Fellowship,Helping and Healing: The Re-Emergence of Self-Help Groups

This article reflects upon three important facets of self-help, e.g., fellowship, helping and healing; it provides an historical and social science base for the re-emergence of a significant voluntary phenomenon—i.e., self-help groups in their contemporary formats, while comparing and contrasting the approaches and limitations of profes sional helper interventions with the positive consequences for personal and/or social change through experiential knowledge gained by members of self-help groups.