Beyond the interpersonal circumplex in group psychotherapy: The structure and relationship to outcome of the individual group member interpersonal process scale

Development of a new scale to measure patient behavior in group psychotherapy, the Individual Group Member Interpersonal Process Scale (IGIPS), is described. This scale captures clinically important aspects of how patients act in group, including how they respond to the other group members. The IGIPS was applied to videotapes of the first four sessions of seven 15‐session outpatient therapy groups (52 patients) in the Mental Heatlh Department of a health maintenance organization. The scale was found to have five factors (Activity, Interpersonal Sensitivity, Comfort with Self, Self‐Focus, and Psychological Mindedness). Patient behavior that was moderate on two IGIPS dimensions was connected with better outcome than was that of patients with more extreme behavior in either direction. Portions of this work were presented to the meeting of the North American Society for Psychotherapy Research, Panama City, FL, November 1991. This work was supported by grant R01‐MH40131‐04 from the National Institute of Mental Health and by support from the Harvard Community Health Plan Foundation.