© simon buckingham shum click to edit master subtitle style compendium: a computerised programme...

© Simon Buckingham Shum

Click to edit Master subtitle style

Compendium: A computerised programme for the tracking and measurement of group process

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Marion Brown, Andy Downie, Nicole HowardOxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust, Aylesbury

Simon Buckingham ShumKnowledge Media InstituteOpen University, Milton Keynes

23rd Meeting of the Society for Psychotherapy ResearchRavenscar, UK, March 2010www.psychotherapyresearch.org


How do we evidence that group analytic process is an effective medium of change?

Group analysts believe that group process is a vital factor in helping individual members change pathological patterns of relating to themselves and others

This is complex to record and measure: notes alone rarely do it justice

Cognitive science and information design give us ways to visualize complex phenomena

A good visualization relieves memory load, and draws analysts’ attention to significant aspects

Any map filters out noise in order to support specific kinds of interpretation

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“Compendium” is a way to map group process, with the addition of a database, in order to build a searchable evidence base


How do we record and understand what’s happening in a group?

How do we demonstrate that this process enables change in individual members?

By tracking interactions in the group

Identifying significant themes, key moments and patterns…

between members

between members and the group as a whole

within individual members

Understanding how these change over time

44


Murray Cox: Group Interaction Chronogram

i Beginning

ii Middle

iii End

Patient:


i Beginning

ii Middle

iii End

i Beginning

ii Middle

iii End

i Beginning

ii Middle

iii End

i Beginning

ii Middle

iii End

i Beginning

ii Middle

iii End

i Beginning

ii Middle

iii End

+

+

-

?

Therapist

Murray Cox: Group Interaction Chronogram


Compendium software (Open University)http://compendium.open.ac.uk/institute

“Semantic hypermedia” software

grounded in 25 years’ computing research in the design of flexible tools for managing information and ideas

Analogy: “a spreadsheet for ideas”

tools to build a visual language, and arrange, connect, index and search information and ideas

A bit like mindmapping, but with a full database underpinning it to enable a long-term evidence base

Free and open source, works on all platforms, funded by UK Research Councils (AHRC; ESRC; EPSRC; e-Science Programme; JISC)

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Context: A brief focused analytic group

A closed 24 session homogeneous analytic group comprising 8 individuals, 4 male, 4 female and one group conductor

Group members were within the moderate to severe level of mental health difficulty

All had complex personal and mental health histories leading to significant difficulty in intrapersonal and interpersonal relationships in their adult lives

The theme that emerged most clearly at assessment was repressed and/or suppressed anger correlating with severe anxiety/panic and depressive symptomatology

This formed the group focus

8


Theme 1: Anger

99

Analyst’s record of her interpretation

to the group on the emerging

theme


Theme 2: Reaching out to one of the group

1010

The tags on a patient’s icon

show the behaviours

perceived by the analyst


Theme 3: Medication

1111

Analyst’s notes on the theme that emerged towards the

group’s conclusion


The individual in the group

1212

Map of the group from a

specific individual’s perspective


Map of all dynamics

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Private notes on a patient (dashed link)

Particularly strong

relationship

No links from other

patients…

Highly active patient

Red ring reminds analyst of one patient’s

effect on the group


Which behaviours do two patients share?Tags shared in common are orange, tags from one patient in green

1414


Analysing the evidence base across sessions

1515


Analysing a patient across Sessions 1 and 11

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Focusing on the “tag profile” for a patient in different sessions


Next steps (1): additional ways of evidencing changes

Group level: Compare maps from two or more sessions by placing

them next to each other Compare the group tag profiles from sessions: by

selecting all nodes in a map, all relevant tags ‘light up’

Individual level: Compare the tag profile for a patient over time, from pre-

group assessment, through early, midway and closing sessions, to review.

Compare relationships between specific patients across sessions


Next steps (2): additional ways of evidencing changes

Theoretical potential: We would hope to see a shift from negative to more

positive tags over time Can we find patterns in tags or links congruent with

theoretical predictions? (e.g. matching tags between patients = “mirroring”)

Technological potential: Video annotation: indexing video data with icons and

connections Summary reports/graphs generated from the incidence

of tags, links, etc

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