Drawing the Ideal Self (Personal Construct Psychology - PCP)

This month’s episode will be focussed on time.  I listened to a few things on the radio about time and read some articles which were all very interesting and sparked this episode. I summarise the information from them and think about what Dorothy Rowe had to say about it and a few ideas for exploring a person’s personal constructions.  References All in the mind(Why it is hard to recall 2021) http...

I thought it was time to invite you to have a go at something you could easily use with people you are working with. This involves eliciting constructs, identifying the more important ones and then pyramiding those constructs. You will use fantasy characters or stories that had an impact on you when you were growing up and it does not matter what sort of media they are from - books, TV, film, game...

This episode has an idea you can experiment with as an exploration of yourself. Miller Mair’s Community of Self is an interesting and rather playful way to take a look at yourself as a number of characters engaged in ‘producing’ you. I have taken some excepts from a paper by Mair and if you are interested, it would be worth reading the whole paper for more about the background to it. References: T...

Happy New Year! This month I have been thinking about the way we might experience being construed by teachers. This is meaningful throughout our lives and can affect the way we construe ourselves. It was sparked by listening to the BBC Radio 4 Life Changing programme which reminded me how important that is:. The episode was from May 2023: Overheard. The programme blub says, “Dr Sian Williams talks...

This month’s episode will consider how validation is a more useful construct than reinforcement when we wonder why someone made a challenging choice. It also summarises a paper about the impact of wrongful imprisonment on a person. The paper is freely available - details below. A dilemma faced by one such prisoner is used as an example. I have been thinking about that situation ever since I heard...

You may be thinking about how you might use PCP in research. This episode features an interview with Dr. Emily Strong, Educational Psychologist, whose research has focussed on children who speak selectively. This is one of the tricky issues to get around, especially when we need to explore a child or young person’s views. The interview with Emily you will hear what she did and what she found throu...

Often it can be helpful to go back to the basics of PCP theory and get a clearer understanding than you had first time around. I found a really nice explanation of a construct in Richard Butler’s book. I think he provides a  good summary and I wanted to share it with you. If you already feel secure in your understanding, you might like to hear the way he expresses it and then take some time to con...

This episode is about exploring what the client expects from their counselling sessions. Fay Fransella and Peggy Dalton remind us how important it is to do this early in the counselling relationship and they provide a description of a first session in PCP counselling. I hope you find it useful. Reference Fransella, F., and Dalton, P. (1990). Personal Construct Counselling in Action. Sage. 

Watching the news has been pretty miserable over the last year or so with so many people trying to flee awful situations. I have been thinking a lot about the people who are traumatised by experiences, and about the people who seem to recover well from similar experiences. This is unrelated to an objective assessment of the experience’s awfulness and closely related to their personal construing. S...

This episode explores the difficulty of getting some tasks done and refers to an exercise you can download from my website - drawingtheidealself.co.uk .  The exercise follows a process for exploring your personal construing of the admin tasks you have to do. It is not specific to an age for use (even children have their tasks at school and home), nor to a profession (a homemaker also has many admi...

If you are enjoying learning about Personal Construct Psychology, you may be interested to take it further. This episode has information about some of the possibilities available, some paid and some for free. References Foundation courses Coventry Constructivist Centre Cathy Sparkes and Adele Pile  Claire Morris  Masters course Padua masters course (taught in English)  Quarterly stu...

I thought it might be useful to see how a PCP approach might be useful in exploring the menopause. I found a paper by Foster and Viney describing a group approach. They developed a model of menopause based on a personal construct account of change and informed by women’s meanings and then a brief intervention aimed at tackling the psychological impact of the menopause. Their study is a nice exampl...

I am sending this message now in case anyone is just about to print and make the ESP cards! I have been able to re-order cards, making it easier to see what is in each category and to print the sets. I have also added a few more cards, based on my work with children in the last couple of weeks. I will be adding the new document to my website by the end of 12/11/22. In future, if I add new cards, I...

The Exploring Situations and Problems (ESP) cards are a new tool for exploring construing in children. They might be useful if your time with a child is very limited, or you need something to use with children with poor attention or are not easy to engage. The cards can be the beginning of a PCP elaboration and an in-depth exploration of the constructs. The ESP cards are used to create a storyboar...

This month is an interview with Sam Beasley, Educational Psychologist, working in Hampshire, UK. It is not only for educational psychologists because there will practitioners in lots of services that work in similar ways to EPs - professionals who have very limited time in their contact with children and young people. Sam talks about how her interest in PCP began and how she uses PCP within her wo...

This month’s episode is about the impact on our construing of having a of physical illness or injury. I found a really PCP model in a paper by Linda Viney (1990): Constructivist Model of Psychological Reactions to Physical Illness and Injury. Everyone will have experience of illness and injury so I hope this will have universal appeal. If you would like a written copy of the model, it can be downl...

Although this month’s podcast is about sports coaching, the ideas are suited to many other coaching encounters. I refer to a diagram which you will be able to see via the link on the podcast description on my website (see below). The Expectation Effect by David Robson BBC R4 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00199wp Richard J Butler (1996). Sport Psychology in Action Nadal’s pre-serve ritual video...

This month the podcast is about constructs. If you are new to PCP, I hope this might summarise what a construct is, the difference between constructs and elements, and verbal, non-verbal and pre-verbal constructs. References A drawing and its opposite: an application of the notion of the ‘construct’ in the elicitation of children’s drawings. Chapter 9 in Ravenette, T. (1999). Personal Construct Th...

This month’s episode is about slot ratting or slot movement. Have you wondered why you haven’t been able to keep up with a desired change in yourself? Have you tried to help someone who wants to make changes, knows what to do/how to be in their new self, and yet they cannot sustain them. Slot rattling is a really useful concept that can help us to understand one reason this might happen.

April’s episode is about holidays, from a PCP perspective. I thought it might be interesting to have a think about this is case you want a little light PCP thinking to consider whilst you are away. If you haven’t decided on a holiday yet, you might find it useful to think about some of this before you make your arrangements. I reference an interesting paper by Beverley Walker: Travelling: “We don’...

This episode is an answer to a question I hear often, "How can I use PCP approach in work with children and young people?" I thought I would talk about my own approach but please remember that other practitioners will have a completely different and equally successful approach. This is one of the great benefits of PCP - there is no prescribed way, so it is about gradually working out your own way...

Ian is a PCP psychotherapist and a social worker who has been using a PCP approach throughout his career. He talks about his journey to date and how he uses PCP in his daily work. Ian’s contact details are Ian Gillman-Smith, Independent Social Work Consultant, UKCP Registered Psychotherapist, Registered Social Worker Email: ian@gillmansmith.com Website: www.iangillmansmith.co.uk References Peggy D...

This month I re-read Tom Ravenette’s paper, Who are you? A structure for exploring a ‘sense of self’ (1989) and was reminded how creative Tom was and how good he was at designing PCP techniques. This is a paper which describes his exploration process, something he developed from what he learned from his practice. So, that is the topic for today’s episode. A copy of the technique can be found at th...

This episode is an interview with Jenny Newland. Jenny is a psychotherapist but she is also a maths tutor and coaches kayaking - a rare combination I expect! We talk about how she came to PCP and how she uses a PCP approach in her three different roles. If you would like to explore more or get in touch with Jenny, her details are below. Jenny’s contact information: For therapy and getting in touch...

It is coming up to the new year and you might be thinking of making some changes in your life - maybe starting something, or stopping something. I thought it could be useful to think about Kelly’s version of aggressiveness which has a different meaning from the dictionary definition. Exploring the implication of changes before making them will help you to anticipate their potential impact - your o...