Observations on the Interplay between Large and Small Analytic Groups

Abstract

The authors address unanswered questions about the attraction of the often stormy large group and the interplay between it and small groups. If the large group is a place that arouses many difficult feelings, why do people in conferences, workshops, training programmes and on the Internet continue to participate in them? The authors found that within Internet large groups there was a clear pattern of setting up a small, intimate core group. They found a similar pattern in two live, group workshops. The authors learned that large and small groups are intricately related, and that when participants have the chance, they choose to continue in an on-going, back-and-forth movement between each.