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Chapter Two Part One – Literature review - Page 37
the classic theoretical formulations of Foulkes (1948, 1964) and Bion (1961) amongst
others. In particular, these developments take more account of the destructive forces
within groups, and there is a growing interest in the social unconscious based on the
notion of social as prior.
Second, and linked, there is knowledge about groups from the group therapy training
field. Group therapists are trained and supervised in groups by group-aware trainers
(Barnes, Ernst, & Hyde, 1999; Behr, 1995; Behr & Hearst, 2005; Hearst and Sharpe,
1991; Sharpe, 1995a, 1995b). There is a small but growing literature on clinical
supervision of group psychotherapy that takes place in groups (Tsegos, 1995).
Third, there is knowledge about groups from classic and more recent studies in the
human relations field (Hinshelwood & Chiesa, 2001; Hirschorn, 1988; Main, 1957;
Menzies, 1960; Miller, 1990; Obholzer & Roberts, 1994; Trist & Murray, 1990). Much
of this work focuses on organisations, management at the boundary, and anxiety and
institutional defences against it. All of these are relevant to the training process. This is
particularly true in a contextual fashion, for example, in terms of understanding the
training course as a temporary institution (Bridger, 1990), but many experiences
encountered in human service organisations (Menzies, 1960) are also directly relevant
to the training process in psychotherapy.
Fourth, there is knowledge, particularly but not exclusively, about groups from the
fields of education and training. A particularly important concept is Schön’s (1983)
notion of the reflective practitioner, one able to move from reflection-on-action (post
hoc) to reflection-in-action. To enable this transition is surely one of the key tasks of
psychoanalytic psychotherapy training, and it is hard to see why one would not work on