In a previous publication, Rinsley and Inge1 described the behavior of adolescent psychiatric hospital patients in terms of the child's need to view hospital treatment structure as an adversary with whom he or she is locked in combat. In that publication, the authors listed 11 "devices" by which patients consciously or otherwise seek to defeat the efforts of the treatment team to understand them and to help them accept the hospital as an ally in their struggle to find themselves and to grow psychologically. These devices include both verbal and nonverbal behavior expressing resistance to the treatment milieu; these devices comprise what can best be considered "resistance metaphors." As an outgrowth of these considerations, we postulated that:
1. "Resistance metaphors" comprise much of the verbal and nonverbal behavior of adolescent patients during the initial phase of hospitalization, hence the term, "resistance phase" applied thereto;