Leadership Effect on the Staff Conference Process

IN recent years increasing attention has been given to the total context in which hospital treatment is applied. Social scientists have been brought into hospital settings to help study and define the forces operating within the psychotherapeutic field which influence staff attitudes and decision making in regard to patients. Concurrent with this has been the advent of the concept of the therapeutic community which has been received and applied with considerable enthusiasm. In such a community the course of treatment is particularly influenced by a complex network of interrelationships. The studies of Stanton and Schwartz,¹ Caudill,² and others have served to emphasize the importance and broaden the understanding of how the structure and communication system among the personnel in the hospital affects the therapeutic process. These researchers emphasize the necessity to direct attention to the specific identification of special patterns of interaction among the