W4-T2 Psychological approaches II: beyond the individual to couple, family and group work.

Question 1

Explain the history of systemic family therapy.

Answer 1

Family=system=interacting unit

Moves from an internal approach focused solely on the individual to move to an external (interpersonal) approach.

Satisfaction with individual therapies prompted the development of systemic therapy.

This is a new systemic approach or systemic family therapy developed from system theory + cybernetics in the 1950s.

Their argument was that problems and ‘pathology’ are fundamentally interpersonal as opposed to individual.

Question 2

What are the main names systemic family therapy?

Answer 2

The palo alto mental research institute. (the palo alto group)

They applied anthropological observation + social system theory to families of individuals with schizophrenia.

Question 3

What were the findings from the palo alto group?

Answer 3

Based on the patterns they saw in families of people with schizophrenia they suggested that:

1. Symptoms of schizophrenia function to maintain homeostatic balance in families.
2. Those symptoms were believed to be the result of family communication.
3. All behaviour is communication, and it can happen at all levels.
   - at content level (surface)
   - at the level of intent (meta-communication level)
4. Contradictions btw communication levels lead to confusion or ‘double bind’ communication, hidden meaning, and paradoxical communication.

Example:

A boy that’s visited by his mom in the hospital. He tries to hug her and she stiffens, so he withdraws. Then she asks: don’t you love me anymore? That is the meta-communication level and implies extra meaning.

Question 4

Explain the tenets of systemic therapy.

Answer 4

Individuals do not exist in a vacuum but in relation to the people in their lives, and their social network (schools, work, neighbourhood, extended family).

Also, they are influenced by their parent’s beliefs and upbringing.

Systemic therapists argue that:

1. Problems need to be explored in the context of the individual’s social environment.
2. Cure the relationship, not the illness. Psychotherapy is a way to help people strengthen their relationships.

Question 5

Explain systemic therapy and constructionism and postmodernist beliefs.

Answer 5

Systemic therapy developed in an environment of social constructionism and postmodernist beliefs.

a. reality per se does not exist, it is socially constructed by individual relations.

b. meanings and connotations we give to objects and concepts are a result of a social convention. (rules, regulations, interactions).

My normality can be different from other people’s normality. Why is pink for girls and blue for boys?

So if meaning is changeable and transitory, how does this subjectivity affect diagnosis?

For social constructionists: Family is the maker of meaning.

For postmodernists: the stories families record are not the actual reality, not objective representations of it, but rather a collectively agreed upon set of beliefs that are created through language and interactions.

Question 6

How did cybernetics see the causation of distress?

Answer 6

Cybernetics in the 50s argued that the causation of problems was a circular continuous process that relied on feedback mechanisms.

Example: A wife is depressed, the husband worries, children notice and misbehave, and there are arguments among parents. (vicious cycles)

Now systemic therapists say it does not really matter where the cycle starts. They reject linear cause and effect.

Question 7

What is the goal of systemic or structural family therapy (SFT)?

Answer 7

Problems as created by the interactions among family members.

Family therapy developed as a psychotherapeutic endeavour that is focused on altering these interaction, seeking to improve the functioning of the family as a whole.