アドレリアン第 22 巻第３号(通巻第 59 号) 2009 年６月

THE COUNSELING PROCESS IN PARENT-STUDY GROUPSBASED ON INDIVIDUAL PSYCHOLOGY
Ayako Ihara, Masako Seino, Shunsaku J. Noda
(Japanese Society of Adlerian Psychology, Osaka, Japan)

要旨
キーワード：In Japan, a course for parent education based on Individual Psychology named "Passage" is provided. The name "Passage" comes from the initial letters of "PArent Study System on AdlerianGroup Experiences". It also symbolizes a passage to happy family life through encouragement.
It is designed according to the Dreikursian method of parenting. The course consists of eight two
and a half hour sessions. The number of members in a group is six to fourteen. Most of themembers are mothers, fathers or school teachers. One or two trainers facilitate the group using astandard textbook.
After finishing the course, many of the participants join follow-up study groups which are held
all over Japan. Usually a "Passage" trainer organizes and facilitates them as a leader. Most of theleaders are non-professionals, but all of them have completed the "Passage" training course.
Follow-up groups have various styles, but most of them deal with actual issues of members by agroup counseling process. A participant presents her or his family issue, mostly a problem withchildren. The leader and other members help her or him to solve the problem, usually referring to
the "Passage" textbook.
The Japanese Society of Adlerian Psychology provides many study opportunities for non-professional counselors and group leaders. For example, group leaders often undertake personal or groupsupervision by licensed psychotherapists. They participate workshops for counseling technique.
Moreover, many leaders make use of the computer communication systems such as homepages,
buletin boards, blogs, chat boards, messengers, and E-mails. A computer communication system wasset up in 1988.

Purpose of this study
Although communication between leaders is active，leaders seldom visit other leader’s groups. As aconsequence, the actual conditions of follow-up groups were not well known. The purpose of thisstudy is to describe the actual process of follow-up groups based on the data gathered in field－1－work.

MethodAs a preliminary study, we visited some groups to observe their meetings. The impression that
we received was that the theory and philosophy of Adler-Dreikurs psychology were deeply acceptedand digested in every group.
On the other hand, each group had a different character or atmosphere. In some groups the leader
spoke a lot; in others members were talkative. In some groups they liked role playing; in others
they did not. In some groups they treated early memories; in others never.
We felt that there was a common base in follow-up groups, but at the same time, wide variety.
To describe these impressions in scientific words, we designed an ethnological study. We decided
to study the verbal conversation process in group sessions. We asked some groups to record thewhole process of some sessions, and four groups consented. One of us visited each group to observe and record sessions. Recordings of nine sessions were obtained.

Speaker Address
1LeaderAll

2

ClientLeader3Leader

Client4

ClientAll

5Leader

Client6

ClientLeader

7Leader

ClientSpeechHello, does anybody havesomething to discuss?
Yes. I am a little confused
about my son.
All right, go on.
He is 14, and he does notstudy ～Please give us a recent
example of the problem.
Last night I told him tostop the games ～What happened after that ?

He shouted "Shut up !"tome and ～Does he always behave
9 Member Client
like that?
No, he didn’t before.
10 Client
Member
I think he ～8Client

All

Style

FunctionTopicdesideclient

Meta
Statement

Remarks

ReportImperative
Statement

Reportget episode

Meta
Statement

EpisodeOpen Q

Q on EpisodeStatement

EpisodeOpen Q

Q on EpisodeStatement

ReportSequence

Sequence(Table 1)
This table shows a sample of the data. The first column shows the numerical order of thespeech. The second column signifies the person who spoke. Persons are classified as leader, client(the person who presented the problem) and member (a person who did not present the problem,
but helped the client to solve her or his problem). The third column indicates the person to whom
the speech was addressed. The fourth column is the content of the speech. The fifth column is thestyle of the sentence. It is classified as statement, imperative, open-ended question, closed-endedquestion, or meta-message. I will explain the meaning of meta-message later. The sixth column indicates the semantic function of the speech. The seventh column indicates when a new topic be－2－

gins. The last column gives remarks. In actual sessions, the total number of utterances ranged between 200 to 600.

(Figure 1)
This figure shows the speech frequency of leaders, clients and members in one of the sessions ofgroups A, B, C and D. Look at the group B. The speech amount of the leader is 16%, while thatof the client is 44%. Compared to this group, the leaders of group C and D are more talkative. Ingroup C, the speech amount of the leader is 43%, and in group D, 34%.

The variety of the group process
To describe tendencies of groups, we decided on five indexes to specify communication patterns.
The Figure below shows those five indexes. 1) leader’s talkativeness, 2) leader’s exclusiveness, 3)
member’s participation, 4) group looseness, and 5) group openness.

(Figure 2)
The talkativeness index is the ratio of the speech amount of the leader to that of the group total.
The higher the talkativeness index, the more the leader is speaking.

－3－

(Figure 3)
The exclusiveness index is defined as the ratio of amount of leader-client-leader speech series tothe total speech amount of the client. When the client speaks after the leader, and sequentially theleader speaks after the client, the leader-client-leader speech series is counted. When the client
speaks before or after another member, it is not counted. Therefore, if the exclusiveness index ishigh, this means that the leader and the client are talking a lot with each other without the othermembers.

(Figure 4)
The participation index is the ratio of the speech amount of members to that of the sum ofmembers and the client. Thus, the higher the participation index, the more members are speaking.

－4－(Figure 5)
The looseness index is defined as the ratio of member-client speech series to total speech. Whenthe client speaks after a member, a member-client speech series is counted. When the client speaks
after the leader, it is not counted. Therefore, the higher the looseness index, the more the clientand members are talking together without the leader.

(Figure 6)
The openness index is the ratio of client-leader-member speech series to client-leader series. Thisis somewhat complicated. When the leader speaks after the client, if the openness index is low,
the leader will address the client, and if the openness index is high, the leader will address othermembers.This index signifies leader’s effort to involve members in the topic.

A#1
A#2
A#3
B#1
B#2
C#1
C#2
D#1
D#2

Talkativeness
0.23
0.28
0.2
0.26
0.17
0.43
0.39
0.34
0.4

Exclusiveness
0.24
0.25
0.24
0.25
0.16
0.7
0.59
0.61
0.63

Participation
0.5
0.58
0.53
0.45
0.47
0.48
0.41
0.48
0.41

Looseness
0.55
0.46
0.61
0.49
0.68
0.2
0.26
0.32
0.22Openness
0.25
0.42
0.34
0.25
0.2
0.23
0.15
0.13
0.23

(Table 2)－5－Table 2 shows the results of the nine sessions of the four groups. I will explain in more detail.

(Figure 7)
Figure 7 shows the indexes of session two of group B and session one of group C. For the participation and the openness indexes, the two groups gave similar values.
However we see quite different values between the two groups for talkativeness, exclusiveness,and looseness. The talkativeness index of group B is lower than group C, the exclusiveness index
of group B is far lower than group C, but the looseness index of group B is much higher thangroup C.
From this we can say that group B is comparatively “loose," which means that members oftenchat away without the leader. On the contrary, we can say that the leader of group C is talkativeand shows strong leadership.

(Figure 8)
These four figures show the indexes of all sessions of each group. Each group had a similar index pattern for all the sessions. This suggests that the leader may determine the tendency of thegroup.

－6－(Figure 9)
To examine this assumption, Masako Seino, one of the researchers of this study, facilitated a session of group B instead of the original leader. In Figure 9, B shows the indexes of the session facilitated by the original leader and M shows the indexes by Masako. As you can see, the indexes
for the sessions with different leaders are different. From this we may hypothesize that the character of the group is strongly influenced by the style of the leader.

The basic structure of the group process
In this study we also analyzed the linguistic and semantic styles of the sentences used in thesessions in detail, but we do not have enough time to report everything here today. So now wewill introduce the function of meta-messages.
B#2

C#1

１
２
３
４
５
１
２
３
４
５
６
７
８
９
10
11
12

Leader’s speech
Is there anything you want to discuss?
About your daughter? And how is she?
Will you tell us a recent event?
Does anyone have any ideas?
What will you do to encourage her?
Shall we discuss on your issue?
What do you think about that?
Where did it occur?
Let us do role-playing. Who will be his wife?
How do you feel?( to the role of the wife)
Let’s change the roles.
How do you feel now?( to the client)
All right, what will you do then?
Let us try!
What do you think, watching the scene?( to all)What do you think?( to the client)Thank you all.

The structure of the session
Deciding client
Gathering information
EpisodeDiscuss on alternatives
Deciding client
Gathering information
EpisodeDiscuss on alternatives
Sharing(Table 3)
Here are two examples of the structure of sessions. The top sample shows the process of session
two of group B, and the bottom sample is of session one of group C.
In the beginning of the session, both groups decided who should be the client. Then, the groupgathered detailed information from the client about the problem. Next, the client was asked to vol－7－

unteer an episode. In group B, long discussion followed to understand the problem, while in groupC, role playing was adopted. When the members had understood the client’s issue enough, bothgroups discussed on alternative ideas on how to deal with the problem. Lastly, sharing was carriedout in the group.
We analyzed the records of all sessions of every group and discovered a common structure in thegroup counseling process. Usually, a group session can be divided into five phases; 1) a reportabout the problem, 2) an episode related to the problem, 3) analysis of the episode, 4) discussion
on alternative ideas, and 5) final group sharing.
These phases are initiated by "meta-messages."

A meta-message is the leader’s message which

decides the direction of the next transaction. For example, "Would anybody like to share a recentevent?" is a meta-message to initiate the report phase. "Could you please give us a recent exampleof the problem?" This is a meta-message to turn the context into the episode phase.
When the client has explained the episode sufficiently, the leader decides a method to deal withthe episode. Some leaders may suggest to reading part of the "Passage" textbook. Some may
suggest to employing role play. Other leaders may suggest the use of Andriessens’ Lifestyle analysis sheet, while some may suggest some other method they like. Therefore, the meta-messsage forthe third phase, the analysis phase, has variety.
After analyzing the problem, the leader asks the client, "Do you have an idea to solve theproblem?" This meta-message initiates discussion about alternative ideas. If the client does not givean answer, the leader will address the other members asking a message something like, "Do youhave any ideas?" When the client is content with an idea and makes up her or his mind to try it
at home, finally, the leader asks the group, "Would anyone like to share anything about today’ssession?" This is the meta-message to begin the sharing phase.
These meta-messages are not instructed in the official training programs. They are spontaneously
created by the leaders of follow-up groups. Of course, some models exist. Some Adlerian
psychotherapists often provide opportunities of open forum counseling, while some of them demonstrate group counseling in front of observers. In these demonstrations, the therapists unconsciously
use these meta-messages. The leaders have probably learnt this method from these kinds of models.

(Figure 10)
Figure 10 shows two demonstrations of group counseling sessions by Dr. Shunsaku Noda, a licensed training psychotherapist. Number 1 was a session carried out before this study. At thattime, Dr Noda was not conscious of the function of meta-messages. Number 2 was carried out af－8－

ter he learned the results of this study, and he tried to operate only by meta-messages without uttering other sentences. The result was totally different. Later, however, he confessed, "The groupflowed so beautifully. I learned that I can manage things with only meta-messages. But, that is notmy style." As you may know he is a talkative kind of person.
We believe that it is useful to know the function of meta-messages with facilitating follow-up
groups. However, the individuality of the leader lies rather in messages. Thus, the character of agroup expressed by five indexes is related to leader’s use of messages. Meta-messages construct thegroup process, and, at the same time, they give leaders a wide range of freedom to select their favorite style of messages.
In other words, the use of messages give tenderness to leaders. As far as the basic structure of
Adlerian counseling is maintained, there are many ways to actualize the concrete process.
Tenderness is realized when we have a systematic method in one hand and when we have freedom
to develop the method in our own creative way in the other.

Conclusion
In conclusion, each group is unique, so there is no group process which is exactly the same, butthere are the common basic principles described by meta-messages. To improve the quality of thegroup counseling process, it is necessary to know the functions of meta-messages and messages. At
the same time, the individual style of counselors must be respected and encouraged, as long as
they manage the process along the basic principles.

Acknowledgment
We are grateful to Diane Rimmer who proofread this article and corrected English expressions.
編集部注
この論文はアドレリアン 56 号『自助グループの個性と構造』に掲載したものをと同じ内容をあらたに英文で書き直し、2008 年のリトアニアで行われた第 24 回国際アドラー心理学会総会において発表したものです。

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