An Explanatory Study of Social Withdrawal Experiences of Adults

Abstract

Social withdrawal may be a common problem among psychiatric patients and in persons who are experiencing stressful conditions in their social environment. As a psychiatric nurse the researcher identified this problem on in-patient wards and had little knowledge or skill to deal with it. It was also observed among staff members, especially the nurses themselves as they would frequently "withdraw" to the nursing station rather than attempt therapeutic communications with their patients. One could wonder if the specific nature of the nursing job had induced this withdrawal, or was it due to a reaction to the withdrawn patients? A similar state of affairs was again found when the researcher was a group counsellor in a provincial prison, and for more than five years she pondered about this perplexing situation. While working as a research officer for one year, she finally was able to verify her perceptions of withdrawal by asking more than twenty psychiatric nurses if they felt withdrawn from their patients or if they noticed a pervasive amount of withdrawal behaviour in their patients. In order to obtain answers to these questions the phenomenon of withdrawal had to first be defined. Then many related questions fell into place, such as: What is the meaning and function of withdrawal for individuals? In other words, was withdrawal an active coping process or a self-defeating process for persons? What effect did withdrawal have in the lives of persons while they were engaged in it? Are withdrawn persons aware of their behaviour, and if so how do they name it or make meaning out of it?