Sequence (cont.) • Patient gradually changes by risking new ways of being with others; change is a function of: • Patient’s motivation for change and amount of current discomfort / dissatisfaction with current behavior • Patient’s involvement in the group • Rigidity of patient’s character structure and interpersonal style

8. Overview: Interpersonal Learning Sequence (cont.) • Patient realizes new behavior does not result in previously feared calamity • Social microcosm concept is bi-directional • behavior learned in group appears in alterations in patient’s interpersonal behavior outside the group

9. Overview: Interpersonal Learning Sequence (cont.) • Adaptive spiral set in motion • As patient’s interpersonal distortions diminish, ability to form rewarding relationships increases • Social anxiety decreases; self-esteem increases; self-concealment needs diminish • Others respond positively to behavior, encouraging further change

10. Overview: Transference and Insight • Transference • Specific form of interpersonal perceptual distortion • In group therapy, range and variety of distortions are considerably greater than in individual therapy • Working through transference is only one of a series of distortions to be examined in the therapy process

11. Overview: Transference and Insight (cont.) • In group therapy, patients may gain insight on 4 different levels: • More objective perspective on their interpersonal presentation • Understanding into their more complex interactional patterns of behavior • Motivational insight - learning why they do what they do to and with other people • Genetic insight - helping patients understand how they got to be the way they are