The Refresher Course on Repertory Grids

Facilitator
Devi Jankowicz

Who should attend
This workshop is intended for delegates who have encountered the repertory grid during their formal studies in psychology, but who have not used it to any great extent and who have been left with an 'interesting; so what?' feeling. Thorough analysis of single individuals and of samples of respondents, the identification of personal values, and the range of applications in the occupational setting will be emphasised.

Workshop overview
This workshop provides an introduction to Repertory Grid Technique and its conceptual underpinnings, for people who may have heard of it or used it once or twice but are not fully conversant with elicitation and analysis techniques. You will be asked to complete a brief, 3-item pre-questionnaire before attending, to let me know your particular areas of interest so that I can tailor examples to suit.

This is a hands-on workshop and while theory is important, please be prepared to practice the technique in the workshop and to share impressions and reactions with other participants.

Aims of the workshop
To bring you up to speed with basic repertory grid elicitation and analysis techniques, specifically:

• to address the argument for constructivist methods, setting Repertory Grid technique in context with other techniques
• to teach Grid and Resistance-to-Change Grid techniques, together with their basic analyses
• to address the specific personal fields of application you have suggested, while showing the breadth of applications.

Psychological theory underpinning the workshop
Kelly’s Personal Construct Theory asserts that there is no difference between the scientist seeking to understand psychological phenomena, and the layperson making personal sense of experience. This basic epistemological premise has profound implications, not least in emphasising the importance of understanding the other person’s construing if you seek to make sense of the other person in terms of your own constructs! This endeavour requires a technique for identifying and analysing constructs in the first place, and that is what the present workshop provides.

The theory will be placed in context with other constructivist approaches from Berger and Luckmann onwards; I should stress, though, that the emphasis in the workshop is more on learning the technique rather than on theory.

Pre/post work required
You will be asked to complete a brief, 3-item pre-questionnaire before attending, to let me know your particular areas of interest so that I can tailor examples to suit.

Date and venue
10^th May 2007, 9.30am - 17.00pm
The British Psychological Society, 30 Tabernacle Street, LONDON, EC2A 4UE

Facilitator details
Devi Jankowicz used to work in psychometrics until someone suggested that it’s more interesting to engage with people in their own language rather than in psychologist’s language. So he shifted his interest into personal construct psychology while retaining a concern for issues of validity and reliability in assessment. Current interests involve the applications of PCP to knowledge transfer across cultural boundaries, with particular emphasis on the post-command economies of central Europe, and he has published some 70 articles and book chapters in these fields, together with basic textbooks on repertory grid techniques, and on general business and management research methods.
Handling cultural differences in basic educational assumptions has been particularly important in recent years, and he has been involved in a number of consultancy engagements for UK and Polish government agencies, the first as a Ministerial adviser and the second as an EU Expert.