We are at a crossroads of trust, truth and authenticity in the history of global culture. Despite the careful and clever theorization of aesthetic experience, which has amongst other things, established the fallaciousness of objectivity in documentary, noted the significance of unconscious sublimation in abstract, experimental and surrealist art and film, and disclosed the mechanics of institutional white supremacy in systems of production, it is as though the difficult work of learning how to think/view/listen critically and skeptically, being open to other possibilities and other truths, is radically diminishing.

From the initial positivism of spreadable media to the current psychotic hallucinations of its fragmented micro shards and scrolls, we are inundated with the bad faith of slippery ontological relationships to reality. How can we trust our screens? Where do we begin and what assumptions must we recognize, if only to challenge and unpick them, in order to rediscover or reimagine authentic, progressive and trustworthy screen futures?

In this talk, I consider and develop Wilfred Bion’s concept of the ‘bizarre object’ to think about the consequences of our unthought experiences with various media, including the small screens we carry with us at all times. Originally coined to define the specific type of psychotic hallucination experienced by schizophrenics, I extend Bion’s notion of the bizarre object to explore broader themes and experiences of hallucination, virtuality and transformation, specifically attending to media object use. I am interested in expanding the clinical context of bizarre objects to consider the unthought projections that dominate our media use and production, which may further illuminate the emptiness endemic to social media use, yet (to end on a positive note) paradoxically indicate a desire for trust and a need to know.

This mixed-methods study explored 110,000 online conversations about death, dying, and bereavement from 2003-2020.

The study highlighted how digital communities provide important emotional support during times of crisis. Using natural language processing and qualitative analysis, the study identified three key ways online spaces support individuals: by providing comfort and validation from others who may be going through similar experiences; by enabling users to build capabilities and be sign posted towards the right information; and by creating communities that people can return to in order to find support.

The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted both the increased importance of these digital spaces when in-person services are halted and the barriers that still exist in trying to access them. The findings demonstrate that online communities are important platforms where people can find peer support, comfort and community during times of loss and change. Digital inequality, however, remains a significant barrier to these forums reaching their full potential. This research offers key insights into how online communities could become better integrated into existing support systems while preserving the grassroots, user-led qualities that make them safe spaces during times of crisis and when people are experiencing a bereavement.

Keywords: online communities, crisis support, digital health, peer support, COVID-19

Our paper explores the experience of working with women volunteers helping male asylum seekers on the Bibby Stockholm barge in Portland Dorset, where we set out to produce a soundscape that captures the psychosocial mood of Portland Bay through the voices of its residents.

The project builds on research conducted by The Weymouth and Portland Community Research Network that focused on the isolation and deprivation of residents in the area. It also highlights the need for Portland residents to develop a reparative community voice as a response to the racism stirred up in relation to fantasies of migration for which the barge became a powerful symbol, attracting global media attention. With that in mind, our research team have used a collaborative psychosocial approach that uses a mix of social dreaming, poetry and audio media to capture the voices of women from the Portland Global Friendship Group to evoke the conscious and unconscious feelings of residents who felt compelled to assist those men on the barge and show solidarity with them and each other at a time of division and upheaval.

This paper explores the unspoken struggles faced by counselling psychologist trainees in Hong Kong as they navigate tensions between Western therapeutic models and their own cultural and linguistic realities. These challenges arise from the need to reconcile English-language training with Cantonese-language practice, reflecting the coloniality of knowledge embedded in therapeutic frameworks. This tension generates unconscious anxieties that shape trainees’ supervisory relationships, therapeutic encounters, and professional identity. However, these struggles remain largely unspoken, leading to a sense of disconnection and marginalisation, creating an identity crisis within the profession.

Psychosocial thematic analysis will be introduced as a method for exploring unconscious processes within the broader socio-political context. Integrating the psychosocial approach with reflexive thematic analysis provides a framework for exploring shared themes across research participants, facilitating an understanding of how unconscious dynamics interact with power structures, cultural histories, and socio-political contexts. Rather than considering unconscious dynamics as exclusively intrapsychic, psychosocial thematic analysis situates them within broader historical and structural contexts, influenced by colonial legacies, power dynamics, and cultural resistance. The examination of these struggles reveals the embedding of the unconscious within a collective postcolonial psyche, shaped by histories of domination and resistance.

This paper will present the initial codes and themes from the researcher’s PhD project, addressing the potential unconscious dynamics that emerge in the interpretation of the data. Through this, group-level themes are proposed as the researcher examines how unconscious processes manifest within wider contexts. This contribution resonates with the conference theme by framing professional identity crises as both a challenge and an opportunity for transformation. It calls for a more reflexive approach in supervision and training to address these unconscious dynamics. By challenging the coloniality of knowledge, this approach promotes a more integrated professional identity and supports trainees in navigating the cultural and linguistic complexities of their practice.