The survival through online Sociodrama: COVID-19, what do you want to tell me? A sobrevivência via Sociodrama online: COVID-19, o que você quer me dizer? La supervivencia a través de Sociodrama en línea: COVID-19, ¿qué quieres decirme?

This article presents an account of an online sociodrama experience. The described session took place in the context of a study group containing 36 participants, including psychology students and psychologists. The meeting took place through an online application that allows video conferencing (Zoom). The proposed theme was: “Covid19, what do you want to tell me?” The action research has a socio-therapeutic focus, with the direction of the session centered on collective creation. The instruments included the director, the scenario, the protagonist, the supporting role, and the public. A final observation was that the online sociodrama created spaces for reorganizing social roles, even in social isolation and crisis.


INTRODUCTION
Sociometry offers the opportunity to observe, among other aspects, social roles, sociocultural learning, collective affect, social conflicts, and identity processes. This science uses a social approach: sociodrama. Sociodrama deals with group issues rather than personal issues. It is used both as a research method and in treating groups and intergroup relationships (Castro, Cardoso, & Leandro, 2020;. Moreno (1994, p. 188) characterized sociodrama as "a deep action method dealing with intergroup relations and collective ideologies".
Sociodrama takes place in the here and now. The actors are present in the moment, and the scene consists of the participants' interactions. Nery (2010) explains that a sociodrama works on intergroup relationships focusing on how social roles influence the group and what objectives and conflicts the group shares and/or identifies with. According to Cukier (2016, p.85), when roles are investigated in situations of trauma, it is seen how "the client's everyday roles are undermined and replaced by others created by the defensive structures and by the internalization of the trauma." Sociodrama becomes an important approach to identify, explore, and work on these changes or losses of roles resulting from the pandemic or social isolation.
In the past, groups required both geographical closeness and cohesion to form a sociometric unit. However, today physical proximity is no longer needed for connection (Malaquias, 2012). Such elements are part of a cyber-culture that is, according to Lévy (1999), a set of techniques, practices, attitudes, and new ways of thinking and values which have simultaneously emerged from a global computer network (cyberspace). Our society, dubbed "the information society", sees Information and Communications Technology (ICT) as the main source of gathering and sharing information. Therefore, participating and being active in cyberspace has turned out to be a way of keeping bonds (Goulart, Ferreira, Mosquera & Stobäus, 2013;Nunes, 2017).
Individuals need group interaction, whether online or in-person, due to ideological or survival instincts. However, some people pretend to be in "lack in time" -when the real issue is their ambivalence about participating; on the one hand desiring to belong to a group, while on the other hand, being afraid of taking the initiative to do so (Malaquias, 2012).
Social media had created a world very similar to that described by Moreno's vision, who had long before the advent of cyberspace, dreamt of "an instrument through which the living and the creative genius can, on this planet, communicate directly and instantaneously with their fellow human beings" (1993, p. 482-483). The idea of online applications of the psychodramatic theory may be a "spontaneous contemporary solution in the face of the advent of the internet, as a sociometric network, a means of communication and a role-playing context" (Vidal & Castro, 2020, p. 63).
The online sociodrama method follows the steps of a sociometric session, which helps interpret group phenomena and takes three contexts into account: 1. The social context, which refers to the culture which individuals belong to, i.e., their real environment; 2. The group context: participants, director and auxiliary egos; 3. The dramatic context, which refers to the dramatization itself, and is the "what if" space where participants play different roles which allow them to act out their fantasies in the imaginary, that is to generate new answers via a surplus reality (Malaquias, 2012). Surplus reality becomes even more relevant in the online sociodrama context because, as Perazzo (2012) highlights, surplus reality allows transformations in the scene to occur and allows for the co-construction of an alternative reality fills in the needs of the group.  A pandemic and associated social isolation can result in traumatic situations and create a need to develop a sociotherapeutic intervention that can support the accompanying feelings. van der Kolk (2002, as cited in Cukier, 2016 states: Verbal therapies are admittedly deficient in these circumstances (van der Kolk, 2002), because the prefrontal cortex does not function properly at the time of the trauma, registering sensations rather than cognition. Body therapies are the most recommended, and psychodrama, as we know, is one of the oldest. (p. 84) The challenge then is how to adapt psychodrama, specifically sociodrama, to the online environment and keep these physical sensations. Also, social isolation in Brazil has led to several changes. As Gonzatto et al. (2020) state: "the occurrence of other great epidemics or pandemics along history confirms that the world will be a different place after the covid-19 tide flows back" (p. 2). In other words, according to these authors, the trauma caused by the covid-19 is changing the course of history, even though we do not know yet to what extent. Furthermore, the seriousness of the situation and the uncertainties concerning the COVID-19, aside from leading to changes in the roles once performed, may trigger emotional states of fear, despair, or fright. Many people find themselves working at home or taking the risk of going out and returning home contaminated (Do Bú et al., 2020).
The use of sociodrama in the face of the covid-19 pandemic resembles its use in a natural disaster, reported Zampieri (2016).
She described sociodrama as a kind of work centered on affective experiences that help in the search for healthy personal and spontaneous healings in addition to emotional restoration. In a more recent study, Zampieri showed the importance of sociodrama to facilitate the revaluation of the dignity and the potentiality of individuals involved in traumatic situations. Individuals are not only left to acknowledge their weaknesses when facing the situation but are encouraged to develop new individual or group responses to face them (Zampieri, 2019). Therefore, the goal of online sociodrama is to discuss the possibility of maintaining the health of the group via videoconferencing tools and online chats, which may allow identification, connection, and the discussion of social phenomena. A thematic sociodrama concerning "Covid-19" is illustrated in this article. The theme focuses on the 2020 pandemic in Brazil and the national quarantine, a Ministry of Health preventive measure that has led to social distancing. The resulting social isolation calls for the search of new sociatric sessions for individual survival in groups.

METHOD
The article describes an experimental online sociodrama session themed "COVID-19, what do you want to tell me?" The session lasted one hour and a half and took place in March 2020. A group of thirty-six people (all adults) members of a psychodrama study group comprised of psychologists and psychology students were invited through social media to participate in the session. The participants connected via audio and video using a video conferencing online platform called "Zoom". Encryption ensured data security and protected privacy. The chat encryption provided by the online platform allowed for secure communication through the use of symmetrical and asymmetrical encryption algorithm. Therefore, by using essential credentials, it leveraged the existing network security avoiding any access to data. Zoom only stored necessary information under user account profile information (Zoom, 2020).
The 36 participants were members of in-person psychodrama study groups in Brazil before their studies were interrupted due to social isolation. Thus, they had already agreed on group rules through a contract. → informed about data privacy and confidentiality, and in case there was a loss of internet connection of the protagonist, it was known that he/she could request an online private chat with the director. Additionally, participants were asked to turn on their microphone whenever they wished to speak and keep their audio off to avoid interfering noise during the scenes. All participants were informed of the director's desire to write this article, were requested permission, and were invited to assist with the writing. As a result, the director and three participants agreed to work on a written description of the experience.
Since the session was designed as action-based research on sociodrama, the directing strategy chosen was centered on collective creation, focusing on a sociotherapy aimed at overcoming difficulties. The method used was sociodrama, and the selected tool was a dramatization. Lastly, the five instruments used were the director, the setting (both real and symbolic), the protagonist, the supporting role divided by Rodrigues into auxiliary ego, and the audience ego and the public (Rodrigues, 2007).
The sociodramatic approach was selected due to its social relevance and the sociometric group relationships that could focus on an answer to Covid-19 and its social impact. The sociodrama act was held with psychodrama students at different stages of their training in single interventions that occurred once every fifteen days.
The techniques used (doubling and role reversal) consisted of interruptions and responses in the dramatization flow carried out by the director and/or people appointed by him/her within the dramatic context. All techniques to enhance the spontaneity state can lead to a dramatic group insight (Rodrigues, 2007). During doubling, the director voiced things that the participant was withholding or was not able to express. During role reversals, participants were invited to play the role of Covid-19. Following this, they were asked to return to their roles to respond to the virus within the dramatic context.

THE ONLINE SURVIVAL EXPERIENCE
The director's warming up the process: starting and keeping the machine running The study groups' first meeting after the beginning of the pandemic and the director decided to bring the fears and doubts that each participant shared in WhatsApp groups and other social media to this dramatic context. To facilitate the group's adaptation to the online environment, the director explored the Zoom platform's tools to adjust them to the sociodrama application and confirm its achievement. This promoted the director to identify the importance of the participants of actually talking to Covid-19. The participants' posts about the virus illustrated that they were ready for that conversation.
The director's performance starts before the warming-up process and the dramatization. It begins when he/she starts thinking about his/her work with a particular group. This pre-warming-up process is experienced by the director and often by the participants (auxiliary egos, protagonists, or audience) and is full of the drama event expectations (Santo, 2017).
Even though the director was a new user of Zoom, she chose to use it to do this online intervention due to the relevance of the theme to the group. Besides the group members, Covid-19 also affected the director, who had to move from a physical to a virtual environment as a teacher and psychologist. Feeling prompted by this creative moment's demands, the director assembled all the study groups and started the conversation around Covid-19. It is worth mentioning that the advent of the pandemic and the social isolation have affected Brazilians' interpersonal relationships, socioeconomic situations, and emotional states. Therefore, this was a very important topic in the current context. During the act, the director realized that she would need a well-trained auxiliary ego to take on the virus's role to facilitate the application of some techniques. Unfortunately, she did not think of that in advance. The problem was solved when the director invited a student, who had directed a group before, to take on the auxiliary ego's role when necessary.
That situation could have been predicted earlier during the director's planning when aligning the following actions for the dramatization: a) the activation of starters or warm-ups: conceptual, emotional and physical; b) the steps of the warming-up process which interpenetrate one another: preparing the setting, establishing connections, preparing for the participants' and director's roles and preparing the audience; c) relational moments: isolation, horizontal differentiation and vertical differentiation 1 (Santo, 2017).
The director identified the group's social conflict and directed the group to take on social roles within this unique social context.
Additionally, there was a group theme or protagonic theme (a term used in the Brazilian psychodrama literature) even though the group had not chosen a protagonist (Alves, 2006) The universality of chosen themes and the director's ability to handle the dynamics are crucial elements for group direction.
Also, one should bear in mind "the respect to ethical limits agreed in the contract and the premise of not causing any kind of damage" (Bustos, 1999, p. 74).

Non-specific warm-up: joining the meeting
The meeting started fifteen minutes earlier with the director welcoming each participant and asking them where they were from and their unique insights on psychodrama. In the meantime, she tested the audio and video and provided room for more chatting. For technical reasons, some students could not join the meeting at the scheduled time, so the group was comprised of 36 members. After they all joined the online group and introduced themselves, the director asked them: "How does one conduct an online sociodrama?" -a question of great interest in a psychodrama study group. As various discussions developed, the director chose to ask each participant to think of a word that would describe their first contact with the psychodramatic method.
The answers involved words like involvement, spontaneity, teachers' names, Moreno, college names, etc. Some participants chose to type words into the chat due to the audio problem, and the director read them out loud.
This phase of the session refers to the isolation moment (Knobel, 2012). Knobel finds that each participant tends to become more introspective and observational, waiting to understand the group experience and what role he/she has in the group. A director's skills become even more relevant in an online sociodrama. According to Knobel (2012), such skills are: "firm and relaxed stance, action and patience, to maintain the group atmosphere and promote acceptance, which favors creativity and spontaneity". In this manner, the director mediated the session during the warming-up process, asking participants to introduce themselves, connect to the here and now, turn off the cell phone, and mute their microphones to avoid noise distractions disturb the dramatization. Acknowledging a sense of belonging generates sociometric proximity in an online context. Here group members must first know where they are and who they are to recognize themselves as part of the online group and create a place for the surplus reality group.
In discussing this portion of the session, Nery (2012, p. 101) states that "the group warming-up process happens gradually as the functional unit uses physical and mental starters". The warming-up process is gradual and begins in a non-specific manner and builds up as specific starters are used. In this process, a character creation representing the group conflict becomes necessary to start a horizontal movement to recognize its members and their sociometric relationships. In the same way, , emphasizes that after the warm-up for the theme/conflict, the director may introduce the auxiliary egos as theme-related characters so that the other group members can talk, come up with new characters, or interact with them, helping the group to warm up to the theme and creating an opportunity for co-creation.
Another main goal of a warm-up "is the preparation for the encounter and the participants' motivation to talk, to reflect, to imagine and to act upon a problem" (Nery, 2012, p. 101). Even in the online environment, warm-up management is possible through various resources: gestures, music, images, pictures, dramatic games, characters, etc.
In the online sociodrama, the director should be more alert and in control and encourage participation while restraining disorganized discourses. If chaos occurs, the director needs to be ready to mediate the conversation. The in-meeting chat was a useful tool to establish participants to speak in turn. Participants illustrated their roles through the following comments: "I am here to bring Jane Doe closer to her family," "I have come to kill everyone," "I am here to remind you of sympathy" and "I have come to bring changes." Similar to the traumas caused by natural disasters which were studied by Zampieri (2019), a pandemic is a disruptive environment because it provokes isolation and it affects each individual differently: feelings of weirdness, hostility, uncertainty, disorientation, disorganization, as well as various other sensations, may be present. These feelings may lead individuals to act impulsively, become unpredictable, act without planning, and demonstrate unfit attitudes. The presence of these feelings and reactions reinforces a need for acknowledgment and normalization. Kellerman (1992) proposes strategic psychodrama techniques that he considers appropriate in work with traumatic symptoms: the dramatization of thematic events or situations that allows us to visit them in a safe environment obtaining cognitive reprocessing of the performed event or, in this case, of the one being achieved; an emotional catharsis, to work with the emotional residual of traumatic experiences; a surplus reality as a way of merging new actions with the individual's inner world; relational work to prevent isolation; and sociodrama concerning the perception of the sharing of a pain hitherto individual and promoting the resignification of thematic events and therefore transforming the role of the victim into the role of a survivor. After having shared their experiences, the director asked participants to take back their roles and list on chat the main themes they had come up with, namely: 1) The Covid-19 of social support; 2) The Covid-19 that came to bring change; 3) The Covid-19 that came to encourage sympathy; 4)The Covid-19 that wants to kill everyone, and, 5) The Covid-19 that makes me look inside myself.
To choose the drama representing the group, the director then asked the participants to vote via chat, which Covid-19 would like to communicate with today. The group choice was "The Covid-19 that brings change". This was the theme of the dramatization that followed. Nery (2012, p. 98) states that "the dramatization and the use of action techniques are the results of the encounter; they are not an end in themselves, but only means for the group to create". Thus, in the online environment it is often necessary to adapt or create techniques or new possibilities to enable the group to create something new and different even in a period of social isolation. Classic techniques like doubling and role reversal, used in this dramatization, use the director's and the participants' speech and, therefore, may be applied in the online context (Vidal & Castro, 2020).

Dramatization
Next, the director explained to the participants that they would now talk directly to the Covid-19 to clarify the purpose of the COVID-19. The director took on the role of COVID-19 and questioned participants randomly, asking: "What do you want from me?" COVID-19, being a disease, is seen as a threat that can isolate, create negative change and even kill. In this sense, just as it is stated in Zampieri's (2019, p.80) study with traumas in natural disasters, "threats can be integrated into everyday life and, thus, cease to be recognized as coming from the outside world and be internalized". COVID-19 has brought social isolation and fear of contamination to those out on the streets. As a result, it has brought about the risk of distorted individual perceptions. Again Zampieri (2019) underlines that if people incorporate threats as part of their subjectivity, they will shape their lives accordingly.
Sociodrama allows opportunities for individuals to express spontaneity and creativity, despite the challenge caused by the pandemic.
In both online and in-person sociodrama, it is possible to create several small sequential dramatizations, produced by different people that direct the theme until one of the characters highlights and confronts the group's central conflict (Knobel, 2012).
After two or three interpellations, the director asked if anyone else wanted to talk to the Covid-19. The participants continued to raise issues based on the virus's effect on their personal lives, and the director would respond in the role of the virus.
One of the participants said: "when things are working out for me, something always comes up to get in the way and now it's you". Then, the director proposed role reversal, asking this participant to take on the role of the Covid-19. The director took over her previous role and repeated what she said. So, in the role of the virus, the participant needed to give a spontaneous response to her apprehensions.
In this regard, role reversal removes the individual briefly from his/her worries without taking him/her away from the context. When taking on the virus's role, the participant can look inside himself/herself without the direct interference of his/her internal conflicts, facilitating a spontaneous movement in search of a proper response. He/she likewise will work on his/her anxieties and distress and the feeling of latent unfairness, being able to cognitively reprocess what has happened in a safe and protective environment. In the case of sociodrama, these individual intrapsychic movements resonate in the collective context, stimulating a collective action, resignifying the event and consequently turning the role of the victim into the role of survivor (Kellerman, 1992 Almost all the participants spoke up and most of them expressed that the virus came to make people take a closer look inside themselves and at people around them and promote changes in humanity.
The virus was asked several questions, for which the director often proposed role reversal. At one point, the director even requested that a participant who had taken over the role of the Covid-19 remain in it, while another participant questioned her.
The director chose the latter participant for participating in previous interventions and the director's knowledge about her training as an auxiliary ego. That participant continued to contribute as an auxiliary ego for other interventions.
Approaching the end of the intervention, a participant stated: "I believe that the Covid-19 did not come to propose anything, each one of us gives it the meaning we want." And yet another said: "I don't care about you, I don't care, what bothers me are all the things you took away from me and that you prevented me from doing." Afterward, the director proposed to the group to ask the Covid-19 questions such as: "Where are you from?", "Why did you show up now?", "How long are you planning to stay?" Their participation was voluntary, but the director intervened in all the questions made by answering them or by using role reversal. Next, the director asked the participants the question: "Where do you think I came from?" This question asked them to seek the answers within themselves to understand their subjective perceptions regarding the virus that they might have been withholding. Some participants said things like: "I have appeared because you need changes.", "I have come to show that you do not have control over everything." and "I will stay as long as it is necessary." When making the participants find their answers to this question, the director used psychodramatic technical strategies applied in trauma situations. Her purpose was to have participants revisit the issues that generate fear or distress in a safe and protective environment, cognitively process what was happening, and resignify the traumatic event that the pandemic has been (Kellerman, 1992).
Human beings are entirely unprepared to face moments of surprise, as they like to be in control. During moments of shock or surprise, things get out of control. They look for a rational way to deal with the situation, which increases anxiety and decreases spontaneity. The word "spontaneity" comes from the Latin expression sua sponte, which means "within itself, in agreement with itself". Therefore, human beings need to be "a double of themselves", to take spontaneous action and recognize themselves in moments of crisis (Moreno, Blomkvist & Rutzel, 2001, p. 49).
Sociodrama enables new responses, which can help the individual identify his/her emotional and collaborative potentials with his/her social groups. It can also strengthen hope for the future amid the protection of the group and external groups (family, society, religion, etc.), thus helping to maintain emotional health (Zampieri, 2019). Nery (2012, p. 98) states that "the basis of sociodrama is the encounter", and that is why the director must promote interaction, participation, and recognition in the other. For this recognition to occur, sharing is one of the most important steps.

Sharing
Sharing is closely related to the fraternal cluster, which, according to Bustos (1990), is where we develop most of adulthood's roles and where we learn to share. Sharing is nothing more than each individual contributing what he can to the common good.
During an online sociodrama, sharing is even more necessary because it is during sharing that the participants report their identification with others, enabling a feeling of protection. Therefore, sharing in sociodrama can be the construction of a sense of us.
Once the dramatization was over, the director asked each participant to express with a hand gesture how they intended to cope with COVID-19. Examples of images were: hands clasped, hands extended apart, hands in the movement of expulsion, → Rev. Bras. Psicodrama, São Paulo, v28, n3, p.176-186, Set. -Dez., 2020 184 Castro A, Vidal GP , Silveira BS, Oliveira DC, hands closed, and many others. Finally, the director asked the group to make a soliloquy of these images, all at the same time.
Thus, through the online sociodrama, the participants were able to recognize themselves in the face of chaos, as in the maxim described by Zerka T. Moreno in Moreno et al. (2001, p. 53) "we not only affect one another, we infect one another" to be applied.
Finally, since this was a study group, the sociodrama was concluded with theoretical processing, outlying the steps, techniques, and theoretical backgrounds used, as well as their place in psychodramatic theory. Stoll, Müller, and Trachsel (2020) mapped the main ethical aspects in favor of and against online psychotherapy. Of 24 ethical arguments in favor of online psychotherapy and 32 against, the top five ethical arguments in favor of online psychotherapy were (1) increased access to psychotherapy and service availability and flexibility; (2) therapy benefits and enhanced communication;

ONLINE PSYCHODRAMA FOR SITUATIONS OF TRAUMA
(3) advantages related to specific client characteristics (e.g., remote location); (4) convenience, satisfaction, acceptance, and increased demand; and (5) economic advantages. The top five ethical arguments against engagement in online psychotherapy were (1) privacy, confidentiality, and security issues; (2) therapist competence and need for special training; (3) communication issues specific to technology; (4) research gaps since there is little study about online therapy and (5) emergency issues (i.e.,

Suicide attempts)
Although some of the above arguments point to some reservations surrounding online work, in Covid-19, the need for online work has been visible since the beginning of social isolation. To increase the number of severe emotional symptoms afterward, even the Brazilian Psychological Association (CRP-Conselho Regional de Psicologia) has realized the importance of online practice in this period. It has amended the related regulation for the short term (Conselho Federal de Psicologia, 2018. Also, according to Cukier (2016, p. 83-84), "Trauma interrupts and prevents a defense response from the body, freezing the cognitive functions and making the body terrified, and without any possibility of defense." Therefore, working online with trauma, especially when there is no personal contact, is also a health prevention measure.

FINAL CONSIDERATIONS
Through this article, it was possible to understand that the pandemic caused by Covid-19 brought about feelings, thoughts, situations, and sensations experienced in moments of crisis. Social isolation, a measure taken by most governments worldwide as a way of preventing the virus spread and promoting the flattening of the epidemiological curve, forces the estrangement from some social roles or even a drastic change in the execution of some other roles. Accordingly, individuals experiencing this moment in time are led to recognize themselves again in these social roles, returning to chaos, to reorganize themselves. The online sociodrama presents itself as a tool that gives space for this reorganization to occur so that these roles' survival occurs even in times of isolation.
Due to the initial adaptation to the online platform, other insights and possibilities have come up in the analysis of this sociodrama: the director could have explored the idea of asking participants to turn the camera on and off during the sociometric investigation; and she could have oriented the participants to use reactions on Zoom for agreement. This was the first online → 185 Rev. Bras. Psicodrama, São Paulo, v28, n3, p.176-186, Set. -Dez., 2020 The survival through online Sociodrama: Covid-19, what do you want to tell me? study group meeting and the first online sociodrama directed by this director. There have been improvements in the theory and the practice of meetings and the use of other psychodramatic techniques.
We have noted some limitations during the study:1) Limited resources available to prepare the director and the study group participants for the use of sociodrama online; 2) Participant difficulty using internet devices, 3) Director's greater online effort to keep the warming-up process going 4) More aspects such as place of origin, age group, level of psychodrama knowledge etc.
should have been included in the sociodramatic mapping.
Finally, there are some limitations concerning this article: 1) it recounts only one play session of online sociodrama performed about COVID-19. Additional sessions with the same group, and/or additional sessions with a greater sample could have been considered 2) There wasn't any use of any research tools, and the sample was limited, that is why it is difficult to assess and draw conclusions regarding the effectiveness or detrimental effects of the play. Therefore, we would like to emphasize the importance of new studies and publications taking these limitations into account, which could further exemplify the application of online sociodramas, hopefully bringing spontaneity and creativity to innumerable people.