Shifting paradigms in group psychotherapy

The mid-1900's saw a shift in thinking within the social sciences away from the then dominant Newtonian worldview of linear causality, towards thinking in terms of circular causality. With the development of the new systemic epistemology, and the subsequent shift towards second-order cybernetics and evolutionary theory, new concepts were created to elucidate the processes whereby man constructs reality. This study considers the relevance of second-order cybernetics and the evolutionary theory as descriptive metaphors for both the pragmatics and aesthetics of group psychotherapy. A recursive relationship between theory, description and intervention is conceptualized, and it is concluded that the theoretical constructs in question serve as complementary sides of a systemic coin in the description of group therapy processes and the application thereof to the group therapy context.PsychologyM.A. (Clinical Psychology