History and issues in the treatment of battering men: A case for unstructured group therapy

Although the history of the treatment of battering men is relatively brief, it is evident that a treatment paradigm is prematurely forming. This paradigm typically employs a structured group format, utilizing a sequence of preplanned psychoeducational sessions based on cognitive-behavioral principles. As its first goal, the article reviews the history and current status of treatment for abusive men. This review reveals the nature and origins of a host of biased, and largely unsubstantiated, assumptions about batterers and their responsiveness to treatment. The second goal is to dispute the utility of the structured therapy model that presently dominates the field. The author argues that all the topics, themes, and strategic skills commonly offered in structured educational programs will emerge as central topics of discussion during the natural course of events in the unstructured supervised self-help group format. The unstructured approach enables the therapist to spontaneously introduce various ideas and techniques at the most opportune moments in the group process, while avoiding the significant disadvantages of structured treatment programs.