psychodrama research

[Adam Blatner]

Reply to "Walter Logeman" <walter at psybernet.co.nz> re his message of January 02, 2009
psychodrama research.
    He wrote: Hi All, Thanks Peter for the suggestion we continue the discussion here. 
I'd like that.  Loved hearing that you sang a little song in response to a discussion 
about research!  It is close to my heart too.  I just saw the movie Australia - they sing 
all sorts of things into being over there.
           ab: as a singer, I find this idea intriguing and pleasant.

    WL: Thanks Adam for your responses. What I got from both of you is that there is not 
just one thing called research, even in the traditional methods, there is a range of 
approaches, purposes and motivations.
    AB: Yes, and two kinds stand out, in light of your response and also Ann Hale's. One 
is the general idea of finding out, exploring, and sharpening perceptions within the 
context of doing psychodrama or a sociometric consultation. As will be noted later, some 
alertness to what is perceived, what alternatives are chosen, might well lead to different 
choices of  how to respond more therapeutically. Good therapists do this all the time.
       Another type of research is closer to that which is asked for by outsiders who want 
to consider the relative validity of the use of this method, as compared to other 
approaches. This tends to be more objective and rigorous.

WL  I'd like to take up some points in one of your paragraphs Adam.
    AB had written previously:
My first association is that the criteria Walter mentions, starting with voluntariness and 
informed consent, is hardly ever fully valid, because unless they are quite familiar with 
the method, people tend to "bite off more than they can chew."    The number of people who 
are truly prepared for sociometric explorations seems to me to be very low. Maybe not in 
New Zealand, but elsewhere, no.
    WL responded: Moreno spoke of "Maximum voluntary participation"  - he realised that 
there is no absolute here.  In a similar vein he used the term "near sociometric".
     considering Adam's line:  "The number of people who are truly prepared for 
sociometric explorations seems to me to be very low." Walter responds: If we think, and I 
am sure most of us do, as a protagonist working for the group, then there is already a 
rudimentary consciousness in us of the sociometric experiment in every Psychodrama. 
Moreno says somewhere that Psychodrama is one form of sociometric experimentation. The 
protagonists concern is a question (shared by the group in some way) and launching into 
the drama in various scenes tests various hypothesis.  The sharing at the end reveals the 
conclusions drawn from the experiment.
    People enter into this sort of sociometric experiment all the time, but not with 
consciousness or using that language.  But they learn "truth"  Psychodrama is a theatre of 
truth.  There is a form of knowing that happens here.  There is some system of 
epistemology that Moreno was in tune with.  There is a feminist tradition termed 
"connected knowing" (google it) which also values something distinct from the more 
analytical approaches.

     AB: This last paragraph is at best a half-truth, maybe less. There are certainly some 
valid elements.
       AB: warming up to topic (1/2/08):
 Not only are there different types of what one means by research, so to there are 
different levels of intellectual rigor. The key question that must be asked in science is: 
"... but is it so?"  It's not the technology, the equipment, even the layered methods for 
each field, but rather this essential idea. Prior to that, if an idea seemed compelling 
enough it became "true" in the minds of the scholar, the theoretician, the theologian, the 
physician... but---and this is key---many ideas that are not true can attain the the 
status of feeling true, clear, revealingly clear (epiphany), strong insight, 
certainty---and yet they are not so.

      If the idea is sufficiently divergent from the collective consciousness, it's called 
madness, delusion. If it's only a variation of what is considered okay, it may be 
heretical, but it doesn't seem crazy. Occasionally these concepts turn out in the testing 
of time and method to be useful and in many respects valid. Occasionally, some aspects of 
these concepts turn out to be valid while other aspects are not found to be useful or 
true. Fairly frequently a given hypothesis or hunch is found to be not so. It was a fair 
stab at explaining whatever needed to be explained, but it just didn't have much basis in 
fact. Sometimes there's a little truth to it, but...

    This is a very important bit of epistemology. It can really seem true and yet be not 
so! Indeed, the nature of mind and the tricks it plays make it actually so that in many 
areas---religion, politics, psychology, family relationships, self-evaluation---it is most 
easy to take a few cues or impressions and mis-interpret them, bend them to fit one's 
desires, biases, or needs, and so forth. All this is to suggest that a moderate to high 
degree of skepticism, dispassionate curiosity, calling-into-question, opportunity for 
dialogue, level of intellectual humility, and the like are needed to get past more obvious 
forms of untruth.

   A slight digression: We can never really know the truth of another---there are too many 
variables. To give up, though, to refuse to seek to understand or empathize, is not the 
necessary alternative; indeed, it's a cop-out. There's a category called guessing, taking 
a chance, and then allowing oneself to be corrected. The last part is important. So it's 
better to do the "research" of guessing and finding out rather than not do it. But in a 
more complex criteria, this isn't considered very rigorous research.

WL: > I have a fantasy that by pursuing all this more consciously we could role reverse 
with the molecules or the planets and learn more -> literally, after-all we are made of 
that stuff, nuclear physics by introspection.  Moreno thought that would happen, but 
without going that far, as a social, psychological science there is more scope here.
        AB: I agree to some limited degree: We learn more than by not exercising our 
imagination, but what we learn may involve subtle nuances that include taking 
responsibility for our projections. What we must not do is confuse such role reversing 
with any objective truth.

WL The analytical methods often destroy the subject matter before they examine it, their 
conclusions about private personal esoteric
experience will be limited.   AB: unclear what you're referring to, what questions are 
being asked, and whether this assertion (at least at the level of "often" rather than 
"sometimes" is valid).  Unclear second part of the sentence.

WL  Sociometry has a future here I think.  ab: Unclear the connection. Seems to be a 
general affirmation of faith.

   I might ask more pointedly, "where" sociometry is believed to have a future: i.e., 
offer three or four specific examples or questions; and more, imagine how the sociometry 
would be introduced.
           I wonder at this point how broad the range of actual applications are.

   I wonder how further development in this field might yield further ideas and technical 
development.

WL Warm wishes, Walter    AB: Warm wishes in return. And thanks to you, Ann, for your 
comments. They do illustrate the first kind of research fairly well! . -- Adam