Brown, M., Downie, A., Howard, N. and Buckingham Shum, S. (2010). Compendium: A computerised programme for the tracking and measurement of group process. 23rd Meeting of the Society for Psychotherapy Research, Ravenscar UK [www.psychotherapyresearch.org/cde.cfm?event=273111] Group analysis is a form of psychodynamic psychotherapy, and as such tends to lag behind cognitive behavioural therapy and other similar treatment approaches in terms of evidence based practice. In these therapies we believe that it is the process that enables change to take place. This is harder to measure or describe and usually relies on therapists hand written notes and memory. Small wonder, then that most research focuses on outcomes alone rather seeking to identify the processes by which change came about. We are working with a computer based programme called Compendium developed by the Open University as a means of recording and analysing dialogue; its uses include web diagrams and critical pathways at work. We anticipate it will identify more clearly the process whereby individual and group change comes about, complementing measures such as CORE. We hope to demonstrate that compendium provides an effective means of extrapolating relevant data in terms of group process in a visual form enabling easier recognition of significant patterns of discourse and points of change in individual members and the group as a whole. http://people.kmi.open.ac.uk/sbs/2010/03/compendium-mapping-group-dynamics

1. 23rd Meeting of the Society for Psychotherapy Research
Ravenscar, UK, March 2010
www.psychotherapyresearch.org
Compendium: A computerised
programme for the tracking and
measurement of group process
Marion Brown, Andy Downie, Nicole Howard
Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Mental Health
NHS Foundation Trust, Aylesbury
Simon Buckingham Shum
Knowledge Media Institute
Open University, Milton Keynes
1
© Simon Buckingham Shum

2. 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
 “Compendium” is a way to map group process, with the addition
of a database, in order to build a searchable evidence base
2
© Simon Buckingham Shum

3. 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
3
© Simon Buckingham Shum

4. Murray Cox: Group Interaction Chronogram
Patient:
iii End i Beginning
ii Middle
© Simon Buckingham Shum

5. Murray Cox: Group Interaction Chronogram
iii End i Beginning
ii Middle
iii End i Beginning
iii End i Beginning
ii Middle
ii Middle
?
+
+
iii End i Beginning - iii End i Beginning
ii Middle
ii Middle
iii End i Beginning
ii Middle
Therapist
© Simon Buckingham Shum

6. 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) 6
© Simon Buckingham Shum

7. © Simon Buckingham Shum

8. 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
© Simon Buckingham Shum

9. Theme 1: Anger
Analyst’s
record of her
interpretation
to the group
on the
emerging
theme
9
© Simon Buckingham Shum

10. Theme 2: Reaching out to one of the group
The tags on a
patient’s icon
show the
behaviours
perceived by
the analyst
10
© Simon Buckingham Shum

11. Theme 3: Medication
Analyst’s
notes on the
theme that
emerged
towards the
group’s
conclusion
11
© Simon Buckingham Shum

12. The individual in the group
Map of the
group from a
specific
individual’s
perspective
12
© Simon Buckingham Shum

13. Map of all dynamics
No links from Highly active
other patient
patients…
Red ring
reminds
analyst of one
patient’s effect
on the group
Private Particularly
notes strong
on a relationship
patient
(dashed
link) 13
© Simon Buckingham Shum

14. Which behaviours do two patients share?
Tags shared in common are orange, tags from one patient in green
14
© Simon Buckingham Shum

15. Analysing the evidence base across sessions
15
© Simon Buckingham Shum

16. Analysing a patient across Sessions 1 and 11
Focusing on the
“tag profile” for a
patient in different
sessions
16
© Simon Buckingham Shum

17. 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
© Simon Buckingham Shum

18. Next steps (2):
additional ways of evidencing changes
Technological potential:
 Video annotation: indexing video data with icons and
connections
 Summary reports/graphs generated from the incidence
of tags, links, etc
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”)
© Simon Buckingham Shum