NCJ Number
108539
Journal
Psychotherapy Volume: 23 Issue: 4 Dated: (Winter 1986) Pages: 578-585
Date Published
1986
Length
8 pages
Annotation
Gestalt theory offers a contribution to theory and research on the plight of incorrigible, beyond-control adolescents.
Abstract
According to Gestalt theory, strong, clear, apt Gestalt formation is the definition of healthy aggression -everything the organism does to contact its environment involves aggressing in a healthy way. From this perspective, the incorrigible's problems originate in constitutional or environmental factors. A youth may lack resources such as nutrition, sleep, or intelligence and may consequently be limited in the ability to analyze a situation to formulate a clear strong response (Gestalt). Environmental factors, such as poor parental modeling of healthy aggression, also may contribute to the adolescent's problems. One task of adolescence is the breaking of parental confluence -- the taking apart and restructuring of parental values in order to find one's own system of Gestalt formation. For some incorrigible youth, their rebellion and defiance is a healthy insistence on opportunities for more complex figure formation. For others, it represents an introjection of parental badness or rebellion. Gestalt aggression research indicates that many incorrigible, runaway youth have difficulty structuring Gestalts for appropriate responses. Thus, helping these youngsters requires selecting and limiting what they may and may not contact and do, providing opportunities for healthy aggression, and helping them analyze situations. 40 references.