by Mercè Martínez, 2013

Introduction

The leading ideas of this brief history of the Foro de Grupo-Análisis come from a communication presented by Juan Campos and myself in the VII Meeting of RedIRIS[1], which I have revised and amplified during these last years, recurring to the archives of the Foro de Grupo-Análisis as well as our pathways in group analysis[2].

If the Forum exists, it exists because Juan Campos —always years ahead of his time, also in what concerns the new technologies— worked tirelessly in leading groups and group analysis into the virtual space. We can pinpoint the beginning of this “expansion” into cyberspace in 1995, when the appearance of Windows ’95 and the more massified access to Internet made that some of the projects he had in mind started to materialize[3].
At the end of that year the distribution list “Foro de Grupo Análisis en Castellano” is initiated. It has come a long way and we still maintain it open although there is little activity. This list is hosted in RedIRIS, and special thanks are due to Jesús de las Heras who always helped us, with efficiency and affection, both worthy of our respect and sympathy. The archives associated to the list gather the activity of the list from 1998 to the present, thousands of messages of undeniable value for the investigation of communication in a virtual group.

The activity of the Foro always has been irregular. It starts to acquire a certain size and scope in terms of members and participation at the end of 1997 when a coordinated project was initiated with the Sub-plenary IV on the theme of “The gestation of a new culture, globalization of communication through Internet: Cypergroups” of the XXV Symposium and the I Virtual of the SEPTG with the title “Social change and new forms of group work”. Readers interested in this flow of participation can see the quantitative analysis (análisis cuantitativo) which covers from January 1998 till December 2008, a long journey of ten years. The peaks of participation coincided with two important aspects: or the group gave itself a task or there was a conflict in the group. When the peak of participation was produced by a task (examples[4]) not only were there more interventions but also more people participating in the execution of it (see table 1, p. 3), in the preparation as well as the posterior discussion.

Although with ups and downs —in 2003 the idea of eliminating the lurkers almost kills the activity— until 2006 the Forum maintains a good level of participation. Between 2006 and 2008 the number of subscriptions which had maintained itself around 80, went down and also the activity of the list. We shall comment later that the fact of sustaining the virtual space, the coordination, the same than in face to face groups, is an element that has an important influence in the functioning of the virtual forum. In fact, the death of Juan Campos, founder and coordinator of the list, is a death blow to the Forum.

When we started our journey, these were the axes or elements that guided the functioning of the Forum and which appear in different versions that introduce the Forum in RedIRIS. Although we modified on more than one occasion the introductory text of the Forum, the objectives and methodology has been maintained [5].

Objectives

• Groupanalysis is conceived as an experiment in communication of a group made by a group.
• The task of the group has been and is “to analyze the functioning of the group itself, in this virtual medium and in the world context in the process of globalization”.
• In view of facilitating this task, we planned to reinforce and organize the dimensions of investigation and of professional and social learning through the use of the resources offered by the associated archives and cooperative work offered by the BSCW of RedIRIS linked to the Foro.

Obstacles

• From our experience, cultural and linguistic barriers add themselves to the ones naturally derived from discourses inspired in different orientations and methodologies of group work.
• We should clarify that cultural factors are not only determined by a shared language but also by the dominant cultural context of the professional associations which promote the professional meetings at the international level.
• It is for this reason that the Forum has avoided to link itself to any concrete groupanalytic organization and that the term groupanalysis is used in the most generic of its meanings.

Methodology

In spite of using the term groupanalysis in a generic sense, there exists the commitment to use a groupanalytic methodology in achieving the objectives of the group. Although this methodology in its historical development has received the imprint of the context of group psychotherapies (the group as an instrument of individual change), such as it is conceived in this Forum its principal objective is not the therapeutic one sensu strictu but is any group work with an added analytic function that takes as its starting point that the human being is in essence and by nature radically social.

In this sense, groupanalysis has the objective of overcoming the resistances that go from a solipsistic position to a solidary position in relation to others in overcoming the obstacles to cooperative action.

Evidently, this is a methodology that can be taken on board by anybody subscribing these ideas and the ones emerging from them.

Who can participate?

This Forum is addressed not only to “psycho people” and/or therapists but GROUP ANALYSIS also addresses itself to biologists, sociologist, anthropologists, ecologist, philosophers, pedagogues, and other professionals and persons whose interest and experience in the group method of analysis does not imply the loss of their professional identity of origin. This is the way we understand the context of interdisciplinary cross-fertilization.

We have found that this Forum is able to function on an experimental level as a cybergroup or virtual group, showing common characteristics with face to face groups and particularities facilitated by the new medium.

What is a virtual group?

Although this subject has been debated on various occasions, in February 2004 a particularly intense interchange was had on how this particular group was (see , 100 mensajes de un grupo sobre el grupo). Approximations are made as to its definition and even an attempt at naming it.

JAS: Group-Analysis is a number of people (GROUP) sustained and motivated by their adhesion to values and logics derived from psychoanalysis in the understanding of the dynamic and energy that link human beings when the structural, emotional, affective and rational aspects are considered (G. of pertainance, nominal G.). The fundamental characteristics of this group are its functioning which uses the technological variants that constitute the informatic sciences and the initial experiences of a virtual reality (prepositional G.).

Tomás proposes that we call it GAV (Grupo-Análisis Virtual) and Juan had proposed Cyber Grupo Análisis (GAC) or GAxNet.

Although we do not find a consensus about the definition nor a different name than the one the list already has, from the analysis of the participation emerge the following minimal prerequisites for a virtual group:

• A nucleus of persons participating that gives continuity to the group.
• Consensus about one or various explicit objectives which can be revised.
• Respect for explicit and implicit norms which the group goes on constructing.
• On the part of the participants the capacity of representing themselves in relation to discussion partners, as to their roles, their relations, as well as being a part of a whole (different from the parts).
• The group can be heterogeneous (guaranty of creativity) but must share certain attitudes and codes that guarantee the possibility of communication and the construction of shared knowledge.
• Although being on a symbolic level, the figure of coordinator/s is necessary as a guaranty of: contention (control) in front of uncertainties or conflicts; and permanence of the shared space.

In this sense, in a classical moment of “attack on the conductors of the group” I attempted to clarify my functions (2-5-2006):

“As administrator I have multiple missions, some as stupid as checking that your e-mail addresses are correct and to change the options of subscription. I can moderate somebody, add to or eliminate him/her from the list, etc. Almost always I limit myself to do what you ask me to.

As coordinator, from a groupanalytic perspective:

• I am one more member of the group
• Like any other member of the group I can point out or propose an analysis in a given moment.
• I should maintain certain limits of containment. In a face to face group one of my missions would be to convene and keep the time-space limits. In this virtual space these limits are cared for in a different way, although they are cared for. I should guarantee a certain safety of the members of the group so that they can participate freely. Naturally, although this is something I have recurred to on few occasions; I can recall rules and norms of conduct when the liberty or integrity of a member of the group is violated. It’s always useful to remember that my liberty starts where the others’ end. Fortunately this has happened on few occasions, and other members of the group react, something for which I always leave space before I intervene. In this case I am a “woman on the frontier” with the task of participating observer.
• My concrete contribution: I always have a representation of the group as a Gestalt, the individual contributions almost always acquire a sense within this Gestalt and I don’t analyze them only as symptoms of the individual but as “emergents” or spokesmen of feelings on the part of the group. My feedback is always from this holistic and not particular perception, and in any case, when the “emergent” is very focalized I try to see it in the context of the group and not in an isolated way. This without doubt implies a weight I share with other veteran members of the group capable of representing the group and to dialogue with it.

We can clarify these functions but the method of conducting will not change neither the coordinadora. This is not a T-group, nor an operative group, nor a morenian psychodrama… although at times we use these theories to better explain what is going on in the group.

Many of these tasks are easier in the face to face groups; a look is enough for somebody to come to word, but in the virtual medium at times I have to be explicit. And I could say this in the plural since it is not only a problem of the coordinator.

The sentence “I hope that this time the task of writing and pointing out be of some use” has to do with what I call the “fish memory of the group” since sometimes clarifications of information are asked for which are written in the presentation of the list or are put up on the BSCW… and I think “is it that they don’t read before they subscribe themselves?… it does not seem like it… more curious still is when the question is asked by a person who is member of the group for years…

One more thing: The commitment becomes better when face to face and virtual sessions are complementary. If this is not the case, there remains a latent and manifest wish to “know each other” although often this is not possible or only is a fantasy.

Anyhow, in time other members of the nucleus group that carried the continuity made one way or another these tasks, specially the feedback or synthesis of the subjects discussed in the group (See the example: José Adolfo Segura (1999); Rogelio Galliano (2004);

How is a group identity acquired?

Although it is somewhat complex, the essential coordinate is time. Continuity.

Other coordinates:

• Overcome the different phases and conflicts that make the continuity of the group difficult: conflicts with authority, inter and intra-personal conflicts, role conflicts, conflicts with the task. Different symptoms in function of the phase (abandonments, silences, misunderstandings, aggressions, etc.)
• Recognizing itself as group in front of other groups with similar characteristics. To have its own signs of identity, taken on board by the group. Problems related to the fact of pertaining to different groups.
• Construction of a group culture (norms and values) that transcend the contributions of the individuals of the group.

I like the commentary of Francisco del Amo when he re-situates our anxiety of being a group:

Mercè.Your paper for me is admirable. Your capacity of recollecting our history. Thank you on the part of us who are just able to read, at times a little late, what the others write.  Thank you because these contributions are the gifts of the Knights of King Arthur to this round table “to which we have to correspond and in corresponding we will better our condition.”

Today I thought it seems that when we proceed with a certain fluidity we begin to want to look at the way we walk and I remembered that when the coyote runs and runs beyond the plateau and falls off the cliff. It seemed to me that this happens to the coyote because he does not follow his way but follows the Roadrunner. Perhaps the impatience, as Javier said: “Time is the measure of our impacience”.

José Adolfo talked about phobias… I don’t know if to call it vertigo but I know from my personal experience that when things go well for me I have a certain tendency to complicate my life. I have dreams that warn me and I am grateful to them.

And when José Adolfo talked about identity I thought that to talk and talk without scientific control could lead us to discover some cyberspace heterodoxy and, charged with wisdom, we could finish in the dungeons of some cyber-inquisition or arrive to discover anew the Mediterranean after sustained efforts of losing the option for a Nobel price.

Yes, indeed, after all this effort, as if we were only playing?

Hugs and I pass the word. Francisco del Amo (1-3-2004)

How overcome the change of space-time coordinates?

One of the most noticeable differences between face to face and virtual groups is the space-time and its consequences in communication and representation of the group and its individuals. As Javier commented:

Some days ago I answered to a question of José Adolfo about the virtual times with the simple sentence: “time is the measure of our impatience”. As usual, eaten up by time J, in great hurry.

The subject broached by José Adolfo merits much more, in my opinion, and my response pretended, with failed result, to spark off a reflection on the virtual times (since there exists not only one) from this perspective of the relation between time and patience (or impatience).

The virtual times, because we don’t have the same perception of time (I almost dare say the “threshold of impatience”) when we meet in a Chat (or in a system of instantaneous messages type MSN, yahoo…), in a list of electronic mail, on a board panel, in a web-page of information, in a virtual library…

Javier López Parada (2-3-2004)

The space, beyond the screen where we read, results in a network of connections (often defined as a multicoloured pencil).

“Fantasmatic space which every member concedes the group, the internal group of everyone”.

The time introduced by virtuality: an always open group, with different personal times, a type of infinite presence. And the conflict, the latency spaces between messages and the silences.

“In this ‘impermanence’ of time we should now divide ourselves between the colleagues who are in our everyday “reality” and our virtual “reality”, in which Time takes on another dimension… but the two realities conform our reality in this XXI century. Then to “be” in the tangible space is replaced by “being” in the symbolic space”.

The problem is that to “be” (time and space) in as much as subjective, seems to dimension itself in a different form on the individual level, in consequence, the problem is to find a “being in the group” sufficiently shared.

And a reflection about the construction of reality which will take us to the following subject: communication.

Where has the Cartesian reason gone to? As many other things, it was left in utopia, because there is no real split between body and soul, nor reason and emotion, nor… The only thing the observer can do is to know his own biases, but even this knowledge makes that he include a new bias to his observation (a delicious compilation of articles on the subject, coordinated by Watzlawick et al, “the observing eye” introduces it well).

Let us start from the base that we human beings are subjective, what makes us really interesting. The construction of our view of the world from the representations of what we lived and learned, in a concrete socio-historic context makes that every human being is marvellously unique.

From there the importance of the group where different visions construct a “something” shared (I don’t dare call it knowledge, and perhaps “culture” is a word too polisemic), “something put in common”.

We all conduct groups and have experience in groups, independent of the theoretical line from which we part, so it is no novelty that there are certain requisites for a group having continuity. The group can agglutinate around a charismatic leader or a task (an objective of consensus); in the group there are structural elements, many coming from the same members integrating the group, and dynamic elements that emerge from the interaction between the members.

To safeguard the existence of the group and its members it is essential to establish certain space-time coordinates and also norms. In relation to objectives as well as to norms, one of the difficulties (apart from the individual-group or imposition-consensus one) is that a large part of them are implicit and not explicit, not to mention that many of the implicit ones remain from the subjective personal and
group level not-conscious.

The matrix of this group counts nearly a decade, which is quite a time for a virtual group (some colleagues don’t like this term, but we understand each other), the only objective of which is “the analysis of the group by the group” in this medium where the coordinates of space as well as of time are different to the ones of face to face groups. Also communication suffers a “break” since the channels are reduced by the medium and we have to look for substitutes for Non Verbal Communication, clarifying meaning and sense. In terms of the anthropologist Hall this would be a culture with a communication of low context (almost nil), were everything has to be made explicit verbally to avoid misunderstandings. But this is not completely so between members who have been in the group various years, and there exists a common culture with shared meanings and where certain questions do not have to be spelled out.

Mercè (29-4-2006)

Communication and communicators

When we initiate the de-codification of the message or the statement of the other, we already introduce filters that have to do with our representation of the world, our knowledge, what we know or think is our interlocutor. Evidently, it is an interactive process that constructs itself from our social experiences. Before the same statement it is difficult that two persons understand exactly the same, depending, as I said before, on a global representation of the situation and the interlocutor who in no way can be the same. Simply in the process of attention and perception we can already encounter differences. For example, in front of the same e-mail, commented by various members of the list, this seems to be different for every one of them (different readings). Some have centred their attention (have selected a part of the information) in one part of the message and others in another. They have used that part which seemed “relevant” to them, disregarding the rest of the content. Even, in front of the same proportion of information the perception of the literal meaning can be different and, moreover, the interpretation of the intention of what the interlocutor wished to communicate.

Starting with what is perceived and contrasted with the context (there could be various messages about the same subject or of the conversation as a whole) and with our knowledge of the interlocutor (his interests, his position in relation to life, his theoretical frame of reference, his profession, age, and sex, etc.) we interpret: we give meaning to what has been said and we respond consequently.

Moreover, let us not forget the emotional and cognitive impact of the message of the other. It is something so complex that the more we study it the more it impresses me that we can understand each other; although there are misunderstandings, confusions…
I shall not continue, because it is a subject which enthuses me and I would go on and on… but what interests me especially is the communication established in the list, the construction of shared contexts, the resolution of conflicts through the negotiation of meaning, and many more.

The question which emerges is between others: How to overcome the barriers of an exclusively verbal communication, without indicators of NVC?

This subject has been discussed at length. Words are often insufficient for communicating, it being not only a question of information (knowledge) but how it should be understood (intention and meaning). We can add that the codes have to be negotiated (professional, cultural codes, etc.) so that understanding can be produced of the content and the meaning and, also, mechanisms of feedback have to be established.

Obstacles y symptoms:

• Misunderstandings
• The latencies of waiting produce frustration
• Change of topic, impossibility of following the subjects
• Messages unrelated to the subjects and undercover publicity produce unrest and aggressive reactions
• Flooding produces rejection
• The equivalent of parallel conversations. “What is said in public and what is said privately”.

The silences produced multiple interpretations and much violence towards the silent members. I like the response of Francisco del Amo (who, on the other hand, contributed frequently):

I would like my silences to be aggressive, passive-aggressive or psychological resistances to group work.

At times I think and it is difficult for me to recognize it that I remain in silence because nothing occurs to me. It consoles me to know that I must be like the hen of the golden eggs, who lays them when she  wants to.

Silence at times is feeling good, ignorance, loneliness, respect for time and preparation for the next cosmic connection. My silence is a little of all that and some other things I still ignore.

Francisco del Amo (9-11-1999)

Some resources for overcoming the barriers of a communication exclusively in writing, without NVC indicators.

• Creation of NV indicators, substituting and clarifying of intention.
• Use of creative and symbolic resources (in our list, poetry has been a frequent resource) for underlining the message. Interested readers can consult our routes of poetry between 1998 and 2005 (Poemario del Foro de Grupo Análisis)
• Creation of shared referents, clarify concepts, investigate interpretative contexts through different resources.
• Put in evidence, bring to the group, and discuss any of the conflicts in communication detected. (See for example this precious Pas a trois)

Function of the members of the group. Personal identity vs group identity

Numerous classification have been presented of the type of participation, the most accepted being the one of Lorenzo García Aretio [6].

• “Cooperative”
• “Opportunist”
• “Silent”
• “Absent”
• “Governors” and “leaders”
• “Mistaken” would be the ones who insist in introducing in the list/course subjects which, although interesting, are not the object of all.

The commentary: We can all play some of these roles, it depends on the moment.

Reaction: Critique of the silent, absent and opportunist.

Also in other moments I said myself something about the silent, although with the pass of time, my attitude was becoming more flexible with the different ways of being in the group.

At times the more talkative we charge against the silent, because we also feel alone, in a type of shared monologue, which we think would be richer if the others said something. Thinking about some of the subjects, with the sensation of carrying the weight of the dialogue on our shoulders, and what not, there are so many ambivalent sentiments. Or feeling along, “overlooked and ignored” when there is not a single response to an “elaborated reflection”. Or misinterpreted when a word or sentence is taken out of context…

Yearning for the space of the face to face group, where I “forced” one to smile when I just had said something totally out of tune, or the emotion when another had just read one of y poems.

Here we can get it wrong, rave, pull the thread of an association… everyone in his way.

I complain less about the silent ones… I understand that this is their way of participating, some moment they pop up their head and give me joy. And perhaps I understand better after trying to listen more and talking less, something I do every now and then.

Also, we position ourselves as a man/woman on the boundary in the group, this is a very hard role… but it is good for the group that somebody occupy this role, since at a given moment they bring the group back to reality.

Productivity and development of the group

The group has been maturing but we have pending a task: conceptualize “in group” the rich contributions that have been made.

“There is still something else that preoccupies us and which hardly gets going, and this is how to put in writing the history of this group, how to pass from the experience to the conceptualization and viceversa.”

We have already elaborated various papers in group, but this “analysis of communication of a group by a group”, always wakes up resistances to the task. This group is not unique, and it is neither due to the fact that it is a virtual group since a similar phenomenon has occurred with face to face groups.

It is difficult to explain how a group arrives to be a burden, a mental burden, especially in silence. How much time do we spend thinking: what has happened? What is the matter with this or that one? Why doesn’t there arrive a poem from…, a reflection from…, a proposal from…, a wink from…?

In the silence fantasy overflows. The not answer is not somehow also a failure, not a personal one but a failure of a project, of the possibility of maintaining spaces of permanent group dialogue, spaces that permit not only change on the individual level but which creates alternative social networks in this individualistic, globalized and un-solidary world.

A group without a leader and whose leader be the group, or this task of establishing different social networks.

We will close with some words from Juan:

Do you know Román?, which is the trick of group analysis: “convert the symptoms in terms of shareable, understandable and solvable problems.”

And, if we used the poem of Silvio to disentangle the symptoms that emerge in this list? For example, the idea that it has converted itself in a branch office of the SEPTG and its symposiums. This takes me to another one to disentangle: how to get the hook into the question of electronic twinning between professional lists and webs and thematic and experimental lists? Something I have more than once mentioned as the “Electronic plexus”.

Cannot someone suggest some idea? J))

Juan Campos (27-4-2001)

The network knitter, networks made only to fish ideas and affections J))

[2] 2008, Juan Campos, Pathway in GA.2009,  Mercè Martínez, Pathway in GA

[3] 2012, M. Martínez. Testimonio personal y transmisión virtual del grupoanálisis  Personal testimony and virtual transmission of groupanalysis,

[4]    Some papers in collaboration with members of the list “Foro de Grupo-Análisis”

• 1998, “La gestación de una nueva cultura, la globalización de las comunicaciones a través de Internet: Cibergrupos”.

• 2000, Integración ¿cómo y para qué?

In Barcelona we organized a face to face workshop on the subject of integration which during the preceding months was the theme of dialogue in the virtual list 2000, Integration:how and what for? We prepared the working document based on to the interventions in the list for the colleagues who could not come to the workshop. To the latter came colleagues from the list from the SEPTG and others who simply were interested in the theme and could come to the Barcelona encounter. Hernán and Susana Kesseman, members of the list and of SEPTG, who crossed the “Puddle” ona visit and came to participate. This collective paper was later presented to the XXVII annual Symposium of the SEPTG in Segovia meeting that year on the same subject.

• 2002, Round table: “Group contributions to the new challenges” during the XXIX Symposium de la SEPTG celebrated in Mallorca.

We incorporate the initial document of the inaugural session and the resonances to it. The general organization can be seen in the web page la página web de la SEPTG. All presentations were previously published in the web and space for commentaries was facilitated.

[5] Presentation of the Foro (actualizada en 2004)

[6] L. García Aretio (2007). La Participation in Cibercomunidades II. En: http://www.uned.es/catedraunesco-ead/editorial/p7-1-2007.pdf