Role reversal

Role reversal is one of the psychodrama techniques that demonstrate a protagonist’s intrapersonal conflicts deeply and explicitly on the stage. This technique is perhaps the single most important and effective technique in psychodrama. In the form of psychodrama, the protagonist is invited to move out of his own position or role into the significant other’s position and enact that role. Therefore, the auxiliary ego can observe and learn how to play the role. For example, in a parent-child's session, a protagonist who is the child reverses role with one of his or her parents. This technique not only helps the protagonist get more insight of a specific role but also helps the director, the auxiliary egos, and the audience learn more about that specific role.

Theory

Psychodrama has three important techniques: the technique of doubling, the technique of mirroring, and the technique of role reversal. Each technique represents different stages in Moreno’s theory of the development of the infant: the stage of identity (the stage of doubling), the stage of the recognition of the self (the stage of mirroring), and the stage of the recognition of the other (the stage of role reversal). Role reversal requires that one has learned to differentiate in the areas of time, place and person, and is capable of moving out of his own position into another’s position to be able to enact that other role