112800 Agenda

1
11/28/00 Agenda

• Announcements Exam
• Family Systems Therapy
• Inventory
• Discussion Question
• Break
• Scoring Sheet Definitions
• Group 1 Presentation
• Wrap-Up

2
Family Systems Therapy

• Bowens Intergenerational Approach
• Structural Family Approach
• Strategic Therapy
• Experiential and Humanistic Family Therapy
• Solution-Focused Therapy
• Narrative Therapy

3
Bowens Intergenerational Approach

• Murray Bowen developed a system that is based on
  an individuals ability to differentiate his or
  her own intellectual functioning from his or her
  feelings. He examined relationships among family
  members. A key concept is the passing of
  psychological characteristics from one generation
  to another.

4
Bowens Intergenerational Approach

• A major problem in families can occur when there
  is fusion, a meshing of thoughts and feelings in
  a family member.
• Given too much stress in a family due to over
  involvement of parents, children may withdraw or
  cut themselves off emotionally from the family.
• Triangulation occurs when two people in conflict
  involve a third person in the family.

5
Bowens Intergenerational Approach

• The goal of therapy is to help family members
  become more differentiated and thus reduce their
  general stress level. Bowen thought that it was
  helpful to try to get family members to
  detriangulate. To do this, he used genograms and
  observations about family dynamics.

6
Structural Family Therapy

• Minuchins structural family therapy deals with
  alignments and coalitions within the family.
  Observing and changing relationships in the
  family is a focus of this system.
• Structural therapists try to bring about changes
  in family that will alter coalitions and change
  alliances to help a family function more
  effectively.

7
Structural Family Therapy

• Structural therapists often join with the family
  to focus on present issues. They may track and
  accommodate family customs to better understand
  the family. Enacting a problem helps the
  therapist observe coalitions and alliances which
  they then map using diagrams to describe the way
  the family relates.

8
Strategic Therapy

• Strategic therapy focuses on the clients
  symptoms or problems that are described to the
  therapist. The basic goal is to remove these
  symptoms, which are often seen as metaphors for
  problems within the family.
• Two types of tasks that are used to bring about
  change are straightforward and paradoxical
  activities.

9
Strategic Therapy

• A straightforward task is one that the family is
  intended to accept and perform as stated.
• A paradoxical task is one that the family is
  likely to resist. Here, change takes place
  whether or not the task is completed. See page
  521. This technique can be high risk.

10
Experiential and Humanistic Therapy

• Both Carl Whitaker and Virginia Satir used
  approaches that encouraged open communications
  within the family.
• Whitaker used an intuitive approach, trusting his
  reactions to the family. He used confrontation,
  exaggeration, and absurdity as techniques. his
  approach was creative and energetic.

11
Experiential and Humanistic Therapy

• Virginia Satir was often empathic with the
  family. She identified five styles of relating
  within the family
• the placater
• the blamer
• the super-reasonable
• the irrelevant
• the congruent communicator

12
Solution-Focused Therapy

• Here, the focus is on the expectations that
  family members have for change. This is a very
  action-oriented approach to therapy.
• Progress on goals is often measured in therapy
  using a 0 to 10 scale. Goals are clear,
  specific, and small.

13
Narrative Therapy

• Changing or retelling stories so that more
  positive resolutions can occur is the basis of
  narrative therapy. The narratives can deal with
  issues in peoples lives that are political,
  cultural, economic, or social. Negative or
  problem-oriented stories can affect the attitudes
  or lives of families.

14
Narrative Therapy

• The goal of narrative therapy is to help clients
  see their lives or stories from a more positive
  rather than a problem saturated point of view.
  Clients derive meaning from examining the
  characters and plots in their lives. Achieving a
  resolution to a problem can come from examining a
  story in new ways to bring about new alternatives
  to events in the story.

15
Inventory

• 1. Individuals should be viewed from the
  perspective of their family rather than from the
  perspective of a single individual.
• 2. Individuals problems can best be understood
  by understanding their family.
• 3. Change in one part of a family system is
  likely to result in changes in other family
  members.

16
Inventory

• 4. Changes within a person can only be made if
  significant others do not interfere with these
  changes.
• 5. A family therapist should be a teacher and
  coach as well as a therapist.
• 6. The major goal of family therapy is to help
  the family to solve the presenting problems.

17
Inventory

• 7. To understand a familys problems, therapists
  should attend to who says what to whom and how
  they interact.
• 8. Being active and often directive is a part of
  the therapists role in family therapy.
• 9. Attending to both verbal and nonverbal
  communications within the family are important
  aspects of family therapy.

18
Inventory

• 10. An important goal of family therapy is the
  growth of individuals, not just the growth of the
  family.

19
Discussion Question

• Complete a genogram (page 509) of your family,
  going back two generations. Discuss the impact
  of generations on each other. How have your
  grandparents had an impact on your parents, which
  therefore has had an impact on you? Has this
  effect been different for your brothers or
  sisters?

20
Break
21
Scoring Sheet Group _____

• Precision and Clarity
• __________ / 25
• Comprehensiveness
• __________ / 25
• Testability
• __________ / 25
• Usefulness
• __________ / 25
• TOTAL __________ / 100
• Name ____________________