What is the group really doing with the topic?

In Gestalt Psychotherapy, there are four common ways to avoid contact. First off - contact between human being is considerer a model of health in Gestalt - the more contact one makes, the healthier he or she is. Anyhow, the four ways are confluence, introjection, projection and retroflection. While they may seem like fancy words, they're really quite easy to understand. Anyhow, one of the reasons I like focus groups is that I get a chance to see which avoidance a group uses when I discuss a particular topic. The results are often quite revealing.

First, a brief synopsis of the four avoidances.

Confluence This is often a state of cluelessness and self-absorption. Teenagers are notorious for it. I'm reminded of the scene in Ferris Bueler's Day Off where Ben Stein is taking attendance among the class. The kids in it have absolutely no interest in him because they do not even recognize that he is there. That is the key symptom of confluence - in the group, people have no interest in you or the topic. There's an energy in the focus group room that gets sucked-out of it when a group is confluent, or there is a sense of phoniness. There can also be the exact opposite - too strong a sense of endearment to the particular topic, kind of like a puppy love if you will - which is also a teenage characteristic.

IntrojectionEver have a group that seems to passively and politely accept or reject what you are saying? It's the well-considered "Ummmmm.... I see what you're getting at" response. Or it's the "I don't know Brian - what you're saying doesn't sit well with me" response. What is actually happening is that the person is deciding to either accept or reject themselves and their beliefs, and not me or my topics.

ProjectionIn this type of neurotic behavior, group members actually feel something - it could be fear, anger, joy, sadness or pleasure, but they do not own it. Instead, they disown it in some sort of way - usually by not taking responsibility for their thoughts, feelings or actions. Instead, what they do is put these on someone or something else.

RetroflectionAt this point, the group is using its brains to sit on the fence and avoid contact. That is, it is wondering - should we risk exposing ourselves and our feelings? Should we take a chance and embrace what is being said?

So what I look for is how the group gravitates and behaves on a particular topic. While behaviours may start off disparate, within a few minutes of the topic, a skilled researcher can often tell how the group is behaving. From there, proper probes and client recommendations can be drawn.

Rather than give specific rules for specific behaviours, I will use examples. The fact is, there is no specific actions based on just observed behaviour, and besides, a lot depends on the nature of the product or communication being tested.

In my first example, my client was selling a service, but people did not want to acquire it because they were unsure about many of its attributes. Within the focus groups, this uncertainty took the form of projection - people were scared of this product, and people were even more scared about their lack of knowledge concerning it. My recommendation to the client was NOT to come up with solutions to each of the objections, or make the product more appealing. Since the product involved personal sales, I simply told the client to have its sales reps listen, emphasize and say "this is a difficult product to wrap your mind around." An indirect acknowledgment of the fear surrounding the product would make it more salable. Overloading with more information would have caused further fear, projection and distancing from the sales force.

The second example involved examining people's perceptions of safety and crime in their communities so that communications messages could be developed. What I noticed in the groups is that people were retroflecting their fears - they were spending a lot of time describing issues in the community, but stopped short of saying that they were personally scared for their lives, even though I knew they were. I began launching a few probes to see if I could get the participants to contact the deep fear inside of them, but they were having none of it. All of my probes brought-up further justifications and intellectualizations, which was a sign that what I was saying was really making them uncomfortable. The communications recommendation to the client was easy - do not mention words like "personal safety" or "harm". Instead focus a message on the fact that safety equals comfort and gentleness. Safety need not come with increased vigilance, with a lock-down of one's freedoms or with increased enforcement. Instead, increased safety can come organically from more community involvement and improved infrastructure measures. The goal of the communication was to provide safety alternatives that would not further fan flames of fear, but rather reduce the anxiety people would have about increased safety measures.