Gags and Gaffes in Group Analysis

My First Group as a Trainer in Norway

I’ll never forget my first group session as a visiting trainer in Norway. I wandered through the vast labyrinthine conference centre until I found my group room. The group was already assembled, awaiting my arrival. As I entered the room a circle of twelve tense, suspicious faces turned in my direction. One by one the group members rose, stepped forward and solemnly shook hands with me. ‘Fine,’ I thought, ‘this is the way they do things in Norway. I’ll understand the cultural meaning of these ritual handshakes later on.’ So we settled into a long, deep silence which felt as if it lasted for half an hour, but which, as I later learnt, had been no more than ten minutes. Eventually someone began talking softly in Norwegian and I started to relax. Clearly this was a defensive manoeuvre designed to challenge the English-speaking conductor. A barely audible exchange in Norwegian ensued leaving me bewildered but determined to let the resistance run its course. At this point there was a knock at the door and I was called out by someone whom I vaguely recognised as a member of our Norwegian Organising Committee. Apparently I had walked into the wrong room and was in the process of chairing a meeting of the Norwegian Institute of Marine Biology.

What is Group Analysis?

A trainee once asked Foulkes this very question. ‘O Foulkes’, he asked reverently, ‘pray what is group analysis?’

Foulkes replied as follows: ‘I cannot answer your question by myself. To answer your question I will need seven persons. Go from this place. Fetch me seven persons of sound mind, even temperament and neurotic disposition. Bring them to me and leave them with me for three years. And at the end of that time you shall return and ask of all of us the question which you now ask of me.’

So the trainee did as he was told and brought the seven persons to Foulkes. And he went away and waited for three years. At the end of the three years he returned and found the seven people together with Foulkes, all sitting in a neat circle, all looking incredibly wise.

Then the student asked the question he had been patiently waiting to ask. ‘O Group’, he said (he knew by now that it would be futile to ask that question of Foulkes alone). ‘Tell me, pray, what is group analysis?’

After a short silence one group member spoke. ‘Group analysis’, he said importantly, ‘is what happens when the group does the work, the patient gets better, and the therapist gets the payment.’

‘No’, said a second group member. ‘That is not the case. Group analysis is what happens when the patient does the work, the group gets better and the therapist gets the payment.

‘Not at all,’ said a third group member. ‘Group analysis occurs when both the patient and the group do the work while the therapist gets better and also gets the payment.’

The fourth group member said, ‘I don’t know what group analysis is, but I know what it should be. The therapist should do the work, the patient should get better, and the group should get the payment.’

Then the fifth group member spoke up. ‘I do not wish to talk about this topic’, he said. ‘It is not important to me. I have other things on my mind.’

The sixth group member tartly said, ‘I did not like the way you said that.’

The seventh group member (the only trainee in the group) said, ‘I think we should ask the group leader.’

So they all turned obediently to Foulkes, their faces radiating hope and expectancy, to await his answer.

And Foulkes sat for a very long time, musing in silence. At last he spoke, and these were his words: ‘It’s time to finish’.

Harold Behr
Harold.behr@ntlworld.com