Co-Creating Meaningful Structures within Long-Term Psychotherapy Group Culture

Abstract

Meaningful group structures are co-created within the long-term outpatient psychotherapy group through a hermeneutical interaction between structure and immediate experience of structure by individuals embedded in personal and collective contexts. Co-created meanings expand original group- and self-understandings and further evolve structures that are stable yet do not exist independently of the narratives and affects of the members who interact with them. Group structures do not reduce, expand, or dissolve but change in connection to the experiences and meaning attributions within the group. This intersubjective process mediates the emphasis within group theory on leader responsibility for culture building that risks overpromoting certain psychotherapeutic cultural intentions over others. Three examples of intersubjective hermeneutical interaction within long-term psychotherapy groups lend insight into global, cultural, and societal groups.