View/Open - Scholarly Commons Home

Chapter Six – Part of a Session – Page 199
challenge is really important, since it is rare in this class for students to challenge each
other, but the outcome is that it is not possible for Frances to be usefully challenged by
individuals or the group. This may be a result of factors in Frances, or of the lack of
leadership by the tutors (which leadership would almost certainly be needed to make
possible the challenge), or of a group process such as scapegoating. Scapegoating would
imply that at some level of awareness there is an imperative that Frances should not be
challenged because she is carrying out a task on behalf of the group.
Abandonment
Abandonment seems to be a major theme in the session. I became aware of this when I
saw the pattern of the eruption coming when the caretakers (tutors) come back. This is
reminiscent of the pattern observed in the studies of the attachments of children to their
caregivers, of distress on reunion, that led to the evolution of Attachment Theory
(Bowlby, 1969, 1973, 1980). I want to suggest that this may be a symbolic
manifestation at the level of the group of infant behaviour following reunion with a
primary caregiver, as studied in the development of attachment theory. It as if the
group’s accomplishment in the task of sustaining the trust of the group in the group and
in the process of the semester has temporarily been lost. Linking in to the previous point
about managing distance, that trust was probably diminished by the non-response of the
tutors to what Tom said about hypnosis before the break. What was needed might only
have been a particular kind of holding remark.
This is a version of a familiar challenge to the psychoanalytic principle of abstinence.
Whilst working psychoanalytically implies acceptance of the ‘fundamental rule of
psycho-analytic technique’ (that the patient say anything that comes to mind) and the
rule of abstinence (that the analyst refrain from responding directly to the patient’s free