Challenges to Healthy Peer Support Groups: Competition Among Group Members

People are endlessly fascinating.  If you’ve facilitated a peer support group, you’ve undoubtedly seen some of the wonderful and not-so-wonderful human behaviors acted out in the group, and you’ve probably been puzzled about why we are the way we are.

Competition is a common part of life and has a clear value when it comes to work and activities such as sports.  In peer support groups, competition represents a common and serious threat to the ability of the group to do the work of a support group.

I commonly see this in one of two forms:

1.      Many people feel a need to feel better than those around them in some way.  In peer support groups, they may make comments about how they are coping with a problem better than other members.  They may make comments trying to show that they are wiser, or smarter, or more successful than other members.  They may try to sound more clever, more insightful or more caring than others.  The fact may be that they are smarter or more caring, but the concern is with their effort to show this during the meeting by comments designed to show some form of superiority.

 2.      A more curious form involves group members making comments about how they are worse than other people.  Their cancer may be worse or more painful than that of other members.  Their substance use may be worse than that of other group members.  Their life failures are worse than other members.  Their depression and anxiety are more severe than others.  Again, the fact may be that they are actually worse in some way than other members, bur it is the effort to prove that to other members, that is the concern.

It is worth asking “why do people want to compete with others in a group designed around mutual support?”

People are basically deeply insecure.  That is true of all of us.  We feel a deep need to prove our worth because we doubt that worth.  We compare ourselves to others in small and large ways.  We reassure ourselves that we are important in ways that refer to others either as less important and somehow less than us.  Even the most secure and confident people have internal dialogues in their heads, reassuring them that they are important and worthy.

When people come into a group setting, these feelings of insecurity are naturally triggered.  Some people have either such deep insecurity or such limited self-awareness, that they start making comments to prove to themselves and others that they are better than other members.  Some even turn the issue upside down, trying to prove that they are “the worst” in the group as a way to stand out.

The problem is what these comments do to the functioning of the group.  I’ve known plenty of group members who quit groups because of too many comments like this.  A friend described an unhealthy cancer support group as a “competition to prove who has the worst cancer”. I’ve had clients who quit AA meetings because “everyone just wants to prove how smart they are”.

Competition within peer support groups has several specific risks:

1.      Competition directly competes with mutual support.  When members are competing, they are not supporting each other.

2.      Competitive comments make other members feel less important, and/or feel angry at the person who made the comment.

3.      Competitive comments support the common feeling that there is a hierarchy in any group of people, prompting people to wonder where they are in the hierarchy.  In this way, competitive comments increase insecurity – the opposite impact from what you want in a healthy support group.

4.      Competitive comments are a waste of group time.  They have no benefit for the group.  They take up time and emotional energy.  They distract from more substantive discussion.

5.      Competition results in members leaving and can create a reputation that will keep new members away.

It can be tricky for group leaders to address and reduce competitive comments in an existing peer support group.  Consider the following strategies:

1.      Talk about competitive comments in the ground rules or “comfort agreement” of the group, letting people know from the start that competitive comments are not helpful in the group and that members should avoid comments that focus on competition.

2.      As a group leader, you should model mutual support and the avoidance of comments that suggest any form of competition between members.  This includes the goal of avoiding comments by you that draw attention to your role as the facilitator, or as a more experienced group member.  You certainly need to point out your role at times, particularly to new members, but comments that are really designed to reassure your relative importance, will have a negative impact on the culture of the group.

3.      Watch for competitive comments, and notice trends in who makes them, when they make them, and the response of other group members.  Avoid rewarding those comments by not responding or by redirecting the conversation toward mutual support. 

4.      Address the underlying need that competition reflects:  the basic insecurity the members feel about whether they are important to anyone else.  Build the group’s ability to provide caring and support to all members.  In a healthy group, most members will feel no need to compete.

5.      If competitive comments become a significant problem, consider raising the topic for the group to talk about, remind them of the goal of mutual support and how this does not fit with competition, remind the group of the comfort agreement and the need to avoid competition, ask members to talk about how they feel in response to competitive comments by others, ask members to talk about why a support group might feel a need to compete.  All of these topics could spur valuable discussion which will help members avoid competitive comments.

6.      If a specific group member has a clear pattern of making competitive comments, and they do not respond well to broader efforts to change that behavior, consider if you should have a discussion with that member outside of the meeting.  In a private setting, share what you have noticed and your concern for the impact of their comments on the group.  Be aware that this may be a very sensitive topic for them, and so tread carefully.  If you see that they are not able to hear you, or not willing to hear you, increase your level of assertiveness.

7.      In extreme cases, when a member makes a great number of competitive comments and has resisted changes to their behavior despite all of your and the groups efforts, you as the facilitator, might want to consider if it is appropriate and helpful to ask the person to take a break from attending the group.  You could frame this as an effort to step away from the group to think about how they are contributing and to think more about the feedback they’ve been given.  You could ask them to meet with you if they feel more able to rejoin the group in a way that is more consistent with the goal of “mutual support”.

Competition is a common part of life, but it undermines the goals of most mutual support groups.  It is one of the most common reasons that people leave groups or decide not to join groups.  As a facilitator, you want to be attentive to this risky dynamic, and take strategic action to address it when you see a clear need.