Ch. 3 Transgenerational Models: Nagy and Contexual Therapy

Question 1

Contexual Therapy basics

Answer 1

• Based on “Relational ethics” - the uniquely human process of achieving an equitable balance of fairness among people
• Family LOYALTY spans generations
• legacy
• entitlements
• ledger

Question 2

Contexual Therapy: On what does emotional health depend?

Answer 2

A balance between the repayment of a person’s debt to the FOO and self-fulfillment

Question 3

Contextual therapy: Legacy

Answer 3

• Contextual therapy
• refers to the notion that because everyone is born to parents, a certain history that emerges from the patterns of interactions and meanings have occurred that form a basis to how one understands relationships.

Question 4

Contextual therapy: Entitlement

Answer 4

• Contextual therapy
• what each person is inherently and fairly due and what each accrues based on his/her behavior toward others and other’s behavior toward him/her

Question 5

Contextual therapy: Ledger

Answer 5

• Contextual therapy
• an internal system in which the relative balance of debts and entitlements is kept. Ideally there should be a balance between the repayment of the person’s debt to the FOO and self-fulfillment

Question 6

Contextual therapy: 4 essential dimensions of individual and relationship psychology that interact with one another

Answer 6

1. Facts
2. Psychology
3. Transactions
4. Relational ethics

Question 7

Contextual therapy: Facts

Answer 7

Attributes that people are born with:
- gender
- ethnicity
- birth defects
....
And the life experiences they have:
- parental divorce
- abuse
- illness
....

Question 8

Contextual therapy: Psychology

Answer 8

Refers to what happens within the person such as thought, fantasies, emotions, and the meanings that the individual ascribes to the facts of his/her life.

Question 9

Contextual therapy: Transactions

Answer 9

They correspond with the primary domain of many family therapy models i.e. the patterns of family organization:

• hierarchy
• triangles
• transactional sequences

Question 10

Contextual therapy: Relational ethics

Answer 10

The most salient feature of contextual model is that people are ethically responsible for the effect of their behavior on others. Without denying one’s own interests, healthy family members consider the basic life interests of one another.

Question 11

Contextual Therapy: theory of normal development and dysfunction

Which idea is central to the theory?

Answer 11

LOYALTY

Question 12

Contextual Therapy: theory of normal development and dysfunction

Equitable asymmetry

Answer 12

the unequal, but healthy, degree of care and consideration given by parents towards children

Question 13

Contextual Therapy: theory of normal development and dysfunction

Merit

Answer 13

What is earned through the accumulation of care and concern toward others

Question 14

Contextual Therapy: theory of normal development and dysfunction

Filial loyalty

Answer 14

The loyalty inherent in children toward parents. The care and concern given to children, in turn, results in filial responsibility toward parents

Question 15

Contextual Therapy: theory of normal development and dysfunction

Debts, or filial responsibility

Answer 15

Describes the special obligations that children have toward their parents

Question 16

Contextual Therapy: theory of normal development and dysfunction

Destructive entitlement

Answer 16

The development of symptomatic behaviors in the pursuit of self-justifying and harmful means to satisfy the perception of what is due as a result of deficient caring and responsibility in parenting.

ex: a child who was forced into the adult role by her parents may feel entitled to engage in irresponsible, adolescent behaviors as an adult (revolving slate of injustice)

Question 17

Contextual Therapy: theory of normal development and dysfunction

Revolving slate of injustice

Answer 17

The generational perpetuation of destructive entitlement in which one generation damages the next innocent generation

Question 18

Contextual Therapy: theory of normal development and dysfunction

what causes much family dysfunction?

Answer 18

destructive entitlement and how it gets passed through generations (revolving slate)

Question 19

Contextual Therapy: theory of normal development and dysfunction

What is the hallmark of well-functioning families?

Answer 19

• NOT the presence or absence of symptoms

- Rather, the relational balances and ethical consideration of each family member for the others

Question 20

Contextual Therapy: theory of normal development and dysfunction

Split filial responsibility

Answer 20

When parents require the child to choose between them; be loyal to one parent over the other
- as a result, child becomes symptomatic in an effort to bring the parents together

Question 21

Contextual Therapy: theory of normal development and dysfunction

Trust and rejunctive v. disjunctive

Answer 21

• trust is the fundamental property of relationships
• rejunctive = moves toward trustworthy relatedness
• disjunctive = moves away from trustworthy relatedness

Question 22

Contextual Therapy: assessment and treatment

What is the main focus of assessment?

Answer 22

Family resources

• assessment is an ongoing process through therapy
• T observes the atmosphere of trust in the family, asks questions abut the availability of members to one another, and attends to the 4 interacting dimensions of individual and relational psych (facts, psychology, transactions, relational ethics)

Question 23

Contextual Therapy: assessment and treatment

What is the therapist’s stance?

Answer 23

Multidirected partiality

• accountable to everyone whose well-being is potentially affected by their interventions
• NOT neutral

Question 24

Contextual Therapy: assessment and treatment

What are the goals of therapy?

Answer 24

1. free themselves from the invisible loyalties that damage the well-being of the family
2. take responsibility for their behavior toward others
3. reclaim disowned parts of themselves
4. overcome irrational guilt
5. acknowledge justifiable guilt based on unethical acts toward others
6. Make amends for their actions

Question 25

Contextual Therapy: assessment and treatment

What is the therapist’s stance?

Answer 25

Multidirected partiality

• accountable to everyone whose well-being is potentially affected by their interventions
• NOT neutral
• acts as an active guide advocating for rejunctive efforts…
  1. encourages open negotiations of ledger issues
  2. explores loyalty and ledger impasses, especially sources of destructive entitlement
  3. deparentification
  4. actions that address inequities

Question 26

Contextual Therapy: assessment and treatment

Exoneration

Answer 26

Goal of treatment in which the T attempts to help the client see the positive intent and intergenerational loyalty issues behind even the destructive behaviors of previous generations.

• Also thought of as forgiveness based upon understanding the past.
• If the behavior can be seen in a human context, the hold of the past is loosened,.

Question 27

Contextual Therapy: assessment and treatment

Renactment responses and transference

Answer 27

Nagy takes advantage of people’s tendency to unconsciously reenact the invisible loyalties towards members of their FOO in the session with both their nuclear fam and the T.

ex: wife gets pissed talking about a time when husband drove daughter to basketball practice. Wife is unknowingly jealous bc her own father was too busy to spend time with her.

Question 28

Contextual Therapy

parentification

Answer 28

When roles become reversed and a child or spouse is expected to be responsible for a parent’s needs

Question 29

Contextual therapy

Ledger of indebtedness

Answer 29

If in their family origin, new spouses each experienced a high degree of equitably, they bring this to their relationship, which allows them to build their new family on the basis of consideration of the welfare interests of each member of the family. Created by legacy and entitlement.

Question 30

Contextual therapy

Invisible loyalty

Answer 30

A state in which a child unconsciously tries to pay a debt to his parents, even to his own detriment.