Psychologically Informed Planned Environment (PIPE): a group analytic perspective

Psychologically Informed Planned Environments (PIPEs) are an additional stage in the Offender Management Personality Disorder Pathway. The author describes the context, the impact of the work on both offenders and staff, and discusses the importance of paying close attention to the psychological process level from both a service and an organisational perspective. It is argued that the group analytic understanding of group and individual process is an important element of the psychological containment within PIPE for both offenders and staff. The group analytic focus on the here and now relational level linking to the historical context and the unconscious group and individual process provides a structure and concept for understanding the intrapersonal, interpersonal, group process, psychosocial process and the organisational context and its impact. Reference is made to the necessity of addressing the environment offender's move onto following their PIPE experience.