ARTICLE
Resistance in Prisoners to Group Psychotherapy
1976 Volume 11 Issue 2 Pages 1-11
Details
1976 Volume 11 Issue 2 Pages 1-11
In many cases, group psychotherapy in prison evokes very strong resistance to the prisoners. This resistance impedes the procedure of the therapy and likely causes it to fail.
In this study, we first observed the prisoners in the early therapeutic situation and studied the types of resistance in early stage of the therapy. Secondly, we sought to find out factors that cause such resistance in the prisoners. Then, we studied how the process of the therapy is related to this resistance.
Some findings in this study are as follows:
1) The resistance observed in the early therapeutic situation has to do with distrust in the prisoners rooted in their family life and/or caused by being institutionalized. This resistance, therefore, seems to be related to the prisoners’ personality traits and previous life history.
2) The occurrence of the resistance greately depends on the variables in the therapeutic situation. When the institution provides variables appropriate to produce a good therapeutic situation, less resistance occurrs, and group therapy becomes successful. From this, it is apparent that the variables of the therapeutic situation have more to do with the cause of the resistance than the personality traits and life history in psychotherapy in the prison.
3) No covert resistance facilitates the psychotherapy, whereas overt resistance brings about effective therapy.
