Perspectives on scapegoating in primary groups

Theory and research related to the scapegoat role and scapegoating processes in primary groups are reviewed. This review and evaluation of the literature leads to the conclusion that scapegoating phenomena, though often highly stressful, can contribute significantly to individual and group development. Treatment issues and approaches are discussed.     

Structuring argumentation in a social constructivist framework: A pedagogy with computer support

What we usually think of as higher order skills in argumentation can be profitably viewed as systematic structures for organizing and representing information. Standard terms like line of argument, synthesis, analysis and draft can be viewed as ways of constructing, storing, and accessing data in a social context — data structures for social communication. What makes argument difficult are the multiple structures that arguers have to construct and negotiate when reading and composing. In this paper, we describe the WARRANT project, a project designed to identify data structures of written argument and to design and implement computer tools to aid in the reading and design of argument.     

Enactments: an intersubjective perspective.

We offer a critique and synthesis of classical and interpersonal views of enactment. From an intersubjective standpoint, the study of enactment leads to a reconsideration of the nature of the psychoanalytic process. And enactment becomes virtually synonymous with the psychoanalytic process. Enactments are interactions of analysand and analyst with communicative and resistive meanings that lead to valuable insight and can constitute corrective emotional experiences. Enactments that are recognized and defined become valuable dramatizing moments that have condensing, clarifying, and intensifying effects upon consciousness. The inevitable participation by the analyst in enactment is compatible with appropriate analytic discipline. A case will demonstrate these points.     

On being both with us and against us: a normative conflict model of dissent in social groups.

Although past research has demonstrated a positive relationship between collective identification and normative conformity, there may be circumstances in which strongly identified members do not conform but instead choose to challenge group norms. This article proposes a normative conflict model, which distinguishes between nonconformity due to dissent (challenging norms to change them) and nonconformity due to disengagement (distancing oneself from the group). The normative conflict model predicts that strongly identified members are likely to challenge group norms when they experience conflict between norms and important alternate standards for behavior, in particular when they perceive norms as being harmful to the group. Data in support of the model are reviewed, mechanisms by which external variables may influence dissent in social groups are elaborated, and the model is linked to contemporary perspectives on collective identity.     

On the action of social groups

This paper deals with the question of whether and when it is appropriate or inappropriate to say that a social group performs an action. After some remarks on the concept of action three kinds of groups are distinguished, i.e. assemblies, institutions, and classes. It is found that in the first two of these cases predication of action is possible: an assembly can act in that all its members act, or some of them do who are interchangeable with any others; and an institution can act because it has a structure and some individuals can act on its behalf. A class, however, cannot be said to act, for its concept may be freely formed, its members cannot be assembled, and it has no organs through which actions could be performed.     

Agency and the Other: On the intersubjective roots of self-identity

The essay argues that a systematic reconstruction of the intersubjective grounds of self-consciousness and self-identity will yield a complex non-reductive notion of agency. Core features of human agency include intentional causality, conscious understanding thereof, as well as the capacity to distinguish self-caused from externally caused phenomena. By analyzing how self-consciousness emerges from intersubjective perspective-taking and dialogue, a socially embedded and symbolically mediated notion of self-identity—one which is able to preserve the core features of human agency—becomes viable. G.H. Mead’s work serves as heuristic framework to articulate the extent to which the Other’s irreducible agency is constitutive of the self’s capacity to establish an identity, now understood as a socially situated narrative self-interpreting process. Self-identity reveals to be an essential open yet not fragmented dynamic, a socially situated yet agent-driven phenomenon, and ethically indebted to the Other as providing the essential gift of selfhood.     

The process of scapegoating in a neonatal nurses' group

This paper reviews the literature on scapegoating, elaborating on the underlying mechanisms before describing the process of scapegoating as it occurred in a neonatal nurse support group. Illustrative vignettes are used to discuss how scapegoating was used by group members to avoid painful feelings arising from their care of extremely ill infants. Group process is related to the stages of the group's development as feelings were addressed more directly and the need to use scapegoating as a defense decreased.     

Determining sociability, social space, and social presence in (a)synchronous collaborative groups.

The effectiveness of group learning in asynchronous distributed learning groups depends on the social interaction that takes place. This social interaction affects both cognitive and socioemotional processes that take place during learning, group forming, establishment of group structures, and group dynamics. Though now known to be important, this aspect is often ignored, denied or forgotten by educators and researchers who tend to concentrate on cognitive processes and on-task contexts. This "one-sided" educational focus largely determines the set of requirements in the design of computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL) environments resulting in functional CSCL environments. In contrast, our research is aimed at the design and implementation of sociable CSCL environments which may increase the likelihood that a sound social space will emerge. We use a theoretical framework that is based upon an ecological approach to social interaction, centering on the concept of social affordances, the concept of the sociability of CSCL environments, and social presence theory. The hypothesis is that the higher the sociability, the more likely that social interaction will take place or will increase, and the more likely that this will result in an emerging sound social space. In the present research, the variables of interest are sociability, social space, and social presence. This study deals with the construction and validation of three instruments to determine sociability, social space, and social presence in (a)synchronous collaborating groups. The findings suggest that the instruments have potential to be useful as measures for the respective variables. However, it must be realized that these measures are "first steps."     

From scapegoating to thinking and finding a home: delivering therapeutic work in schools

This paper discusses how the child psychotherapist's core skills can be usefully applied in a school setting. It outlines some of the important policy changes that have necessitated a move towards delivering therapeutic work in community settings such as schools. It is argued that the role of the child psychotherapist in schools has much in common with the role played by the psychotherapist in a therapeutic community. The paper suggests that therapy in schools is in many ways less simple than therapy in clinic settings, and in particular it is often unclear who exactly the client is and at what level to intervene when a referral is made. The referred patient is not necessarily the ‘problem’, so that the child psychotherapist must be prepared to tackle issues in the system to ensure that splitting and projection are reduced, and systems around children can become more containing. Clinical vignettes and one main clinical illustration are used to try to illustrate these points.     

The impact of social experience on neurobiological systems: illustration from a constructivist view of child maltreatment

In this article, I highlight the discipline of developmental psychopathology as an integrative framework that builds upon the historical underpinnings of a constructivist perspective. After presenting illustrative developmental psychopathology principles that I consider to be central to a constructivist view, I turn my attention to the role of experience on brain development. This serves as the entree into a discussion of research conducted with maltreated children on brain event-related potentials (ERPs) and the cognitive processing of emotional stimuli, neuroendocrine functioning, and acoustic startle. Each of these components of brain functioning serve to underscore how different neurobiological systems reflect the way in which individuals ascribe meaning to traumatic experiences. Research on child maltreatment, an “experiment of nature,” reveals that maltreated children actively construct their reality at both the biological and psychological levels of analysis, at least in part based on the meaning these children impute to their caregiving experiences.     

What remains of the intersubjective?: On the presencing of self and other

Recent work in the social sciences has been concerned with how we understand the subject. This has entailed critiquing the ways the subject has traditionally been understood – as a mental entity existing prior to and so organizing our experience of the world. In its place a relational subject has been posited, one emerging through a combination of affective experiences, performative enunciations, and haunting absent presences. However, the implications of such critiques for how we understand intersubjective relations have not been discussed. What remains of intersubjectivity when any subject entering into a relation has already been decentred amid a more-than human ecology of affective relations? In response, this paper draws on the work of Jean-Luc Nancy in developing understandings of the socio-spatial constitution of subjectivity/intersubjectivity in terms of movements of presencing. Here the body-subject is always in approach to itself and others, but neither is actually reached, never (self) present, always already receding: a spacing at the heart of any relation. The discussion is interspersed with a series of narrative sections outlining an encounter between a street performer and their audience which draw attention to a number of key themes in any understanding of intersubjectivity and attempt to expose this inherent dis-position.     

The shadow of familiarity: a contributor to the intersubjective field

This paper examines the influence of familiarity on the progress of analysis. It is proposed that familiarity is a particular aspect of the intersubjective field which emerges over time and begins to shape and influence the behaviours, perceptions, thoughts, and feelings of the participants. It is also proposed that states of familiarity can have facilitative or defensive functions in an analytic relationship and that it is an influence co-created in the field. The experience of familiarity operates as background to our various foreground concerns in analytic work and therefore exists primarily as an implicit, rather than explicit, experience in analysis. Defensive familiarity often creates a feeling of relatedness that is subtly unrelated, a form of pseudo-intimacy. Parallels between defensive familiarity and related concepts are examined including defences against the unknown, role responsiveness, romantic love, the image of the stranger, and unformulated experience. This paper concludes with two case examples and a discussion of procedural knowledge in the implicit domain as an explanatory framework for the understanding of familiarity states in the analytic setting.     

Children's subjective identification with social groups: a self-stereotyping approach

We contend that previous work on children's identification with social groups has looked at the mere categorization of the self in group terms and not subjective identification properly conceived. Drawing upon self-categorization theory, the present research operationalizes identification as self-stereotyping (i.e. the ability to conceive of the self in group-relevant terms). Children's self-stereotyping was explored in two studies using gender as the relevant ingroup. Study 1 required 5-, 7- and 10-year-old children, on two separate occasions, to rate their similarity to, and difference from, same-sex peers. Relative to the control condition, when gender had been made salient, children perceived significantly greater similarity, and smaller difference, between themselves and same-sex peers, thus providing evidence of a capacity for self-stereotyping and, hence, for subjective identification with a social category. Similarly, Study 2 sought trait ratings of the self both when gender had been made salient and when it had not. Boys of all ages (though not girls) rated ingroup-stereotypical traits (such as bravery and strength) to be more characteristic of the self when gender was salient than when it was not. Together, these findings suggest that the capacity for subjective identification with social groups is present at least by the age of 5 years. Moreover, they demonstrate that children's self-conceptions are contextually variable.     

The intrapsychic and intersubjective in psychoanalysis

Both the intrapsychic and the intersubjective take part in the analytic process. A pointless struggle for supremacy may await those who support either point of view exclusively. If the "objectal" perspective is well known, the "subjectal" one is less theoretically defined: it includes the series of the ego, the self, the subject, the I, etc. The drive is the matrix of the subject. An examination of the relationships between perception and representation raises the question of the connections between drive and object. The object is the revealer of the drive. A revision of Freud's theory must underline the role of the object, which is unduly neglected. The new paradigm should consider the indissociable couple, drive-object. The construction of the object leads retroactively to the hypothesis of the drive, which reciprocally constructs the object. The function of the similar other (autre semblable) is defined as a fundamental link (desire and identification). The intersubjective relationship connects two intrapsychic subjects. Force and meaning are intertwined and combine their effects. Psychic causality is at the crossroads of the biological (metabiological) and the cultural. This paper examines the transition from the first topographic model to the second.     

Gaining and losing social support: Momentum in decision-making groups

This paper addressed the question, is there a momentum effect in decision-making groups? That is, does movement toward a decision alternative encourage further similar movement? In the first two of three experiments, the movement of group members toward or away from a subject's preference was manipulated while holding constant the content of group discussion. The only significant effect of such shifts in position was an antimomentum effect; e.g., subjects were less likely to move toward an alternative which had gained a supporter than if no such shift in position had occurred. These experiments also demonstrated that the inverse relationship between overall level of support and likelihood of changing one's position (the “strength-in-numbers” effect) was not solely attributable to larger factions' ability to generate more arguments than smaller factions. In a final experiment, subjects were given an opportunity to defend their preference; under these conditions, the loss of a supporter might result in momentum-producing attributions (e.g., my arguments are unconvincing). However, these experimental conditions did not produce a momentum effect. Analyses of the content of subjects' speech paralleled the data on opinion change in these and previous studies—subjects were much more sensitive to current levels of support than to changes in the level of support. The antimomentum effect observed in Experiment 2 was attributed to a sensitivity to both one's current and past levels of support in the group.