Conflict in Group Therapy: The Management of Individual Differences

We present a new model for understanding how individuals manifest conflict in group psychotherapy and the major changes in technique following from this model. It is proposed that individuals make unconscious decisions to expose conflict when it is safe to do so, as opposed to traditional dynamic theory, in which conflict emerges when it erupts out of defensive control. Control-mastery theory is described and compared with traditional dynamic approaches to group therapy. An extended clinical example (not included but available on request) demonstrates technical innovations that are useful for management of group conflict and that respond to the presence of often strongly contradictory individual growth needs in the group setting.