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The Open Dialogue approach has gained increasing international interest outside of its origins in Finland. However, the central principle of promoting dialogue can be a difficult concept to teach and apply. In addition, there is a wide range of authors and articles about Open Dialogue and dialogical approaches creating a potentially overwhelming number of sources for clinicians to consider. In this narrative review, we describe and synthesise the wide range of writings on how dialogue may be promoted in family therapy. This article covers the various uses of the term 'dialogue,' the dialogical mindset of the therapist, recommendations on how to respond to clients during meetings, the involvement of the therapist's 'self' in meetings, and the use of reflecting teams. We present a concise list of recommendations to aid clinicians and to promote further discussion about dialogical practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Co‐therapy has been used widely in marriage and family therapy and counselling, especially in the second half of the last century. In recent years, there has been a decline in the use of co‐therapy, especially for financial reasons. However, currently, with the focus on dialogical ideas, co‐therapy has emerged as a preferable option. Although co‐therapy is now commonly used in dialogical practices, no clear description of the qualities of dialogical co‐therapy exist. Using practitioner research, we attempt to discover/describe specific qualities defining dialogical co‐therapy. The results show how a specific dialogical epistemology is evident in the co‐therapy setting and demonstrate the advantages and disadvantages of such a setting, as well as identifying the challenges co‐therapists working dialogically might face. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Open Dialogue is an approach to working with people and their families experiencing psychosocial distress. Interest in Open Dialogue in Australia has been growing recently, raising questions about its adaption and implementation to local contexts. This article is an attempt to answer some of the frequently asked questions we have encountered in training and discussions about Open Dialogue. We attempt to provide responses to questions of how Open Dialogue is different to what is done already, how it fits with current approaches, how you know if you are doing it, whether it is passive or just about doing reflections, issues about including the social network, and concerns about the evidence base. This article aims to present a variety of viewpoints in relation to these questions and to hopefully further discussions on how Open Dialogue can be implemented and adapted to Australian health care and social care contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As part of a larger research project, this qualitative study explores sequences from six network therapy sessions. We focused on these sequences because only the therapists found them to be meaningful; the other participants did not think they were significant. The aim of this study was to explore the therapists' inner dialogues, the degree to which these inner dialogues consist of professional and personal voices, and what this means for the dialogical process. We used a multi-perspective methodology that combines video recordings of network therapy sessions, participants' interviews, and text analysis. We found that the outer dialogue and the therapists' inner dialogues are strongly related to each other and that both personal experiences and professional knowledge are present in an implicit way, which helps the therapist to be present in the dialogical process both as a person and as a professional. We also found that when the outer dialogue is very emotional, the therapist moves away from the outer dialogue and becomes more present in their inner dialogues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies exploring the experiences of recovering from mental health difficulties show the significance of social and relational aspects. Dialogical practices operate within the realm of social relations; individual perspectives are not the primary focus of attention. The present study is part of a series of qualitative studies from southern Norway, exploring dialogical practices and change from the perspective of lived experience and in relationship with network meetings. Two co-researchers, who themselves had experienced mental health difficulties, were part of the research team. Material from qualitative interviews was analysed through a dialogical hermeneutical process where ideas from Emmanuel Lévinas and Mikhail Bakhtin were used as analytical lenses. Six interdependent dimensions emerged from our interpretative analysis, comprising three temporal dimensions (1. Dialogues open the moment, 2. Dialogues open the past, and 3. Dialogues open the future) and three dimensions of speaking, which operated across the three temporal dimensions (4. Ethical: Dialogues open through inviting attentiveness and valuing, 5. Expressive: Dialogues open for new vitality, and 6. Hermeneutical: Dialogues open for new meaning). These dimensions were incorporated into one main theme: Dialogues - beginning by others being invitingly attentive - open for moving and living. The way the findings point to change events as an opening for movement - 'moving in' as if from the outside, and 'moving on' as opposed to being stuck - are discussed in relation to other studies. We conclude by suggesting that the salient point of change-generating conversations is in the ethics of being invitingly attentive, and such conversations should take into account multidimensionality, that relates to the past and the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study is part of a series of qualitative studies focusing on dialogic practice in southern Norway. In this article, we present a qualitative study of a network meeting focusing on the interplay between the participants' inner and outer dialogues. The network meeting is between an adolescent boy, his mother and two network therapists, the same adolescent case discussed previously in this journal by Bøe et al. (). The aim of this study is to explore how the interplay between inner and outer dialogues contributes to significant and meaningful moments for the interlocutors. A multiperspective methodology is used that combines video recordings of a network meeting and participant interviews with text analysis. Our research found the interplay has an important role in understanding the emergence of significant and meaningful moments in therapy. A one-sided focus on participants' utterances or inner dialogues was insufficient to explain their significance and meaning to the interlocutors. A dialogical approach provides a theoretical frame and concepts that are useful in investigations of therapeutic conversations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we use the intersubjective ethics of Bakhtin and Levinas and a case illustration to explore change in therapy as an ethical phenomenon. We follow Lakoff and Johnson in their emphasis on the way our conceptions of change seem permeated by metaphors. Bakhtin and Levinas both suggest through a language in which metaphors play a crucial role, that human existence-the consciousness and the subject-emerge within the dialogue of the encounter. They both describe the dynamics of human existence as ethical in their origin. Following this, we argue that change may be seen as an ongoing ethical event and that the dynamics of change are found in the ways we constantly become in this event. We investigate the ethical dynamics of this ongoing event through three themes illuminating the contributions of both Bakhtin and Levinas: (1) we become as responsible, (2) we become in speaking, (3) we become in answering the unknown. We explore these themes through a case illustration. Finally, we briefly point out some possible implications for mental health practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]