Henry Ezriel

Henry Ezriel (c1910-1985) was a Kleinian analyst who pioneered group analysis at the Tavistock Clinic.

He is perhaps best known as the originator of one of the Malan triangles

Training and contributions

Having taken a medical degree from Vienna, Ezriel emigtrated to England, to work post-war alongside W. R. Bion as consultant psychiatrist to the Tavistock.[1] There he developed his method of psychoanalytic group work, expounded in a series of articles in the fifties, and through his personal teaching thereafter.[2] His non-directive approached centred on group tensions expressed in the here and now, and on transferences between members, and between members and the group.[3]

Ezriel influentially proposed using what he called a “three part interpretation”, including the three key areas of adaptation, desire and anxiety. He highlighted the patient's required or conformist relationship to the group, which was seen as a defence against the wished-for relationship, a defence in turn driven by fear of an imagined catastrophic relationship.[4] His associate David Malan would simplify Ezriel's fomulations into his so-called 'triangle of conflict'.[5]

Criticisms of Ezriel's approach included the way his minimalist interventions tended to promote an image of the omniscient therapist, as well as a feeling that individual patients were being neglected by comparison with the group as a whole.[6]

Selected writings

Ezriel, H. 'A Psycho-Analytic Approach to Group Treatment' British Journal of Medical Psychology 23 (1950)

Ezriel, H. 'Notes on psychoanalytic Group therapy: II .Interpretation' Research Psychiatry , 15 (1952)

See also

References

  1. ↑ David E. Scharff, Object Relations Theory and Practice (1996) p. 511
  2. ↑ David E. Scharff, Object Relations Theory and Practice (1996) p. 511
  3. ↑ I. B. Weiner, Handbook of Psychology (2003) p. 348
  4. ↑ H. Spandler, Asylum to Action (2006) p. 74
  5. ↑ J. P. Gustafson, The Complex Secret of Brief Psychotherapy (1997) p. 138
  6. ↑ L. Horwitz, Listening with the Fourth Ear (2014) p. 21

Further Reading

Raphael Springmann, Psychotherapy: The Neglected Art (2002)

External links

Discussion

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