Why co-present groups? Affective processing to produce meaningfulness

Abstract

Small human complex systems, here called co-present groups, are found across all fields of human social life. Complexity thinking suggests why this is so: that these groups, irrespective of formal content, have a meta-function of providing maximum complexity to manage the indeterminacy or uncertainty that characterises the most complex of human social issues. This claim depends on an understanding of the functioning of these groups as being characterised by irreducibly complex intersubjective (person to person) relations, which are involved in the processing of raw human experience (‘affective processing’), to produce shared meaningfulness. An example of the use of co-present groups in medical continuing professional development (CPD) is given.

Keywords:

• Co-present groups
• relations
• affective processing
• uncertainty

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jeanette Lancaster

Dr Jeanette Lancaster is a psychiatrist in private practice in Melbourne. She has a long-standing interest in how complexity theory can be used to contribute to our understanding of professional learning.