Self-talk of group therapists.

Abstract

To identify group leader cognitions and the role experience may play in leader cognitive schemas, 60 participants were placed in 1 of 3 groups on the basis of group-leading experience and were exposed to a 20-min videotape of a group session, during which they completed a thought-listing instrument. Two judges free sorted the 1,299 collected thoughts and identified and defined 17 distinct thought categories. Three trained judges then placed 1,271 (97.8%) of the thoughts into these categories. Differences among experience levels were also explored through correlation and stepwise multiple regression analyses. Two thoughts, interpretation of group process and internal question regarding member, were found to account for 56% of the variance in experience level. Findings are discussed in terms of group leader cognitive processing, and suggestions for future research are provided.Group counseling, as opposed to individual counseling, presents a more complex therapeutic environment. Group therapists must reflect on and process vast amounts of information (Kivlighan & Quigley, 1991); thus, competent group leadership skills are important. Stockton, Morran, and Velkoff (1987) stressed the need for researchers to begin to conceptualize group leadership as a dynamic, flowing process that requires great flexibility and adaptability for optimal effectiveness. In Conyne, Harvill, Morganett, Morran, and Hulse-Killacky (1990), Morran stated that research must not ignore "the fact that leadership is largely a cognitive process" (p. 33) and that effective group leadership needs a comprehensive operational definition that attends to both the behavioral and cognitive components of leader behavior.Cognitive process research, which acknowledges the importance of understanding the many covert events occurring simultaneously within the therapeutic process, is important because it provides data upon which counselor trainers can create and empirically test counseling training methodologies (Hill, 1990). This research has centered around two main areas of study: counselor intentions (

Self-Talk of Group Counselors: The Research of Rex Stockton

“…Stockton reported that these unique intentions were specifically related to group counseling and working with multiple clients. They also found that intention categories were similar to the already discussed self-talk categories of Hines, Stockton, and Morran (1995), which demonstrated that self-talk and intentions are closely related constructs. This provided strong support that self-talk is involved in the impact of intentions on actual intervention selection.…”

“…While both Hines, Stockton, and Morran (1995) and Kivlighan and Quigley (1991) showed that experience level affects group leader selftalk, Hines (1994) did not find the same experience-related differences in cognitive complexity identified by Kivlighan and Quigley. Therefore, Stockton posited that factors other than experience must affect cognitive complexity.…”

“…Hines (1994) conducted a doctoral dissertation (now published as Hines, Stockton, & Morran, 1995) that examined such content. In this study, participants identified as novice, beginner, or expert group leaders watched a series of video vignettes and listed their thoughts regarding these vignettes.…”

Are Group Leader Knowledge Structures Related to Member Satisfaction With the Leader?

“…Two types of thoughts, interpretation of group process and internal question regarding group members, significantly differentiated the experienced group leaders from the less experienced group leaders. Taken together, the Kivlighan and Quigley (1991) and Hines et al (1995) studies show that experienced group practitioners have a more differentiated and complex knowledge structure than do novice group practitioners. Kivlighan, Markin, Stahl, and Salahuddin (2007) examined how novice leaders' knowledge structure of group members changed with group counseling training.…”

Conceptualizing Group Dynamics From Our Clients' Perspective: Development of the Conceptualization of Group Dynamics Inventory

“…There also has been a significant amount of research about case conceptualization in the context of group counseling (Browne, 2005;Christensen & Kline, 2000;Hines, Stockton, & Morran, 1995;Kivlighan, Martin, Stahl, & Salahuddin, 2007;Kivlighan & Quigley, 1991;McPherson & Walton, 1970;Okech & Kline, 2006;Rubel & Kline, 2008). These findings suggest that group counselors' case conceptualizations differ in terms of cognitive organization and complexity (Kivlighan et al, 2007;Kivlighan & Quigley, 1991;McPherson & Walton, 1970), professional experience and feelings of competence (Hines et al, 1995;Okech & Kline, 2006), and thematic content (Browne, 2005;Hines et al, 1995). These studies reveal a significant breadth and depth of information about group counselors' thoughts and perceptions about their groups.…”