An even broader view of group functioning can be gained when the third perspective (Continental) is engaged. There are dynamics playing out in the group (and in the community and society) that concern social class, money, control and social/structural freedom. Frequently, the Continental perspective can effectively complement the Tavistock analysis of group projections concerning the role(s) forced on (or grasped by) specific group members as a function of their race, ethnicity, sexual orientation or physical abilities. While the insights gained by all group members can be quite painful when it comes to the injury inflicted on individual members of the group, these insights can also be liberating and motivating with regard to taking action outside the group to bring about justice and reduce restrictive and dehumanizing “role suction.”
Case Example: Sonia has signed up for a Tavistock workshop in part because she was intrigued with the theories being offered by Tavistock authors—especially Wilfred Bion. She was not fully prepared for the further conceptual insights she gained from participation in one of these workshops. She also was not prepared for the deeply disturbing and transforming feedback she would get from other members of the Tavistock group.
Sonia is typically a rather quite member of a group. She works in a large bureaucracy and usually doesn’t feel that anyone will listen to what she has to say—or will not take any action on the recommendations she might make. Sitting back and watching what was happening in her small group as well as the large group in which all workshop attendees participated was valuable and reaffirmed the Tavistock theories she had read. There was a strong pull in her small group toward dependency and searching collectively for someone on which members of the group can rely and from which they would gain “nourishment” (of some elusive kind).
There was a moment, however, when the small group turned specifically to Sonia. She was “not a caring participant.” Members of the group noted that she often didn’t respond when they talked to her. She was a “cold” person who was “standing-off” from other people. What suddenly became apparent to Sonia was that all of this related not to her role as a quiet member. Rather, it had to do with her hearing disabilities. While Sonia wore hearing aids, they were not readily visible to other group members. Furthermore, Sonia had not shared the fact that she had a very hard time hearing other people—especially in a group setting.
The moment came for Sonia to move her quad three “secret” about being hard-of-hearing to quad one. She shared information about her hearing challenges and eventually also felt free (and safe) to disclose her sense of shame about this disability. She became aware that some of her reticence about participating in groups related directly to this sense of shame and to the difficulty she experienced in hearing what other people were saying. It seems that it was not always the case that Sonia was listening carefully to the words spoken by other people and observing the behavior that related to these words. Sometimes, Sonia was just tuning out other people.
