The relation between referential and reflexive processes: implications for clinical practice

Although referential process (RP) (Bucci, 1997, 2015) and reflexive process share some theoretical assumptions, their relation has never been explored through an operational approach. This study analyzes the relation between Referential Activity (RA) (Bucci, 2011) which may be conceived as the linguistic index of RP, and two reflexive processes of different complexity, reflection and reflexivity, which have been recently conceptualized by the present study’s authors according to a semiotic and psychodynamic perspective (Freda & Esposito, 2017). Specifically, the audio recordings from seven sessions of a counselling group for underachieving university students were transcribed verbatim and analyzed through two procedures: (1) the latest Italian version of the computerized text analysis software developed for the analysis of RA (Discourse Attribute Analysis Program software) (Mariani et al., 2013) and (2) the analysis of the narrative functions (Marra & Holmes, 2004) that aimed to track reflection and reflexivity processes (Esposito & Freda, 2016). Findings showed that the software-based analysis mainly captured those processes that, according to the combined analysis of the narrative functions, may be defined as reflection processes. Instead, more complex processes of reflexivity could be detected by taking into account an additional and innovative configuration of software indexes. Overall, these data inform us about some similarities between reflexive process and RP: they are not antagonists; rather, high referentiality seems essential for the activation of reflexive processes of higher complexity. Further studies are required to understand whether the data obtained are replicable in other group counselling interventions. Furthermore, some clinical implications for counselling, as well as the methodological relevance of this study, will be discussed.