Coventry Constructivist Centre

David Green presented a workshop in Coventry on 13/3/15 called “Come back Idiographic assessment, all is forgiven-almost"

Another Way of Knowing: the poetry of psychological enquiry. Miller Mair (2014)
Miller Mair’s last book has just been published. As its editor ( Simon King- Spooner) says on the cover “ Another way of knowing has the theme of a personal journey, taking in smaller themes as it feels its way forward………… It should be read by anyone tired of bullying know-all reductionism, and feeling the need for another way of knowing”.
 Available direct from the publishers  Lulu Press, or from Amazon.

PCP Diploma Course 2013 - 2015

Personal  Construct  Perspective  on  Working  With  Anger
A  review  of  a  presentation  at  the  University  of  Herts  on  12th  June  2014  given  by  Peter  Cummins and   Dr  Dina  Pekkala.

This  day  course  was  attended  very  substantially  and  reflected  the  researched  experience  of  the   presenters  in  providing  clinical  care  for  those  referred  for  treatment  of  anger.
They  described  their  utilising  standardised  instruments,  comprehensive  survey  of  developmental   features  including  socialisation  and  abuse  and  also,  from  an  idiographic  position,  what  people   themselves  actually  say  in  the  initial  phase.    The  presenters  noted  that  sometimes  referrals  for anger masked  pressing  social  and  interpersonal  concerns,  more  suitable  for  the  resolution  of  normal social   pressure  than  for  ‘Anger  treatment’.
They  gave  an  account  of  their  use  of  popular  Anger  Management  strategies  that  have  owed  much to Ray  Novaco,  portrayed  as  helpful.    At  a  certain  point,  though,  almost  paralleling  their  treatment   progression,    the  presenters  gave  their  cardinal  view  that  it  is  structure  of  meaning  issues  that  lie   behind  anger.    In  essence,  they  demonstrated  very  clear  researchable  indications  that  anger  is  the   expression  of  some  initial  change  in  structure  of  meaning  and  subsequent  fixity.
Normally,  PCP  protagonists  blather  incomprehensibilities  about  the  theory  but  on  this  day  it  slipped   in  so  easily  how  invalidation  of  a  frame  of  meaning  can  in  the  end  lead  to  stuckness,  hostility   and,   quoting  Leitner,  “Structural  Arrest”.
We  received  many  illustrations  of  the  ways  in  which,  within  a  semi  manualised  framework  (and,   modesty  forbids,  informed  and    fluid  facilitation)  people  reconstrued  themselves  and  their  anger.     And  there  were  graphs  to  prove  it!!
In  this  day  presentation  there  was  everything  which  the  evidenced-­‐based  afficionado  desired  and   also  something  more  about  wider  meaning  than  just  the  dehumanising  label  of  ‘anger’.
Reference:    The  supporting  literature  is  available  in  the  text  called  “Working  with  Anger:  a   Constructivist  Approach”  by  Peter  Cummins  (2005)  and  published  by  Wiley.    If  you  are  thinking  of   running  an  anger  programme  then  this  is  well  worth  the  investment.