ABSTRACT
Working psychotherapeutically with patients who expresstheir disturbance predominantly through action requires acareful consideration of the meaning behind behaviour. Understanding the significance of a particular form of sexualised or violent behaviour can provide a sense of relief to patients, offering meaning to a pattern of behaviour which might have previously been experienced by the individual as senseless, repetitive, and compulsive. For many patients starting in group treatment, starting to make links between their history, their current situation, and their particular form of acting out conveys a sense that behaviour can be understood, and, thus, some control gained: knowledge is, indeed, power.
