Ottawa Psychoanalytic Group Therapy

Promoting change

The primary goal of interpersonal psychoanalytic therapy is to encourage, rather than enforce, a transformation by enhancing the patient’s awareness and comprehension of their own deliberate and instinctive behaviors, ideas, and self-perceptions in social contexts. This goal can be achieved through various methods, with group psychotherapy serving as a dynamic environment where the unique characteristics of patients are not just identified but also demonstrated by the group members. This setting enables the analyst to examine these behaviors as they occur in the here and now and foster the previously mentioned awareness.

Since in our western culture therapeutic treatments are mostly represented in the form of individual psychotherapy, most therapists and patients overlook group therapy as a potential solution to the psychological suffering we, as humans, go through.

Group therapy is as effective as individual therapy. One of the main differences is that not only the therapist but also the group contribute to fostering awareness regarding each participant's way of functioning within a social context. Being in a group can be intimidating at first, but what most patients later recognize is that it is a warm and welcoming environment where they can learn a lot about themselves.