This article starts with a response to the second article by Taha et al., published here, which further defines the Egyptian Minia model of group psychotherapy. The debate continues as to whether group analysis has as part of the model an inactive conductor and whether this is linked to the social unconscious of the modern West and whether that indeed is a fatherless society. There is a discussion on which different components of therapy are more effective. Methods of group analytic psychotherapy are clarified and the therapist’s role linked to the goal of the therapy. The group analytic therapist keeps in mind, both the personal transference and social unconscious levels and develops the group by facilitating communication at both these levels. Examples from individual and group analytic psychotherapy illustrate work at the level of the social unconscious.
This article examines the theory and research from psychotherapy, neuroscience and outcome studies that help to understand the impact of childhood sexual abuse and its treatment in groups. When treating trauma in groups, attention needs to be paid to containment, and as such there is an analysis of the relationship between containment and structure in group analytic groups. The concept of the cultural mother, related to the mature matrix is outlined. The journey in an analytic group from being stuck, and repeating traumatic relationships, to freedom in being ‘reborn’, is mediated through the significance of the maternal and phallic symbols as they are active and experienced within the group analytic group.
The results of an audit project on treatment length from an NHS department of psychoanalytic psychotherapy are outlined. Average lengths of treatment in individual and group therapy are reported. A discrepancy was found between the`prescribed' length of therapy and length of time actually spent in therapy.
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