Narrative Flashcards
True/False Narrative Counseling is attached to modern counseling approaches?
False: Narrative and Collaborative Approaches are Post Modern counseling approaches
True or False: Post Modern Approaches believe that one’s sense of self is constructed in and through relationships rather than being independently thought up in ones head
True
Who formed Narrative Therapy?
Michael White and David Epston
What is the main goal of Narrative Therapy
Narrative counselors help separate people from their problems by exploring the sociocultural influences and language habits that maintain problems
What is the role of the counselor in the narrative counseling relationship?
Co-editor and coauthor, Optimism and Hope and Investigative reporter
What is the main premise of Narrative Therapy?
that we “story” and create meaning of life events using available dominant discourses—broad societal stories, sociocultural practices, assumptions, and expectations about how we should live.
Narrative counselors assume that all people are resourceful and have strengths, and they do not see “people” as having problems but rather see people as being imposed on by unhelpful or harmful societal cultural practices
What are Dominant discourses?
culturally generated stories about how life should go that are used to coordinate social behavior, such as how married people should act, what happiness looks like, and how to be successful-culturally generated stories about how life should go that are used to coordinate social behavior, such as how married people should act, what happiness looks like, and how to be successful
What are local discourses?
occur in our heads, our closer relationships, and marginalized (not mainstream) communities. Local discourses have different “goods” and “shoulds” than dominant discourses
Who is Michael White?
A pioneer in narrative counseling and the first to write about the process of externalizing problems
Who is David Epston
David Epston worked closely with Michael White in developing the foundational framework for narrative counseling. His work emphasized creating unique sources of support for clients, such as writing letters to clients to solidify the emerging narratives and developing communities of concern or leagues
What does the overall counseling process look like in Narrative counseling?
- Meeting the person- getting to know them, hobbies, values, & everyday aspects
- Listening- for dominant discourses and times without problems
- Separating persons from problems- Externalizing
- Enacting preferred narratives- New ways to relate to problems that reduce their negative effects on the lives of all involved
- Solidifying- Strengthening preferred stories and identities
What is thickening in narrative counseling?
enriching of the person’s identity and life accounts - helps the client become more balanced rather than fixating on problems
What is the narrative therapy motto?
“The problem is the problem. The person is not the problem”
What does a narrative counselor do with a problem saturated story?
The counselor listens for the story to see where it is effecting the client individually and relationally, then the counselor listens for alternative endings and subplots to see where they can find unique outcomes to rewrite the story
What are unique outcomes or sparkling events in narrative case conceptualization?
refer to stories or subplots in which the problem-saturated story does not play out in its typical way. They are used to help clients create the lives they prefer and to develop a more full and accurate account of their and others’ identities
What is the preferred Narrative and Identity goal?
- the sense that they influence the direction of their lives
- reflected goals that consider local knowledge rather than simply adopting the values of the dominant culture.
- “make this problem go away” to “I want to create something beautiful/ meaningful/great with my/our life/lives
What are examples of the “working phase”
Reduce frequency of allowing depression to take the client into avoiding pleasurable activities.
Increase opportunities to interact with friends using “confident, social” self. Increase instances of defiance in response to anorexia’s directions to not eat.
What are examples of the “closing Phase”
Personal identity: Solidify a sense of personal identity that derives self-worth from meaningful activities, relationship, and values rather than body size.
Relational identity: Develop a family identity narrative that allows for greater expression of differences while maintaining family’s sense of closeness and loyalty.
Expanded community: Expand preferred “outgoing” identity to social relationships and contexts.
What are interventions in narrative therapy?
Relative Influence Questioning
A. Mapping the influence of the problem
B. Mapping the influence of persons
Externalizing Conversations: Statement of Position Map
Avoid Totalizing and Dualistic Thinking
Externalizing Questions
Problem Deconstruction
Mapping in Landscapes of Action and Identity
Intentional vs Internal State questions
Scaffolding Conversations
Permission Questions
Situating Comments
Leagues
Letters and certificates
ExternalizingWhat is the intervention of externalizing?
linguistically separating the person from the problem
the attitude of externalization is key to its effectiveness
single-session intervention, externalization is an organic and evolving process of shifting the client’s perception of their relationship to the problem from “having” it to seeing it outside the self
What is the intervention of Mapping the Influence of the problem
inquire about the ways the problem has affected the life of the client and significant others in the client’s life, often expanding the reach of the problem beyond how the client generally thinks of it; critical that this is followed up by mapping the influence of person questions
Examine all the ways the problem has affected the client: Self, relationships, job, etc.
What is the intervention of Mapping the Influence of Persons
involves identifying how the person has affected the life of the problem,
Examine how the client has affected the problem.
● When have the persons involved kept the problem from affecting their mood or how they value themselves as people?
● When have the persons involved kept the problem from allowing them to enjoy special and/or casual relationships in their lives?
● When have the persons involved kept the problem from interrupting their work or school lives?
● When have the persons involved been able to keep the problem from taking over when it was starting?
What is the intervention of Statement of Position Map?
his map includes four categories of inquiry that are used multiple times throughout a session and across sessions to shift the client’s relationship with the problem and open new possibilities for action:
- Negotiating a particular, experience-near definition of the problem
- Mapping the effects of the problem
- Evaluating the effects of the problem’s activities
- Justifying the evaluation
What is the intervention of Avoid Totalizing and Dualistic Thinking?
avoids totalizing descriptions of the problem—the problem being all bad— because such descriptions promote dualistic, either/or thinking, which can be invalidat- ing to the client and/or obscure the problem’s broader context.
What is the intervention of externalizing problems?
externalizing questions involve changing adjectives (e.g., depressed, anxious, angry, etc.) to nouns (e.g., Depression, Anxiety, Anger, etc.; capitalization is used to emphasize that the prob- lem is viewed as a separate entity). Externalizing questions presume that the person is separate from the problem and that the person has a two-way relationship with the problem: it affects them, and they affect it.
What is the problem deconstruction intervention?
- Deconstructive listening involves the counselor listening for “gaps” in clients’ understanding and asking them to fill in the details or having them explain the ambiguities in their stories
- Deconstructive questions help clients to further “unpack” their stories to see how they have been constructed, identifying the influence of dominant and local discourses.
What is the Mapping in Landscapes of Action and Identity/Consciousness intervention?
specific technique for harnessing unique outcomes to promote desired change
- Identify the unique outcome
- Ensure that the unique outcome is preferred
- Map in landscape of action: identifying what actions were taken by whom in which order
- Mapping in the landscape of identity/consciousness: thickens the plot associated with the successful outcome, thus directly strengthening the connection of the preferred outcome with the client’s personal identity. Mapping in the landscape of identity focuses on the psychological and relational implications of the unique out- comes
What is the intervention Intentional versus Internal State Questions
intentional state questions (questions about a person’s intentions in a given situation: “What were your intentions?”) over internal state questions (questions about how a person was feeling or thinking: “What were you feeling?”), because intentional state questions promote a sense of personal agency,
What is the intervention: Scaffolding Conversations
uses scaffolding conversations to move clients from that which is familiar to that which is novel, “zone of proximal development” is the distance between what the child can do independently and what the child can do in collaboration. 5 progress movements developed by White
- Low-level distancing tasks: Characterizing unique outcomes
- Medium-level distancing tasks: Unique outcomes taken into a chain of association
- Medium to high level distancing tasks: Reflection on chain of association
- High level distancing tasks: Abstract learning and realizations
- Very High Level distancing tasks: Plans for action
What is the intervention of Permission Questions?
Narrative counselors use permission questions to emphasize the democratic nature of the counseling relationship and to encourage clients to maintain a strong and clear sense of agency when talking with the counselor- questions that counselors use to ask permission to ask a question
what is the intervention of situating comments?
situating comments are used to maintain a more democratic counseling relationship and reinforce client agency by ensuring that comments from the counselor are not taken as a “higher” or “more valid” truth than the client’ counselors situate their comments by revealing the source of the perspective they are offering, emphasizing that it is only one perspective among other
What are “Leagues” in Narrative Therapy
means of solidifying the new narrative and identities, narrative counselors have cre- ated leagues (or clubs, associations, teams, etc.), membership to which signifies an accomplishment in a particular area. In most cases, leagues are virtual communities of concern (e.g., giving a child a membership certificate to the Temper Tamer’s Club)
What are letters in narrative counseling?
Letters can be used early in counseling to engage clients, during counseling to reinforce the emerging narrative and reinforce new preferred behaviors, or at the end of counseling to consolidate gains by narrating the change process
What are certificates in narrative therapy?
Certificates are used often with children to recognize the changes they have made and to reinforce their new “reputation” as a “temper tamer,” “cooperative child,” and so on
