Stories of Change: Comparative Time-Framed Experience Telling in Health Promotion Group Discussions

Abstract

In this article, we examine comparative time-framed experience telling: episodes of interaction in health promotion group discussions in which one of the participants tells their experience and, in response, another participant tells their own experiences from separate moments or periods of their life and compares them. In so doing, group members reinforce and encourage the previous speaker’s positive stance or challenge the negative stance toward contextually relevant objects: behavior change and suggested solutions. This practice allows group members to demonstrate their independent access to experiences that are similar to those of the other, present evidence of similarities and differences between the experiences, and show their epistemic independence regarding their claims. By recontextualizing the experience of the other in this way, it becomes possible for the group members to interpret and even oppose it while maintaining a level of understanding of the differences between the experiences in question and respecting them.

Effects of Transmission Delay on Client Participation in Video-Mediated Group Health Counseling

“…Earlier research on interaction dynamics in counseling settings has demonstrated how clients' possibilities are shaped on at least two intertwined levels: The lines of activities put forward in the interaction and how single turns of talk are designed to encourage different kinds of participation (Karhila et al, 2003;Logren et al, 2017aLogren et al, , 2017bLogren et al, , 2019aLogren et al, , 2019bPoskiparta et al, 1998Poskiparta et al, , 2001Tiitinen et al, 2018). Our analysis showed that participation dynamics is also managed at the level of speakership after overlaps.…”

“…While the small dataset could limit the generalizability of our findings, CA of institutional encounters aims not only at finding generalizable practices but also at describing what kind of practices are possible in a specific context (Peräkylä, 2004). In this research model, generalizability stems from comparing the findings from different contexts, which in our case means earlier findings from the counseling context (Karhila et al, 2003; Logren et al, 2017a, 2017b, 2019a, 2019b; Poskiparta et al, 1998, 2001) and research on VM interaction in different contexts (Ruhleder & Jordan, 2001; Rusk & Pörn, 2019; Seuren et al, 2020). Moreover, by using the concept of participation (Castro et al, 2016; Collins et al, 2007; Halabi et al, 2020) as a basis for theoretical comparison, we have been able to show how delay, which is a general feature of any kind of VM interaction, becomes consequential specifically in counseling contexts.…”

“…Group health counseling offers practical knowledge about healthier living and enables beneficial social processes that are not available in individual counseling, such as social support (Cormack et al, 2018;Frigerio & Montali, 2016;Logren et al, 2019aLogren et al, , 2019b. With digital technologies having become widespread, counseling can be provided online, as through synchronous video-mediated (VM) encounters in which counseling clients and supervisors meet in a video conference.…”

“…Logren et al (2017a) have described how clients can ask questions to produce shifts from leader-driven to member-driven discussion, which then affords increased client participation and exchange of experiences among peers. By responding to one another's experiences, clients can provide social support, offer different perspectives on the topic at hand, and challenge other clients' thinking in constructive ways (Logren et al, 2017b(Logren et al, , 2019a(Logren et al, , 2019b. When group members engage in these practices, they work collaboratively toward the goals of counseling, sometimes in ways that are not available to the counselor.…”