MFT Exam

Satir's Communication Approach Interventions

"Vehicles for Change" not techniques: Role of Therapist, Modeling Communication, Metaphors, Self-Mandala, Parts Party, Temperature Reading, Family Reconstruction, Family Sculpting

Undifferentiated Family Ego Mass

(now referred to as the Nuclear Family Emotional System) - This term is used to identify an excess of emotional reactivity, anxiety, and fusion within a family system (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

Separation

1. From a psychoanalytic perspective, the emotional transformation of the parent permitting the child to form significant bonds with others 2. In family systems theory, the reduction of enmeshment by the clarification of diffuse boundaries 3. A married couple's decision to live their lives in a more separate, disengaged way which may or may not involve legal arrangements and may be a step toward divorce

Change

1. From structural family therapy, perspective change is the process by which elements of a system are transformed to new states or levels of organization 2. developmental system change refers to the family life cycle and the transition of the family from one stage of development to another. 3. Strategic models see change as occurring suddenly and resulting from shifts in beliefs (discontinuous change); whereas the structural and transgenerational models see change as occurring through a gradual process (continuous change)

Alliance

1. In the structural and strategic models, a bond or affiliation between two or more family members. Alliances differ from coalitions in that they are generally within a subsystem and not hidden. 2. In the domestic violence literature, refers to the redemptive phase of the abuse cycle, in which the perpetrator promises never to act violently again and the victim agrees to participate in that goal

Strategic Humanism Terms

4 ways to resolve conflict (dominate & control, desire to be loved, love & protect, repent & forgive)

Clear Boundary

A ... between the parental subsystem and the children establishes the parents in the leadership positions. It allows the parents and children to interact, but supports the couple in a separate relationship, with time to enjoy the mature activities of recreation and pleasure. Healthy families have clear generational, hierarchical boundaries that allow parents to maintain parental roles and children to maintain child roles (Structural Family Therapy)

Relationship Enhancement

A 10-session psychoeducational program for couples emphasizing empathy, genuineness, and positive regard (non-judgmental acceptance). Therapists teach clients to recognize and acknowledge feelings and to express them openly. The program is designed to create a context in which positive changes can occur. The therapist and client share treatment planning and decision-making.

Activating Constructive Anxiety

A Symbolic-Experiential Therapist's effort to reframe symptoms as efforts toward building competence by focusing on the positive attributes of anxiety as a means towards self-growth (Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Complementarity

A balanced relationship between two individuals that often results in effective teamwork. The relationship may not be symmetrical--that is, equal parts--but nonetheless balanced. Partners establish roles and take on bx patterns which fulfill the unconscious needs and demands of the other (Structural Family Therapy)

Baseline

A beginning observable, stable performance measure against which change, particularly behavioral change, can be measured.

Functional Analysis

A behavioral assessment technique used to determine the interpersonal or environmental contingencies that maintain the problem.

Operant Conditioning

A behavioral learning paradigm in which a naturally occurring response is reinforced, increasing the probability that it will be repeated

Shaping

A behavioral procedure in which successive approximations to a desired, often more complex, behavior are reinforced until the desired behavior is achieved

Token Economy

A behavioral program in which tokens (secondary reinforcers) are dispensed for desirable behaviors. The tokens can later be redeemed for desired items

De-catastrophizing

A behavioral technique in which the therapist teaches the client to challenge his/her tendency to have catastrophic expectations.

Time Out (Time Out From Reinforcement)

A behavioral technique used to extinguish (eliminate) undesirable behaviors by removing the person from a situation in which the behavior is unlikely to be reinforced.

System

A bounded set of interrelated elements with coherent and pattered behavior. Open systems exchange information and resources with their environment, while closed systems restrict such exchanges

Dysfunction

A breakdown in the ability of a structure to achieve its goals

Family Systems Theory

A broad range of theories and therapeutic models that view the family as an open system that functions in relation to its larger environment and define individual problems in the context of family dynamics.

MRI/ Mental Research Institute

A center for the study of families in Palo Alto, CA whose researchers and practitioners - Bateson, Satir, and Haley - studied schizophrenia and family interactions, communication, and cybernetic theory. They emphasized process and interactional sequences rather than structure, and distinguished between first-order change and second-order change. They developed a version of brief family therapy based on the notion that the "problem" or treatment focus, stems from the failed solution previously attempted by the family. Later MRI practitioners include Watzlawick, Weakland, and Fisch.

Sacrifice Intervention

A closing statement in a Milan systemic (early Milan) session that includes a statement of paradox. The person with the symptom is characterized as being in the service of the homeostasis. This intervention tends to overcome resistance by causing a rebellion against the symptom.

Psychodrama

A combination of group therapy and theatrical techniques created by Moreno. Participants engage in lively enactments of troubling events, exploring family relations in the process. The goal is for clients and families to experience themselves and their histories in new ways. Many of Moreno's role-playing techniques have been adapted by family therapists.

Personal Map

A conception of interpersonal reality that a person uses to make sense of the world.

Metaframeworks Model

A conceptually wide-ranging integrative model that addresses six core domains of human experience: organization, sequences, development, culture, gender, and internal processes. Each person and family has the capacity to interact positively and harmoniously unless they are being constrained. The therapist considers the contributions of gender, ethnicity, class, religion, education, or regional background in the development of constraints. The goal is to release constraints, not to focus on deficits.

Tarasoff v. Regents of University of California (Duty to Warn)

A court ruling, adopted by most jurisdictions, that states that when a therapist determines, or should determine, that their client presents a serious threat of harm to a specifically identified other person, they have an obligation to use reasonable care to protect the intended victim against such danger

Sexual Orientation

A description of the gender or genders of people to whom one is sexually attracted

Qualitative Analysis

A descriptive analysis of the elements of an interaction.

Logical Connotation

A development in the Milan systemic model that grew as the use of paradox declined. The therapist communicates that the development of a symptom is understandable, given the context. There is no implication that a problem is useful, beneficent, or functional (Positive Connotation), only that people have gotten used to it and that habits are hard to change.

Multigenerational Family Therapy

A diverse grouping of theories and therapy models based on psychodynamic principles developed by Ackerman, Bowen, Nagy, Framo, Paul, and others, which identify family patterns that repeat across generations.

Collusion

A family system defense mechanism in which members cooperate by unconsciously sharing thoughts and feelings. The defense is use to protect family members from threatening outside forces. For example, both spouses and children may collude to perceive an alcoholic member who induces friends and family to drink with him, as simply a light hearted partygoer.

Quid-Pro-Quo Contract

A form of behavioral contingency contract in which one family member agrees to change a behavior or engage in a desired behavior after the other partner in the contract has made a desired change. The behaviors are, thus, mutually positively reinforced (see Parallel Contract).

Pretend to Have Symptom

A form of paradoxical intervention where Madanes would instruct a child to have a symptom and instruct the parents to help the child through it (Strategic)

Interactional Insight

A goal of symbolic-experiential therapy occurring as a result of expanded emotional interactions within the session resulting in less inhibition. Insight can be a by-product of change, but is not a curative factor.

Cicumplex Model

A graphic model for observing and assessing families designed by Olson, which measures the family's level of cohesion and adaptability. Families with too much cohesion tend to function as enmeshed, and those with too little can be disengaged. Too much adaptability can result in excessive and unpredictable change, while too little can result in rigidity and failure to transition through the life cycle. Healthy families will be balanced, having neither too much nor too little of either quality. Olson's evaluation tool is FACES.

Social Constructivist Family Therapy

A group of postmodern therapeutic approaches based on the concept that reality is an intersubjective phenomenon that is constructed in conversation. The theories have been referred to as: postmodern, collaborative, constructivist, narrative, reflexive, and second-order cybernetic

Experiential Family Therapy

A group of therapy models, developed principally by Satir (human validation process model) and Whitaker (symbolic-experiential), that have in common certain tenets such as: experience is more important than intellectual thought; the importance of experiencing a full range of affect; the stance of the therapist as a real person; the importance of spontaneity and creativity; the belief in the freedom of choice; the focus on the here-and-now; the belief in the inherent ability of families to heal themselves; and the description of general rather than specific therapy goals.

Suprasystem

A higher-level system, such as a community, in which other systems are components.

Modeling Communication

A key component to Satir's approach to working with families was the therapist's capacity to effectively model functional, healthy communication (Satir's Communications Approach)

Classical Conditioning

A learning paradigm studied and practiced in a laboratory or other controlled environment in which a stimulus called the unconditioned stimulus (US) which naturally elicits an unconditioned response (UR), is paired with a neutral stimulus that does not initially elicit a response. Through the repeated pairings, the neutral stimulus (now the conditioned stimulus—CS) begins to elicit the desired response (now the conditioned response—CR)

Privilege

A legal right that state law gives to clients stating that communications between therapist and client are protected by the law from forced disclosure. That is, only the client, not the therapist, has the legal right to disclose communications that take place within such a relationship

Adaptability

A measure of the family's ability to respond and adapt to changes in their lives. Also called "flexibility". Families are rated at four levels: rigid structured, flexible, and chaotic (Olson, Circumplex Model)

Centrifugal

A measure on The Beavers-Timberlawn Model suggesting that family members look to get their needs met outside of the family system (Assessment in Family Therapy)

Centripedal

A measure on The Beavers-Timberlawn Model suggesting that family members look to get their needs met within the family systems (Assessment in Family Therapy)

Analogical Message

A metaphorical or symbolic message (process) (Milan Systemic)

MANOVA - Multiple Analysis of Variance

A method of statistical analysis used by researchers for determining which independent variables have a causal relationship with the dependent variable (see ANOVA).

Analysis of Variance (ANOVA)

A method of statistical analysis which enables researchers to determine the likelihood that a variable being measured (dependent variable) is associated with a second variable (independent variable) by chance alone. If the deviation (variance) from the norm (frequency of association expected by chance alone) is sufficiently large, the variables are likely to be causally related.

Network Therapy

A model associated with Speck, Attneave, and Ruevini in which the treatment includes people from a client's social network (often a large group, including family, friends, neighbors) as well as a team of therapists that come together to solve the client or family problem. Treatment consists of six phases: retribalization, polarization, mobilization, depression, breakthrough, and exhaustion-elation.

Integrative Problem-Centered Therapy (IPCT)

A model developed by Pinsof in which various family and individual approaches are used in sequence, progressing from the simplest here-and-now interventions from structural, strategic, cognitive-behavioral, solution-focused models or pharmacological agents. If those interventions are unsuccessful, the therapist moves deeper into intergenerational issues or object relations. The therapy may use a team approach, bringing in experts in the various techniques or assigning family members individual therapists.

Object Relations Family Therapy

A model developed by Scharff & Scharff; based on principles in object relations theory that emphasize the internalization of experience as the developmental foundation on which humans form relationships and attachments.

Functional Family Therapy (Originally Systems Behavioral Therapy)

A model of cognitive-behavioral marital therapy developed by Alexander which integrates systems theory, behaviorism, and cognitive therapy. The two-step therapy includes cognitive work and psychoeducation and is most often applied to adolescents and their families.

Family Group Therapy

A model of early family therapy created by Bell in which the therapist stimulates open discussions, leaving the family to solve its own problems. Like other groups, Bell found that families in therapy proceed through stages, and he structured his work to concentrate on those stages.

Conjoint Marital Therapy

A model of marital therapy developed by Satir in which both partners are seen together by one or two therapists. The treatment is designed for married couples without children and in which one or both of the partners has either a psychiatric disorder or a social diagnosis e.g., (alcoholism, gambling, extramarital affair).

Brief Family Therapy

A model of problem-focused and time-limited therapy developed by the Mental Research Institute in Palo Alto, CA. Milton Erickson and others.

Gestalt Family Therapy

A model of therapy that focuses on the anxiety inherent in the contact between people and which uses techniques to heighten self-awareness and personal choice.

Schizophrenogenic Mother

A now-discredited notion by Fromm-Reichmann regarding the origin of schizophrenia, in which she describes a domineering rejecting mother whose behavior was thought to contribute to her child's mental illness.

Ordeal

A paradoxical directive that places a client in a situation where is creates more work for them to maintain problem symptoms or behavior than it would be to change it (Strategic Family Therapy)

Positioning

A paradoxical intervention of pushing a family member further into the absurdity of their initial position, thereby making them realize their own absurdity (MRI Systemic)

Prescribing the Symptom

A paradoxical intervention through instructing client to intentionally engage in the behavior they wish to change. They may either rebel against the therapist's directive and experience desired change, or comply with the therapist's directive and become aware of their control over choosing to continually engage in the undesirable behavior (MRI Systemic, Strategic Family Therapy)

Restraining the Progress of Change

A paradoxical intervention when clients come in reporting that therapy has been effective and that they are experiencing change, the therapist encourages them to slow down, and cautions them about the risk of changing too fast (MRI Systemic)

Postmodernism

A philosophic view held by an eclectic group of family therapy models in which the practitioners consider reality to be subjective, and attend to social and political norms within the client's culture. Constructivist, narrative, and solution-focused are examples of postmodern models.

Gender-Sensitive Family Therapy

A philosophical position that can be applied to any model of family therapy in which the therapist examines the impact of gender roles on family members in order to help clients make choices that are not limited by internalized gender biases or external pressure based on gender.

Second-Order Cybernetics

A postmodern model that conceives of the therapist and family as one unit. Objectivity is not possible. The treatment unit is a meaning system to which the treating professional is an equal and active contributor. The system does not create a problem; the problem creates a system.

Narrative Therapy

A postmodern therapeutic model developed by White and Epston, which centers on the narrative metaphor. The family member's sense of reality is organized around the stories (personal narratives) he/she tells about him/herself and the world. Each culture forms dominant narratives, which influence personal narratives, and therapists and clients discuss their impact. Problems, symptoms, and dominant narratives are externalized in the therapy conversations. Narrative therapists encourage their clients to tell "stories" about themselves and respond by exploring alternative perceptions of reality, leading to new options for solutions to problems and in the process, "re-story" their lives. For example, the therapist might explore what the family thinks Depression or The Feminine Ideal have in store for them. In this way, the therapy helps people reexamine their stories and re-story their lives to fit the outcome they prefer.

Individuation

A primary goal in growth-oriented therapies, encouraging each individual family member in becoming more and more of who they are, includes separating from the larger group or system (Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Emotional Cutoff

A problematic manner in which individuals deal with unresolved attachment issues through a process of separation, isolation, withdrawal, running away, or denying the importance of one's parental family (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

Family Reconstruction

A process in which an individual re-experiences the development of their primary triad across several generations (Satir's Communications Approach)

Introjection

A process of normal development in which parts of caretakers are split off and internalized into the child's developing personality. Expectations of self and other are based on these internal representations.

Externalizing the Problem

A process that separates the problem from the person, often personifying the problem into its own external entity. The manner in which the problem becomes externalized is based upon the client's use of language and expressed lived reality (White, Narrative Family Therapy)

Behavioral Parent Training (BPT)

A program for training parents in the use of contingency management to modify or extinguish unwanted behaviors and reinforce desirable behaviors in children.

Gender and Violence Project

A project at the Ackerman Institute started during the mid-1980s, the goal of which was to describe the relationship between gender and violence using both the feminist and systemic perspectives. An important question considered was whether family therapy could be successful in cases of domestic violence.

Sculpting

A psychodramatic technique used by Duhl, Kantor, Satir, and others. One member, acting as "director," places the family in a tableau or enactment of an event, feeling, or family structure in a therapy session. The process reveals patterns of emotional closeness and distance.

Medical Family Therapy

A psychoeducational model in which clients with medical problems and their families are treated by a team including physicians, allied health care professionals, and mental health professionals.

Survival Skills Workshops

A psychoeducational program for families coping with mental illness in a member. In these workshops, groups of families learn about the etiology, prognosis, psychobiology, and treatment of the illness and learn ways the family can deal with its special demands.

Parent Management Training (PMT)

A psychoeducational program in which parents learn behavior management techniques to reduce the prevalence of troublesome behaviors and increase the frequency of more desired behaviors. A goal is to reduce distress and conflict and increase cohesiveness and expressiveness.

Marriage Encounter

A psychoeducational weekend couple's retreat for improved communication, problem solving, sexual intimacy, and spiritual health. Originally for Catholic married couples and later adapted for Protestant and Jewish couples.

Cross-Sectional Studies

A research design which examines subjects at a single point in time (see Longitudinal Studies).

Quantitative Research

A research method that emphasizes experimentation, large samples, data collection, statistical analysis, objectivity, and verification. Quantitative research is typically used to test hypotheses (confirmatory research).

Qualitative Research

A research method that is exploratory, open-ended, and directed more at discovery than at evaluation or justifying a set of hypotheses. Its methods are intended to expand and enhance quantitative research techniques, and to provide a context for better understanding the meaning of quantitative data. Qualitative research is often use to generate, rather than test, hypotheses (exploratory research)

Subjective Units of Discomfort (SUDS)

A scale used by behavioral therapists on which the client's rate their level of anxiety to a stimulus or situation.

Differentiation of Self Scale

A scale, developed by Bowen, to measure the degree of emotional fusion with others. The scale ranges from 0, or no self, to 100, a hypothetical ideal of fully differentiated.

Managed Care

A service delivery system in which the third-party payer controls the cost, quality, quantity, and terms of treatment.

Epistemological Error

A set of beliefs that are incongruent with reality and become problematic, such as not believing that one is responsible for his or her own behaviors (Milan Systemic)

Ethics

A set of commonly agreed upon rules and standards for proper professional conduct. Distinguished from law in which a governmental body legislates criteria for professional bx, the violation of which may result in criminal or financial penalties

Equifinality

A similar outcome may result from many different initial events. The idea that an organism or system can reach a certain end state from a variety of different sources, conditions, and means or from different initial states. For example, GAD may stem from a biological imbalance, trauma, or free-will (Cybernetics)

Double Bind

A six-step concept described by Bateson in which an individual receives contradictory commands within an important emotional relationship. The recipient of the information can neither comment nor escape, a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation. Researchers originally hypothesized that the double bind was a disordered family communication style that led to the development of schizophrenic symptoms.

Pretending (Pretend Techniques)

A strategic, paradoxical technique designed by Madanes. Clients are instructed to pretend to have the symptom. By pretending to have the symptom, it becomes voluntary, unreal, and subject to being changed.

Mapping the System

A structural family therapy assessment tool used to depict a family's organization and gain an understanding of its complex structures and sequences.

Probing

A structural technique in which the therapist asks questions and/or makes provocative comments designed to evoke responses which help to obtain information about how the family operates. Even failure to obtain the family's cooperation provides information about their boundaries.

Entropy

A system's tendency to break down which, over time, threatens the survival of a system, measure of disorder in a system that occurs without imposed controls and inputs (Cybernetics, General Systems Theory)

Pseudomutuality

A systemic pretense of harmony and closeness that hides conflict and interferes with intimacy (Lyman Wynne)

Negative Entropy

A systemic state that emerges when a system is balanced between openness and closeness (Cybernetics)

Team Approach

A team of therapists that strategically hypothesize and plan interventions regarding each particular family. Often, team members will watch therapy as it unfolds behind a one-way mirror as one or two therapists work directly with the family (Milan Systemic)

Aligning with Parental Generation

A technique directed at strengthening the parental hierarchy and reinforcing that parents are in charge of the children. The therapist will break neutrality and intentionally align with the parental subsystem (Strategic & Structural Family Therapy)

Co-therapy

A technique, introduced by Whitaker, in which two therapists work together as a team.

Dyad

A temporary or permanent connection between two persons

Content

A term that describes the topics that people in therapy are discussing

Fixation of Triangles

A term used by Whitaker (symbolic-experiential therapy) to describe a clash of family of origin cultures (a man from a family of isolates marries into a family of social activists). The weakest family member is vulnerable to pathology arising out of family mythology.

Symbolic-Experiential Family Therapy

A theory and therapeutic approach developed by Whitaker in which the therapist uses his/her own experience and craziness, to influence family members' internal meanings, thereby changing dysfunctional patterns.

Contextual Family Therapy

A theory and therapeutic model developed by Boszormenyi-Nagy based on the ethical dimension of family relationships. The family maintains invisible, intergenerational loyalties, which members hold in their personal ledgers. Problems in relationships are thought to result either from an attempt to maintain or change the balance sheet of what members owe to one another.

Strategic Family Therapy

A theory and therapeutic model developed by Haley and Madanes, with interventions that focus directly on changing the presenting problem. Therapy typically begins with the therapist first assessing disorders in the system's hierarchies and/or the dysfunctional coalitions that maintain the symptom. Interventions, given as directives, may be straightforward or paradoxical. Therapy is not growth-oriented, but change-oriented, and the therapist takes responsibility for the success or failure of the outcome.

Behavioral Family Therapy (BFT)

A theory and therapeutic model developed by Patterson, Reid, and others, based on principles of learning and behavior change. In BFT, all family members are seen as part of the problem and symptoms are reformulated into concrete observable behaviors, each of which will either be rewarded or extinguished.

Milan Systemic Family Therapy

A theory and therapeutic model influenced by Bateson and the MRI Group, originally developed in Italy by Selvini Palazzoli, Boscolo, Cecchin, and Prata. The primary techniques associated with the early Milan group were rituals and positive connotations. The Milan Group split in the early 1980s with Selvini Palazzoli and Prata forming one group, adhering to the strategic model and developing a ritualistic technique, invariant prescription, to counteract the dirty game, or power struggle between the parents and their child. Boscolo and Cecchin moved away from the strategic approach, developing a collaborative style of therapy. In this model, problems are maintained when the family holds to an old epistemology that does not fit its current circumstance. The therapist introduces new information indirectly by asking questions and the family solves problems themselves as they develop a new epistemology. The therapist/client interactions within the session are the treatment. In their interviews they displayed a curious attitude about the family and the meanings they derived from their experiences and interchanges.

Reactor

A therapeutic stance in which the therapist would be more likely to respond to others than to direct them (see Conductors).

Unconditional Positive Regard

A therapeutic stance originated by Humanist, Carl Rogers, and used by therapists in emotionally focused couples therapy in order to create a safe environment where primary feelings can be revealed

Case-Specific Symptom Prescription

A therapeutic technique of the strategic model, in which symptomatic or other undesirable behaviors are paradoxically encouraged in order to lessen such behavior or bring it under conscious control.

Conductor

A therapist whose stance is to be aggressive, confrontational, and charming

Bilateral Transference

A therapist's intentional maneuver to adapt to the language, accent, rhythm, or posture of the family (Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Initial Interview

A therapy format associated with Haley in which the therapist conducts a structured interview consisting of four stages: social stage, problem stage, interactional stage, and goal setting stage.

Reflecting Team

A therapy technique or process involving a team of therapists using a one-way mirror to observe the family and the therapist. The team then discusses the family while being observed by the family and the therapist. The therapist and family then discuss the team's observations.

Feminist Family Therapy

A treatment philosophy with a nonsexist, egalitarian view in which the social and familial gender roles of women and men are actively considered, including the perspective that social and cultural structures often give men a greater amount of power and control over political and economic resources.

Therapeutic Double Bind

A type of paradoxical technique in which clients are instructed to continue to have the symptom. They are then caught in a bind since to continue the symptom willfully demonstrates that they have control over a symptom that they previously experienced as involuntary. When asked about a possible diagnosis, Whitaker would initiate a t...—that is, a relational diagnosis that is unlikely to ever change (Symbolic Experiential Therapy)

A System

A unit bounded by a set of interrelated elements and which exhibits coherent behaviors (Cybernetics)

Accommodation

A variety of engagement techniques, such as joining, used principally by structural family therapists in which the therapist adapts themselves to the family's style of interacting

Constructivist Family Therapy

A variety of therapeutic models based on postmodern philosophy, which emphasizes the concept that a person's knowledge of the world is based on his/her perception and internal construction of the "truth" and the belief that reality can never really be known (see Social Constructivist Family therapy).

Pseudohostility

A volatile and intense way of disguising and distorting both affection and splits (Lyman Wynne)

Family Typologies

A way of classifying families which illustrates members' similarities and differences, and which may quickly enable the therapist to identify therapeutic goals. For example, the Beavers-Timberlawn model classifies families as centripetal or centrifugal.

Therapeutic Certificates

After clients discharge, Narrative Therapists will present them with a Therapeutic Certificate for them to keep, honoring the effort and growth of their engagement in therapy (Narrative Family Therapy)

Therapeutic Letters

After clients would discharge, a Narrative Therapist may write them a therapeutic letter that reflects upon the nature of their work and the growth they achieved, helping to maintain the growth into the future (Epston, Narrative Family Therapy)

Working Through

After insight is achieved, working through process entails translating insight into more desirable and constructive ways of being (Object-Relations Theory)

Preferred Narrative

After the problem-saturated story has been deconstructed, clients reflect upon what sort of p... n... they may wish to construct moving forward (Narrative)

Battle for Initiative

After the therapist wins the battle for structure, the family must win the... —that is, realize and demonstrate that they are responsible for change, not the therapist, take back from the therapist its authority to make choices about what is discussed and about decisions that affect their lives (Whitaker, Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Defense Mechanism

An analytic concept describing the unconscious process by which the ego protects the person from conscious awareness of anxiety provoking, threatening thoughts and memories.

Ego

An analytic concept referring to a hypothetical internal mental structure that both contains the individual's perception of him/herself and is also the rational mediator between the instinctual demands of the id and the internalized social prohibitions of the super-ego

Marital Adjustment Scale

An assessment inventory used to determine the relative strengths and weaknesses of a marriage, e.g., communications skills, the manner and availability of rewards versus punishments, and sexual satisfaction.

Global Assessment of Relational Functioning (GARF)

An assessment tool used to rate family functioning along a continuum in three areas: problem solving (decision making and communication); organization (roles and boundaries); and emotional climate (empathy, respect, regard). Originally designed by family therapist Lyman Wynne, the GARF is included as an appendix in the DSM-IV.

Linear Causality

An assumption of cause and effect in which one event is thought to cause the next. For example, in a classical conditioning paradigm, a particular stimulus elicits a specific response (see Circularity).

Paradigm

An example, model, or concept that contains an interrelated set of assumptions

Human Validation Process Model

An experiential model developed by Satir, in which the therapist and family work together to promote open communication and authentic emotional experiences.

Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy

An experiential/humanistic couples therapy model from Greenberg and Johnson which posits that problems often stem from an attempt to hide primary emotions such as fear and need for attachment and instead use defensive and coercive reactions known as secondary reactive emotions. The relationship is characterized by negative interactions such as pursuer/distancer or blame. The negative interactions lead to greater suspicion, more fear, and more negative reactions. In therapy the couple accesses the primary emotions so that they are able to reframe their relationship and alter their negative interactions and simultaneously strengthen their emotional bond.

Sexual Dysfunction

An impaired physiological response preventing a person from full sexual functioning. A physiological arousal or performance problem. This requires a MEDICAL referral. (Sex Therapy)

Family Sculpting

An in-session intervention where family members are asked to place other family members in positions symbolic of their role in he family from the perspective of the sculptor. Family members will take turns going about this process while reflecting on the experiences and interpretations throughout (Satir's Communications Approach)

Object

An individual's collective distortions based upon his or her subjective experiences and perceptions of another person—typically, a primary caregiver. Is typically an internalized representation of a parent or primary caregiver based upon a series of repeated interactions throughout early childhood (Object-Relations)

Integrative Couples Therapy

An integrated approach using support and empathy to help couples accept differences and disappointments and break the cycle of mutual blame. Treatment begins with a formulation consisting of: a theme that defines the conflict and a polarization process describing the dysfunctional pattern of interaction. The problem is externalized and the couple unites against a common enemy. The couple uses behavioral exchange processes such as quid pro quo and good faith contracts, but is also taught to make I-statements, to listen, and to express themselves in direct but non-blaming ways.

Joining and Accommodating

An intentional maneuver by the therapist to establish a therapeutic relationship with the family system. The therapist will adapt to the family's communication pattern and other mannerisms to create a comfortable therapeutic space (Structural Family Therapy)

Mimesis

An intentional maneuver by the therapist to join and accommodate with the family by replicating their body language, use of expressive language, mannerisms, and other observable behaviors to create a comfortable, trusting therapeutic space (Structural Family Therapy)

Boundary Making

An intervention in which therapists reinforce appropriate/clear boundaries and diffuse inappropriate boundaries by adapting the interactional patterns of the family's structure (Structural Family Therapy)

Rituals

An intervention presented by a therapy team that is described in great detail, instructing various individuals within the family to carry out specific behaviors at specific times of the day for a distinct period of time. They serve to provide consistency and clarity as to the hypothesized problem within the family (Milan Systemic)

Temperature Reading

An intervention that explores thoughts and feelings while improving communication and self worth. Clients are encouraged to share particular experiences of their appreciations and excitements, complaints, and possible solutions, hopes and wishes, etc. (Satir's Communications Approach)

Coital Alignment Technique (CAT)

An intervention used to increase mutual stimulation through full body contact (male learns to position and maneuver on top of the woman) (Sex Therapy)

Counterparadox

An intervention used to unravel a family's double-bind message by referring to their dysfunction as legitimate and necessary, and as so, instructing the family not to change (Milan Systemic)

Parts Party

An intervention where individuals will explore their various parts, both good and bad, to promote wholeness and integration in individual therapy. In family or group therapy, individuals will have others act out their various parts under their guidance and instruction (Satir)

Unbalancing

An intervention where the therapist intentionally sides with one family member over the other, meant to disrupt homeostasis and encourage change at the behavioral and structural level (Strategic & Structural Family Therapy)

Perturbation

An intervention which introduces a small change or ripple without altering the system's basic organization in an attempt to magnify the change later.

Circumplex Model

An objective assessment tool measuring levels of cohesion, flexibility, and communication within family systems (Olson, Assessment in Family Therapy)

Beavers - Timberlawn Model

An objective assessment tool measuring two types of family patterns: Family Competence and Family Style. Competence dimensions are: adequate, optimal, midrange, borderline, and severely dysfunctional. Stylistic dimensions are: centripetal, centrifugal, and mixed. (Assessment in Family Therapy)

Projection

An unconscious defense in which unwanted feelings or beliefs about oneself are split off and then attributed to others. When a child is born, each parent projects the fragments of his or her repressed object relationships onto the child (Object-Relations)

Structural Family Mapping

As a means of assessment, a therapist will create a Structural Family Map of the hypothesized family structure (Structural Family Therapy)

Debts or Filial Responsibility

As an account for the child's experience of the degrees of fairness and ethical consideration from their parents toward them, they will either be d... (resulting in destructive entitlement) or f... r... (resulting in loyalty) (Contextual Family Therapy)

Relative Influencing Questioning

Assists the client in externalizing the problem through mapping the influence of the problem and mapping the influence of the person (Narrative)

Bonding

Attachment Theory's term for the process in which individuals form a connections in a relationship that satisfies the primary need for attachment (Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy)

Complementary Relationships

Based on differences that fit together (Communications Theory & MRI Systemic Approach)

Symmetrical Relationships

Based on equality, behavior of one mirrors that of the other (Communications Theory and MRI Systemic Approach)

Symbolic Experiential Interventions

Battle for Structure, Battle for Initiative, Expanding Distress, Activating Constructive Anxiety, Redefining Symptoms, Fantasy Alternative, Affective Confrontation, Co-Therapist, Degrees of Craziness, Teaming Roles, Therapeutic Double Bind, Bilateral Pseudo-Therapy, Bilateral Transference, Flight Toward Health...Empathy, Play w Children, Grow until we die, Tickle the Defenses (Ackerman's term)

Biobehavioral

Biological factors that influence behavior, e.g. depression, that is caused, in part, by faulty neurochemistry.

Collaborative Family Health Care

Bloch and his followers use teams with other medical care providers - nurses, physicians, or rehabilitation specialists - to help families cope more effectively with the consequences of medical illnesses.

Diffuse Boundary

Boundaries that are permeable and permit fluid contact with other subsystems. Not clearly defined or maintained, resulting in blurred generational role and responsibilities. May be prone to enmeshment (Structural Family Therapy)

Detriangulate

Bowen believed that families will automatically attempt to triangulate the therapist into their conflict--and if they are successful in doing so, therapy will become ineffective. The therapist detriangulates the family's emotional process by remaining neutral and differentiated, thereby decreasing emotionality across the family and making room for constructively resolving conflict (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

Nonanxious Presence

Bowen emphasized the importance of the therapist remaining differentiated and providing a non-anxious presence throughout the session, influencing the family to become less reaction and access rationality. This intervention served to promote higher levels of differentiation for each family member through modeling (Bowen)

Sibling Position

Bowen endorsed that an individual's personality development will be highly influenced by his or her position in the sibling birth order. This also plays a role in how children are chosen as the object for the family projection process (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

Coaching

Bowen used this term to identify what he believed his role to be with clients as he coached them through the process of differentiation of self. He used the metaphor of "coach" to exemplify that he is responsible for getting the process started, but that the actual work must be done by the client (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

Bowenian Family Therapy

Bowen's theory and therapeutic model is based on the family's emotional system, the differentiation of self within one's family, and the multi-generational transmission of emotions and family patterns.

Language and Meaning

By attending to the l... and m... used by clients, therapists can gain an understanding of their lived reality and how they experience the meaning of situations, relationships, others, and self (Solution-Focused Therapy)

Contextual

C... refers to the systemic impact of all that are impacted by the therapeutic effort. Also refers to the social and political context within a family (Contextual Family Therapy)

Symbolic Experiential Contributors

Carl Whitaker Secondary: August Napier, David Keith, Walter Kempler, Thomas Malone, Laura Roberto Classical (Cybernetics & General Systems Theory)

Legacy

Certain attributes or qualities that are attributed to an individual as an account of being born to his or her parents (Contextual Family Therapy)

First-Order Change

Change that occurs at the behavioral level only regarding family patterns of interaction, do not affect the system's organization (MRI Systemic Approach)

Second-Order Change

Change that occurs at the level of family beliefs or rules that govern patterns of interaction resulting in fundamental system reorganization and permanent changes in interactions (MRI Systemic Approach)

Multigenerational Family Therapy/Bowen's Family Systems Approach

Class: Transgenerational History: Schizophrenia - patient & mother Themes: individuality & togetherness 1. cognitive capacity to realize potential to accomplish tasks for survival 2. affective capacity to communicate and connect with others Assessment: genogram Dx: non-pathologizing Who?: Combo of anyone/individual Duration: long-term, years Goals: decrease anxiety, increase differentiation

Strategic-Humanism Contributor

Cloe Madanes Classical (Cybernetics & General Systems Theory)

Metacommunication

Communicating about communication—communication that modifies, qualifies or even disqualifies a communication (this is frequently occurring in family therapy). Essentially, this is referring to the non-verbals going on in the room that have a profound impact on what is being said at the auditory level. This is directly related to the emphasis of tracking content and process in family therapy. Can be congruent (pat on the back w/ "job well done") or incongruent ("nothing's wrong" w clenched teeth). If incongruent, usually the nonverbal message settles the discrepancy (Communications Theory)

Streptic Communication

Communicating through sounds (e.g. claps, whistles) (Communications Theory)

Paralinguistic Communication

Communicating through tone, pace, and inflection (Communications Theory)

Kinesthetic Communication

Communication through body motion (Communications Theory)

Haptic (or symbolic) Communication

Communication through touch (Communications Theory)

Hypothesizing

Continual process of conceptualizing the nature of the family's behavior that guide questioning and interventions (Milan Systemic)

Negative Feedback Loops

Corrective information that flows back into the family system which serves to minimize deviation, keep the system functioning within prescribed limits, and discourage change. Negative feedback is homeostatic.

Concurrent Couples Therapy

Couples therapy in which one therapist works with both spouses at different times (see Collaborative and Conjoint).

Collaborative Couples Therapy

Couples treatment in which each partner is seen by his/her own therapist

Narrative Interventions

Deconstruction Questions, Externalizing the Problem, Externalizing Questions, Unique Outomes (Sparkling Events), Relative Influencing Questioning (Mapping the Influence of the Problem, Mapping the Influence of the Person), Lanscape of Action Questions, Landscape of Meaning Questions, Preference Questions, Therapeutic Letters, Therapeutic Certificates, Collaborative Case Notes, Clients as Consultants

Morphogenesis

Describes a system's tendency toward growth creativity, change, and innovation (Cybernetics)

Multigenerational Family Therapy Interventions

Detriangulate, Nonanxious Presence, Genogram (Guerin), Family Diagram (Bowen), Process Questions, Going Home Again, Displacement Stories, Coaching, The "I" Position, Relationship Experiments, Person-to-Person Relationships, Therapist is neutral, acts as coach

Interactional Patterns

Dichotomous patterns of relating such as the pursuer-distancer or attacker-blamer relationship pattern (Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy)

Strategic Family Therapy Terms

Directives, Ordeal Therapy Aligning w Parental Generation, Unbalancing, Presenting Problem as Metaphor

Fantasy Alternative

Discussing problematic or stressful situations in fantasy based, "what if" terms or deemphasizing stressful situations by suggesting absurd f... a... (e.g. maybe if you medicated your husband, he wouldn't be so emotional). (Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Sexual Disorder

Disorders of sexual functioning caused by psychological factors such as anxiety, beliefs, or perceptions. A psychological arousal or performance problem. This can be treated by a sex therapist (Sex Therapy)

Strengths and Resources

During the assessment and throughout the ongoing process, the therapist maintains a focus on the client's strengths and resources, as these will likely serve and a component to resolving the presenting problem (Solution-Focused Therapy).

Process

Dynamic aspects that are changing within the system. Often, family therapists make the distinction between process (how something is said) and content (what is being said) (Cybernetics)

Paradoxical Prescription

Either prescribing the symptom or asking the family not to change (Milan Systemic)

Disengaged Systems

Emotionally distant and uninvolved, overly rigid boundaries in which members are isolated and disconnected (Structural Family Therapy)

EFT Interventions

Empathic Reflection, Validating, Focusing the Session, Slowing down the processing, Organizing

Milan Systemic Terms

Epistemology (Epistemological Error), Games, Analogical Message, Digital Message, Metacommunication, Punctuation (different than Structural), Time

Balancing Power

Equalizing access to power in a couple which is overly organized by a hierarchy.

Ethnicity

Ethnic origin of a family which incorporates a value system, conscious and unconscious processes, and from which members often derive a sense of identity and belonging

Report and Command Functions

Every communication has two components, r... (i.e. the content of the message) and c... (a message about the relationship) (MRI Systemic)

Communication (from Steve Treat)

Expresser & listener roles Language & distance Hierarchy of language Intimate communication Process & content Process questions Process intervention Process before content • "My wife and I are always fighting" • "We can't resolve any conflict" • Practice skills • Negative feedback loops • How do you talk about it? How does that go? Anger? • Does anyone listen? • Does it go to defense mechanisms? Fighting? • What is the process of their communication?

Craziness

Falls into three categories of being driven crazy, going crazy, or acting crazy. Different orientations of craziness as exhibited in dysfunctional families. Healthy functioning for both therapists and families includes a high proportion of non-rational, creative, right-brained activity (Whitaker, Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Binuclear Family

Families in which the parents are divorced, have remarried, and formed two intact nuclear families.

Ludwig von Bertalanffy

Father of general systems theory

MRI Systemic Approach Terms

First-Order Change, Second-Order Change, Problem as Attempted Solution (More of the Same), Report and Command Functions, Metacommunication, Complementary Relationship, Symmetrical Relationship

Solution Focused Interventions

Formula First Session Task, Miracle Question, Exception Questions, Scaling Questions, Compliments

Bi-Modal Feedback Mechanism

From Ashby, the rule-bound mechanism by which a system remains unchanged so long as the internal or external environment is stable, but when the fluctuation exceeds the range of stability the system must respond in some new way. The system either breaks down or it makes a leap into new levels of functioning. The change results in a new set of patterns which, like the old pattern, is also bound by rules, and it, too, remains unchanged, so long as the environment is stable.

Emotional Divorce

From Bowen's family therapy, the cool distance between the parents whose relationships vacillated between overcloseness and overdistance.

Fusion

From Bowen, fusion refers to the blurring of intellectual and emotional features or boundaries between family members. The opposite of differentiation, it results in a lack of a separate self and high levels of reactivity among family members

Triangulation

From Bowenian family therapy, a dysfunctional process in which an unresolved conflict between two people (often parents) is extended to include a third person (often their child), whose loyalty is fought over

Highly Differentiated

From Bowenian theory, a person who is able to react to the world rationally and enter into relationships while balancing competing needs for belonging and individuality (see Poorly Differentiated).

Pseudo Self

From Bowenian theory, a person who is not differentiated may be fused with another person. As a result he/she does not reason from his/her own values, but instead borrows the values of the person with whom he/she is fused and commonly makes emotionally reactive choices.

Solid Self

From Bowenian theory, a person who is well differentiated and is able to function based upon a personally defined set of values, beliefs, convictions, and life principles (see Pseudo Self).

Poorly Differentiated

From Bowenian theory, a person with a pseudo-self who is ruled by his/her emotions. He/she adopts the values and attitudes of significant others in order to be accepted and loved (see Highly Differentiated).

I-Position

From Bowenian therapy, statements that reflect the speaker's own thoughts and feelings, instead of attempting to blame others.

Rational Emotive Family Therapy

From Ellis, a cognitive-behavioral model with the goal of helping family members realize that illogical beliefs and distortions cause their emotional distress (linear causality). They are taught to recognize the problem-causing pattern: A - B - C, in which events in the family (A) are influenced by irrational beliefs (B) and result in a problem (C). The goal is to identify and modify the irrational beliefs.

Collaborative Language Family Therapy

From Goolishian and Anderson, a model of family therapy based on the idea that problems are maintained in the family's language and may be resolved by changes in their use of language. The therapist asks questions from a not knowing stance, designed to draw out the client's own views of the problem. The problem is "dissolved" as new meanings and actions evolve.

Dysfunctional Hierarchy

From Haley's strategic model, the primary focus of treatment. Family decision-making structures that do not allow the family to accomplish goals and meet the needs of family members, for example, parents who have abdicated their executive function to their children.

Simple Bind

From Hoffman, a mechanism for change in which a message or request is given and the recipient's new behavior is rewarded. Distinguished from a double bind in which the nature of the message insures that no response will be rewarded. A double bind is a simple bind that is continually imposed and then continually lifted.

Sweat Boxes

From Hoffman, a mild or severe threat to the continuity of the relationship and the system, a possible precondition to morphogenesis.

Crisis of Accession - Crisis of Dismemberment

From Hoffman, discontinuous changes in families, like symptom development, often occur at times of stress. Changes in the family composition are particularly demanding. There are crises of accession when someone joins the family (marriage, birth) and crises of dismemberment when members leave (divorce, death).

Symmetrical

From Jackson and the MRI Group, the opposite of complementarity, a relationship in which there is a relatively equal distribution of control and power, often resulting in rapid escalation of conflict

Field Theory

From Lewin, the theory that the individual's field or "life-space" is psychologically and emotionally constructed of objects which are perceived to have either positive or negative valence. Positively valued objects are approached, while negatively valued ones are avoided. Closely related to Gestalt psychology in its interest in how attention to objects is determined.

Symptom Prescription

From MRI strategic therapy, a treatment technique in which the therapist asks the family to continue to perform or even expand a symptom. The intervention may be compliance based if the therapist wants the family to do as suggested or defiance based when he/she wants the family to defy the directive.

Dramatizations

From Madanes, a therapeutic technique in which a parent is directed to request that the child intentionally perform the problem behavior. In this way the symptom will not draw as much parental attention, and if it no longer serves a purpose, it can be dropped.

Make Believe Play

From Madanes, a therapeutic technique in which parents are asked to make-believe they need the child's help and the child is to make-believe helping them. Since the parents explicitly ask for help and the child overtly helps them, there is no need for the covert symptomatic behavior. Additionally, when parents are put in this inferior position overtly, they may feel at odds with what is appropriate and reassert a superior position.

Odd Day/Even Day Ritual

From Milan systemic, a technique to encourage irreverence or a more flexible view of the family. The family is given a directive that on odd days one set of opinions would be true, but on even days, false. On the seventh day, the family should act spontaneously.

Parentified Child

From Minuchin's structural model, a role set of behaviors, and placement in a family sequence which stems from the functional removal of a child from the sibling subsystem. A parentified child differs from a child with healthy responsibilities when that child's parental responsibilities are poorly defined and, therefore, unlimited and are beyond the child's developmental capabilities. Such children become symptomatic when they are given responsibilities they cannot handle or are not given the authority to perform a responsibility they are given. For example, a 17 year old girl functions as the family's head when her mother sits uninvolved in the corner of the room.

Invisible Loyalties

From Nagy's contextual therapy, unconscious obligations that children take on in order to help their families, sacrificing their own interests and well being in the process.

Cohesion

From Olson's Circumplex Model, a measure of the strength of the emotional bonds between and among family members

Cross-Generational Coalition

From Structural therapy, a stable coalition between a parent and child against the other patent.

Systematic Desensitization

From Wolpe, a behavioral therapy technique for reducing the capacity of conditioned stimuli or activities to evoke anxiety. The therapist first instructs the client to arrange various anxiety-provoking stimuli or activities on a hierarchy rated according to a subjective units of discomfort scale. The therapist teaches the client to induce a state of relaxation, then pairs the relaxation response with the anxiety-provoking stimuli, working progressively up the hierarchy

Behavioral Exchange Theory

From behavioral family therapy, a way of describing relationships in terms of costs and benefits. Functional relationships have plentiful access to rewards and relatively few costs, while distressed relationships have a scarcity of rewards relative to costs.

Coercion (Aversive Control)

From behavioral family therapy, one person uses aversive stimuli to control the behavior of another.

Reciprocity

From behavioral family therapy, the likelihood that the members of a dyad will equitably reinforce one another over time

Parallel (or Good Faith) Contract

From behavioral marital therapy, a contract in which the behavior of each partner is not contingent on the other (The husband agrees to take out the garbage even if his wife does not make the bed.)

Caring Days

From behavioral marital therapy, each partner identifies behaviors that his/her partner finds enjoyable and makes a commitment to increasing those behaviors.

Love Days

From behavioral marital therapy, on specific days one partner non-contingently increases those behaviors the other partner finds pleasurable (see Caring Days).

Premack Principle

From behavioral therapy, a technique in which a high probability behavior i.e., one that the subject would voluntarily tend to engage in frequently, is used to reinforce a low probability target behavior in order to increase the frequency of the target behavior.

Not Knowing

From collaborative language systems, a stance in which therapists do not use diagnoses, give directives, or make hypotheses. They may offer tentative opinions or ideas, but assert that to take a more "expert" or directive stance would limit the solutions the family and therapist might discover through their conversations. The therapist and client engage in conversation and inquiry as partners. The therapist is not separate from the problem system.

Disjunctive Moves

From contextual theory, moves away from trustworthy relatedness.

Rejunctive Moves

From contextual theory, moves toward trustworthy relatedness (see Disjunctive Moves).

Relational Ethics

From contextual theory, the fundamental dynamic force that holds families and communities together through reliability and trustworthiness.

Redundancy (Behavioral Redundancy)

From cybernetics, rule-determined repetitive patterns of interaction.

Unfinished Business

From experiential therapy, originally a concept of Gestalt therapist Fritz Perls, referring to unresolved feelings or disowned parts of the self.

Emergents

From general systems theory, distinct entities of the whole family or group, not present in the parts.

Negentropy

From general systems theory, the measure of organization in a system. A well-organized system would have high levels of negentropy. (see Entropy).

Leagues (Communities of Concern)

From narrative therapy, groups of clients who are working on similar problems meet in order to continue to construct and maintain new narratives and to support each other's preferred outcomes.

Dominant Cultural Discourses

From narrative therapy, sociocultural norms that can become internalized and have a controlling effect on one's story of oneself. In treatment these norms are personified (e.g., "Expectations for Men, Women, or African-Americans") and their impact is discussed.

Unstoried Competencies

From narrative therapy, those competencies that the client possesses which are not part of his/her dominant story and therefore are not expressed until the dominant story is reconstructed (see Subjugated Stories).

Sparkling Events

From narrative therapy, those events that exemplify the client's preferred outcome rather than his/her problem saturated stories.

Multi-Conductor Model

From network therapy, multiple therapists who share the group leadership as a team.

Therapeutic Neutrality

From object relations family therapy, an atmosphere of nonjudgmental exploration. The therapist is not tied to a specific outcome other than insight and working through.

Ideal Object

From object relations theory, a neutral object freed from exciting and rejecting aspects. Maintained by the Central Ego.

Antilibidinal System

From object relations theory, a repressed system within the ego characterized by aggression, rage, and contempt.

Libidinal System

From object relations theory, a repressed system within the ego characterized by need, excitement, and longing.

Libidinal Ego

From object relations theory, an exciting (or overstimulating) object gives rise to the libidinal ego.

Rejecting Ego

From object relations theory, one of three parts of the ego, the rejecting ego is unconscious, inflexible, and frustrated by its rejecting object (see Central Ego and Exciting Ego).

Central Ego

From object relations theory, one of three parts of the ego. Is conscious, adaptable, and free to deal with future experiences with attachment figures in reasonable ways. Maintains its own object, the ideal object (see Rejecting Ego & Exciting Ego).

Exciting Ego

From object relations theory, one of three parts of the ego. It is unconscious, inflexible, and in a state of longing for a tempting but unsatisfying object (see Central Ego & Rejecting Ego).

Antilibidinal Ego

From object relations theory, that part of the ego that is formed from interactions with the rejecting object.

Exciting Object

From object relations theory, the exciting (or overstimulating) object gives rise to the libidinal ego.

Rejecting Object

From object relations theory, the rejecting object gives rise to the antilibidinal ego.

Extinction

From operant conditioning paradigm, when a previously learned and reinforced bx is no longer reinforced it eventually disappears

Positive Reinforcement

From operant conditioning, a process for increasing the probability that a desired (target) behavior will be repeated by adding a reinforcing stimulus after the target behavior is exhibited. For example, when a slot machine pays off (reinforcing stimulus), the likelihood of a gambler putting in another quarter (target behavior) increases

Social Reinforcer

From operant conditioning, social interactions (rather than material reinforcers) such as praise, approval, nagging, or yelling that increase the frequency of a behavior.

Modernism

From philosophy, a position in which "truth" consists of a tangible, knowable set of observable or deductible facts. In this philosophy it is assumed that there are universal principles that would guide researchers and therapists towards theoretic tenets, diagnoses, and treatment

Reflexive Questions

From second-order cybernetics, Tomm designed questions that inspire families not only to reflect on the meaning of their current perspectives, but also to consider new options.

Multi-Partiality (Plurality)

From social constructivist, Hoffman, the therapist's stance in which he/she strives to positively regard each person's point of view, even ones that are repugnant to the therapist or to society, in order to find the meaning behind behaviors, actions, and events.

Modeling

From social learning theory, learning new behavior or extinguishing old behavior by observing the reinforcement contingencies of the behavior in another person

Fixed Linguistic Statement

From solution-focused therapy, the idea that when families begin treatment they often characterize the problem as though it were an immutable fact, generating a sense of hopelessness. To reverse this tendency, the therapist begins by eliciting information about what happens when the problem does not occur.

Therapeutic Paradox

From strategic family therapy, an intervention which entails maneuvers that appear to contradict the goals of therapy, yet are actually designed to achieve them (see Prescribing the Symptom & Pretending).

Family Rules

From strategic family therapy, rules that govern family members' behavior or promote specific reactions (see First- & Second-Order Change).

Tracking

From structural family therapy, an engagement technique in which the therapist participates in the existing family dynamic, while privately noting the dysfunctional or unbalanced processes being enacted. The therapist must assume the "median" position—paying attention to themselves while engaging with the family

Distancing

From structural family therapy, the process of creating emotional space, often in response to enmeshment due to diffuse boundaries. For example, adolescents may distance themselves as a way of solidifying an identity.

Detouring

From structural family therapy, when two family members attempt to preserve their relationship by defining their conflict as a disagreement about a third person, keeping the focus on that person rather than themselves and their problem.

Shaping Competence

From structural therapy, a method of increasing family members' confidence in being able to solve their problems by pointing out what they have done right, rather than focusing on mistakes.

Inconsistency

From symbolic-experiential therapy, an attitude by therapists in which they do not delude themselves into believing that they are consistent with families. They accept inconsistency, and realize that it helps undermine the family's attempt to maintain a rigid pattern of living.

As If Structure

From symbolic-experiential therapy, family members are encouraged to freely experiment as if they were in the role of the other, so long as they understand that the role-play is symbolic. The process allows family members to alternately experiment and return to their secure roles.

Discriminative Stimulus

From the operant conditioning paradigm, a cue that signals the availability of a reinforcer.

Negative Reinforcement

From the operant conditioning paradigm, a procedure for strengthening a behavior, i.e. increasing the probability that the behavior will be repeated or increasing its frequency. A stimulus, often aversive, is removed once a target behavior is exhibited. For example, a mother has been nagging a child to clean up her room. If the nagging stops (stimulus behavior is removed) when the child picks up her room (target behavior), it is likely that the child will pick up her room again (frequency increases)

Punishment

From the operant conditioning paradigm, a process for decreasing an undesirable behavior by applying an aversive stimulus immediately following the target behavior. For example, a teacher reprimands (aversive stimulus) a child when the child throws his sandwich on the floor.

Primary Reinforcer

From the operant conditioning paradigm, biologically determined reinforcers such as food and sex

Secondary Reinforcer

From the operant conditioning paradigm, items that have acquired reinforcing properties such as praise, approval, tokens, or money to be exchanged for actual goods

Schedules of Reinforcement

From the operant conditioning paradigm, target behaviors may be reinforced after each occurrence, after a fixed or variable number of occurrences, or after a fixed or variable length of time. Behaviors that are reinforced intermittently and unpredictably are the most resistant to extinction.

MRI Systemic Approach (Palo Alto Group) Contributors

Gregory Bateson (non-clinical), Don Jackson (founder MRI), Virginia Satir, Jay Haley, John Weakland, Paul Watzlawick Secondary: Richard Fisch (MRI > Brief Therapy Center) Classical (Cybernetics & General Systems Theory)

Third-Order Change

Gregory Bateson's term for a dramatic transformation in thinking (see First-Order Change and Second-Order Change)

Displacement Stories

Guerin's intervention meant to assist individuals in creating distance between themselves and their problems and encourage rationality by having them reflect on another couple's conflict as opposed to their own (Guerin, Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

Strategic Humanism

Haley and Madanes's more recent model is oriented toward increasing family members' ability to soothe and love rather than to gain control over one another.

Collaborative Languages Approach

Harry Goolishan, Harlene Anderson, Karl Tomm, Tom Anderson Constructivist Models (Post-Modernism) Not-Knowing Approach, Problem-Determining System, Language, Inventive Questioning, Reflecting Team

Analogic Communication

Has little structure, but is rich in content such as a child's kinetic family drawing (Communication Theory)

Enactments

Having the family experiment with new ways of behaving and interacting, as instructed by the therapist, in the here and now of the therapeutic encounter (Structural Family Therapy)

Family Interaction

Healthy f... i... in Experiential Therapy is traditionally characterized through flexibility and openness to life experiences (Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Teaming Roles

Healthy members of a family may be intentionally paired into teaming roles by the therapist to encourage further healthy behavior by other family members (Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

GAP Report

In 1970 the Group for the Advancement of Psychiatry (GAP) published a report with a primary finding that demonstrated that the majority of therapists who worked with families identified improved communication as their primary treatment goal.

Family Emotional System

In Bowenian Family Therapy, the recurrent pattern of emotional reactivity linking family members.

Problem as Attempted Solution

In MRI Systemic Therapy, the therapist traditionally assess that the problem is not the problem, but the attempted solutions to fix the problem reinforces the interactional behavioral sequence (MRI Systemic)

More of the Same

In MRI Systemic Therapy, this term refers to the problem in families being a failure to appropriately respond to normal life circumstances, making the attempted solution to the problem the problem. Families falling into this pattern end up doing "more of the same" behavior, meaning that they do more of the failed solution as opposed to trying a different solution (MRI Systemic Approach)

Clients as Consultants

In Narrative Therapy, after clients had discharged the therapist would welcome them back to serve as consultants on current cases. This would reinforce their growth and maintain the collaborative stance of the therapist (Narrative Family Therapy)

Collaborative Case-Notes

In Narrative Therapy, the therapist may write case notes collaboratively with the client toward the end of each session to ensure that he or she was correctly capturing the essence of the client's experience of the session (Narrative Family Therapy)

Communication

In Satir's approach, all forms of behavior are considered ... and need to be tended to by the individual communicating as well as the recipient (Satir's Communications Approach)

Hope

In Solution-Focused Therapy, the therapist is intentional about maintaining the presence of h... that things will improve and get better for the client (Solution-Focused Therapy)

Miracle Question

In Solution-Focused Therapy, the therapist will ask the client to describe what their lives would look like without the problem , as well as define what would be different to the point that they would know the problem was resolved or no longer present. This question comprises components of assessment, goal setting, and intervention (Solution-Focused Therapy)

Formula First Session Task

In Solution-Focused Therapy, the therapist will use the first session to shift the attention of the individual or family toward the overlooked positive aspects of their situation. This occurs through illuminating upon times when the problem is not present as well as explores strengths and resources. This sets the stage for therapy being solution-focused as opposed to problem-focused. Clients are asked to reflect on what happened between the first and second sessions that they would like to continue to have happen so they begin to identify their strengths (Solution-Focused Therapy)

Problem-Determined System

In collaborative language family therapy, any system in which a problem is so prominent in the family's conversation that few decisions can be made without taking it into account. People who are interested in talking about the problem constitute the problem-determined system.

Intergenerational Loyalties

In contextual family therapy, the set of emotional obligations to one's family of origin as well as to one's spouse and children.

Circular Causality/Circularity

In determining the origins of problems, General Systems Theory departs radically from traditional, linear causality. This is different than liner causality and acknowledged that two things do, say, or feel mutually influence one another in a recursive, circular relationship (feedback loops). The problem could not be maintained if any one element were to be removed. Meaningless to identify an individual as having caused or started a problem. (Cybernetics, Milan Systemic Group)

Contingency Contract

In the behavioral family therapy model, an agreement between two or more family members aimed at increasing mutually rewarding behaviors. The contract, which is usually written, specifies the desired behaviors each will do and under what circumstances.

Affective Intensity

Increasing the emotional intensity of the system to encourage structural change (Structural Family Therapy)

Multigenerational Family Therapy Key Terms

Individuality & Togetherness, Differentiation of Self, Triangles, Nuclear Family Emotional System, Undifferentiated Family Ego Mass, Family Projection Process, Multigenerational Transmission Process, Sibling Position, Emotional Cutoff, Societal Emotional Process

Family Models/Maps

Individuals and the system at large will consciously or unconsciously use models or maps meant to manage their boundaries and make sense of their individual and shared realities (Cybernetics)

Subsystems

Individuals, dyads, triads and groups form subsystems or units within the family that perform certain functions (Structural Family Therapy)

Boundaries (Structural Family Therapy)

Individuals, subsystems, and families are separated from one another by .... A hypothetical line of demarcation that serves to protect a family and its subsystems. Either rigid, clear, or diffuse (Minuchin, Structural Family Therapy)

Feedback

Information which is returned to the system and which exerts a controlling influence on it

Vehicles of Change

Instead of relying on predetermined techniques, Satir endorsed a model of using ... with clients that were more adaptable (Satir's Communications Approach)

Open Systems

Interact regularly with the environment with relatively no inhibition, flexible boundaries (Cybernetics)

Introject

Internalized images and memories from past relationships, particularly parents, who continue to exert an influence on current thoughts, feels, and/or behaviors, Internalized objects become introjects, and are split into being either all-good or all-bad (Object-Relations Theory)

Paradoxical intervention

Interventions used to address the concept that families are naturally resistant to change. They either involve instructing the family not to change, or to change in ways that contradict their desired change. Now, the family's natural resistance to change will promote them to rebel against the directive to not change, thereby experiencing the initial desired change (MRI Systemic Approach)

Contextual Contributors

Ivan Boszormenyi-Nagy Transgenerational (Psychoanalytic Theory Applied to the Family System)

Object-Relations Contributors

James Framo Secondary: Norman Paul, Jill & David Scharff Transgenerational (Psychoanalytic Theory Applied to the Family System)

Strategic Family Therapy Contributors

Jay Haley, Cloe Madanes Classical (Cybernetics & General Systems Theory)

Structural Family Therapy Interventions

Joining & Accommodating (Mimesis), Intensity, Planning, Structural Family Mapping, Enactments, Spontaneous Behavioral Sequences, Challenging Family Assumptions, Challenging the Symptom, Reframing, Affective Intensity, Shaping Competence, Boundary Making, Unbalancing, Punctuation (different than Milan)

Triphasic Sexual Response

Kaplan included sexual desire, excitement, and orgasm to better explain sexual intercourse. (Sex Therapy)

Contextual Terms

Loyalty, Legacy, Entitlement, Ledger, Contextual, Equitable Asymmetry, Merit, Filial Loyalty, Split Filial Loyalty, Revolving Slate of Injustice, Debts or Filial Responsibility, Destructive Entitlement, Parentification, Exoneration, Deparentification Process

Milan Systemic Approach Contributors

Mara Selvini Palazzoli, Guiliana Prata, Luigi Boscolo, Gianfranco Cecchin Classical (Cybernetics & General Systems Theory)

Cognitive Maps

Mental models by which incoming information is perceived, understood, transformed, and stored, together with a corresponding repertoire of behavioral options. Maps are based on the integration of experiences. Each part of the cognitive map - i.e., input and output - forms the individual's internal representation of reality. Cognitive maps shape actions and communication. They may be flexible, able to change and expand cumulatively with new information and experiences, or they may be rigid and limiting. Maps have both language and spatial aspects with a private vocabulary and imagery that determines how incoming communication is interpreted.

Narrative Contributors

Michael White, David Epston Constructivist Models (Post-Modernism)

A Learning Process

Milan Family Therapists viewed the use of interventions as nothing more than... in which the therapist tests hypotheses and interventions through trial and error as they learn about the family (Milan Systemic)

Contextual Interventions

Multidirectional Partiality

Multigenerational Family Therapy Contributors

Murray Bowen Secondary: Phillip Guerin, Thomas Fogarty, Monica McGoldrick, Betty Carter Transgenerational (Psychoanalytic Theory Applied to the Family System)

Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP)

NLP practitioners focus on the hidden effects of language, the meaning of non-verbal behavior, and the utilization of communication and trance to create change.

Narrative Terms

Narrative Metaphor, Constitutionalist Self, Problem-Saturated Stories, Preferred Narrative, Subjugated Story,

Primary Needs

Needs that are related to attachment and experienced through primary emotions (Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy)

Incongruous Hierarchies

Occurs when children create symptoms in an attempt to change their parents (Madanes, Strategic Family Therapy)

Bilateral Pseudo-Therapy

Occurs when family members attempt to play therapist to one another—this is avoided (Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Challenging Family Assumptions

Offers the family alternative perspectives and views on how they interact with one another (Structural Family Therapy)

Challenging the Symptom

Offers the family alternative ways of perceiving the role of the symptom in relation to the family's structure (Structural Family Therapy)

Computers

One of Satir's four dysfunctional communication styles. C... are often overly-rational, level-headed, analytical, and speak in a matter-of-fact manner. Often fear the vulnerability associated with expressing their true feelings. Here, the context is acknowledged but the self and other are not (Satir's Communication Approach)

Distractors

One of Satir's four dysfunctional communication styles. D... desperately avoid conflict and will often change the topic of focus or conversation in the midst of escalation. They may also avoid conflict by taking on the role of a placater, blamer, or computer, but quickly shift out of the stance prior to another's reaction. They often feel insignificant and scared inside. Here, the self, other, and context go unacknowledged (Satir's Communications Approach)

Placaters

One of Satir's four dysfunctional communication styles. Disregarding one's own feelings of worth and handing power over to another individuals (e.g. pleasing everyone in the family except one's self). Here, the context and the other is acknowledged, but the self is not (Satir)

Blamers

One of Satir's four dysfunctional communication styles. Often disagree with others and hold others responsible for things not going their way. Often feel insecure and powerless, and feel that they must go to extreme measures—verbal and/or physical aggression—for anyone to really listen to them. Here, the self and the context are acknowledged, while the other is not (Satir's Communications Approach)

Psychology

One of the four dimension of individual and relational psychology that interact with one another in Contextual Family Therapy. Refers to the person's internal experience of the world, including thoughts, desires, emotions, and meaning. As Facts occur externally to the individual, p... develops internally within the individual (Contextual)

Facts

One of the four dimensions of individual and relational psychology that interact with one another in Contextual Family Therapy. F... refer to the stable and physical attributes that individuals are born with (i.e. gender identity, ethnicity, race, disabilities, cognitive functioning, etc) and the contextual circumstances of their upbringing (i.e. divorce, moving, trauma, etc.) (Contextual Family Therapy)

Relational Ethics

One of the four dimensions of individual and relational psychology that interact with one another in Contextual Family Therapy. R... E... are the most significant component to Contextual Family Therapy, and refer to the responsibility each individual has for the impact that their behaviors have on others. Contextual Family Therapy endorses a consideration for the best interests of the other in your family (Contextual)

Transactions

One of the four dimensions of individual and relational psychology that interact with one another in Contextual Family Therapy. Refer to the patterns of organization and dynamics within the individual's family system. The patterns of family organization—hierarchy, triangles, and transnational sequences. (Contextual Family Therapy)

Complainant

One of the three types (also Visitor, Customer) of clients in Solution-Focused Therapy. C... are willing to acknowledge that there is a problem, but unwilling to acknowledge their role in it and instead keep focus on others (Solution-Focused Therapy)

Customer

One of the three types of clients in Solution-Focused Therapy. C... acknowledge that there is a problem, are willing to accept their role in it, and are engaged in putting forth effort toward change (Solution-Focused Therapy)

Visitor

One of the three types of clients in Solution-Focused Therapy. V... are agreeable to attend therapy, but are not willing to put forth effort to change (Solution-Focused Therapy)

Marital Skew

One parent dominates the family, and the other is submissive/dependent. The couple presents the situation as "normal," leading to a distortion of reality by family members in order to maintain the marraige (Theodore Lidz)

Autopoetic Systems

Originated by postmodern Chilean biologist, Maturana, systems that are self-organizing and self-maintaining, such as biological and human systems. Autopoetic Systems can be described by second-order cybernetics.

Allopoetic Systems

Originated by postmodern Chilean biologist, Maturana: systems that can be controlled from the outside, such as machines.

Communication Theory

Originated by the MRI group, the study of the process by which verbal and non-verbal information is exchanged within a relationship. Communication can be analogic which has little structure, but is rich in content, or digital which is verbal communication perceived and interpreted based on meaning. (see various types of communications: Haptic; Kinesthetic; Paralinguistic; and Streptic).

Rigid Boundary

Overly restrictive, permit little contact with outside subsystems, often resulting in disengagement (Structural)

MRI Systemic Approach Interventions

Paradoxical Intervention (Positioning, Presribing the Symptom, Restraining the Progress of Change), Out-of-Session Directive

Strategic Family Therapy Interventions

Paradoxical Interventions, Reframing, Metaphoric Task, Pretend to Have Symptom, Incongruous Hierarchies

Out of Session Directives

Paradoxical interventions were typically prescribed through ... ; that is, instructing the clients to engage in behavioral change outside of the session as opposed to in the here-and-now of the session (MRI Systemic Approach)

Feminist Family Therapy

Peggy Papp, Olga Silverstein, Marianne Walters, Betty Carter, Deborah Luepnitiz, Rachel Hare-Mustin Constructivist Models (Post-Modernism)

Bicultural

People who belong to more than one culture and who are able to alternate between the cultures, adjusting temporarily to each depending on the circumstance.

Symbolic Experiential Terms

Person of the Therapist, Existential Encounter, Therapy of the Absurd, Individuation, Family Interaction

Egodystonic

Phenomena or experiences at odds with an individual's self-perception.

Egosyntonic

Phenomena or experiences consistent with the perceived needs, self-perception, or ideals of an individual.

Sex Therapy

Pioneered by Masters and Johnson, Kaplan, and LoPiccolo. Treatment that focuses on the client's or couple's sexual functioning; often combined with couple's therapy.

Interface (Boundary Interface)

Points at which the boundary from one system or subsystem meets the boundaries of other subsystems or the environment.

Milan Systemic Interventions

Positive Connotation, Rituals (Paradoxical Prescription, Neutrality & Irreverence), Counterparadox, A Learning Process (Hypothesizing), Team Approach

Metaphoric Tasks

Prescribing a directive to a family that engages them in a conversation or activity that is easier or more accessible than talking about the problem directly. It is a metaphor that represents or resembles a family dynamic that is too difficult to talk about directly, but by discussing it through metaphor, it will indirectly contribute to resolving the actual problem (Strategic Family Therapy)

Reframing

Presenting an alternative perspective on a family members view of another's problematic behavior (Strategic and Structural)

EFT Terms

Primary Emotions, Secondary Emotions, Attachment, Softening, Interactional Patterns, Primary Needs, Bonding

Satir's Communications Approach (Satir's Human Validation Process Model) Terms

Primary Survival Triad, Body, Mind & Feelings, Communication, Self-Worth, Dysfunctional Communication Styles/Survival Stances (Placaters, Blamers, Computers, Distractors, Levelers {congruence}), Model Integration Analysis, Role-Function Discrepency

Object Relations Terms

Projection, Projective Identification, Insight, Working Through, Interpretation, Transference, Countertransference, Object, Introject, The Dirty Middle (Framo)

Externalizing Questions

Questions oriented toward helping the client to externalize the problem, thereby separating from them in an effort to feel less powerless. These questions usually entail shifting the use of language from identifying the problem as an adjective (i.e. feeling depressed) to a noun (i.e. recognizing the presence of depression)(White, Narrative Family Therapy)

Landscape of Action Questions

Questions that gather information about the times in clients' lives that they were able to resist the effects of the problem (Narrative Family Therapy)

Exception Questions

Questions that have clients reflect on times when the problem was not present, or when the problem was not a problem (Solution-Focused Therapy)

Landscape of Meaning Questions

Questions to help clients consider a new, more heroic self view (Narrative Family Therapy)

Enmeshed Systems

Receive affection and nurturance within the family system but may risk autonomy and outside relationships due to diffuse boundaries (Structural Family Therapy)

Loyalty

Refers to an individual's internalized expectations of and obligations to his or her FOO. This concept is assumed to exert a powerful influence over the individual's functioning (Contextual Family Therapy)

Confidentiality

Refers to the ethical obligation of the therapist to protect the client's identity and other personal information. Therapist may not reveal information without the client's consent to third parties except as allowed by the governing licensing body and/or as outlined in the Ethical Guidelines of AAMFT

Boundary Interface

Regions between each subsystem of the family and between the family and the suprasystem (Cybernetics)

ABC-X Family Crisis Model

Reuben Hill's model used to explain whether or not a stressful event would result in a crisis in some families but not in others. A = the stressor, B = the family's crisis-meeting resources, C = the family's definition of the stressor, and X = the crisis (see Double ABC-X Family Stress Model).

CBFT

Richard Stuart Constructivist Models (Post-Modernism) Primary Reinforcer, Secondary Reinforcer, Premack Principle (high-probability bx serves as positive reinforcer for low-probability bx), Target Bx, Baseline, Functional Analysis of Bx

Structural Family Therapy Contributor

Salvador Minuchin Classical (Cybernetics & General Systems Theory)

Levelers (congruence)

Satir considered l... to be those demonstrating functional and effective communication styles. They can be open and honest in their communication and display genuine receptiveness as they listen to others. They are able to acknowledge the self, the other, and the context throughout communicative interactions (Satir's Communications Approach)

Dysfunctional Communication Styles (Survival Stances)

Satir identified four primary dysfunctional communication styles within families: Placaters, Blamers, Computers and Distractors. Levelers referred to the functional communication style (Satir's Communications Approach)

Role of Therapist

Satir viewed the ... to be one of an equal; a unique individual serving to facilitate change through genuineness, empathy, curiosity, and transparency (Satir's Communications Approach)

Body, Mind, and Feelings

Satir's belief that the ... interact and influence communication processes at both the verbal and nonverbal level (Satir's Communications Approach)

Closed Systems

Self-contained system with impermeable boundaries, are more isolated and resistant to interactions with the environment thereby increasing its dysfunction (Cybernetics)

Spontaneous Behavioral Sequences

Similar to enactments, except these behaviors are spontaneous as opposed to being directed by the therapist (Structural Family Therapy)

Solution Focused Terms

Solution and Future Focus, Strengths and Resources, Beginner's Mind, Change is Constant, Language and Meaning, Hope, Commitment to Change (Visitor, Complainant, Customer)

Change is Constant

Solution-Focused Therapies view that change is..., that the client's situation is always in flux although these changes often go overlooked (Solution-Focused Therapy)

Scaling Questions

Solution-Focused Therapists will often put questions in the form of a 10-point scale to measure progress. Emphasis is always drawn to the positivity associated with the number not being lower than it could be. For instance, if the client rates his depression as a 3, the therapist will celebrate that the depression is not at a 2 (Solution-Focused Therapy)

Compliments

Solution-Focused therapists will intentionally and consistently ... and reflect upon client's efforts, strengths, and improvements throughout the entire discourse of therapy (Solution-Focused Therapy)

Proxemics

Spatial relations between those in dialogue (Communications Theory)

Solution Focused Contributors

Steven de Shazer, Insoo Kim Berg Constructivist Models (Post-Modernism)

Intervening

Structural Family Therapists are continually stepping in and out of the family, raising intensity, and unbalancing the system through swift and strategic interventions (Structural Family Therapy)

Structural Family Therapy Terms

Subsystems, Boundaries (Rigid, Diffuse, Clear), Disengaged Systems, Enmeshed Systems, Complementarity, Hierarchy, Intervening, Conflict Mgmt, Coalitions

Discontinuous Change

Sudden, unanticipated change in family organization usually brought on by a crisis (may be therapeutically induced), which causes a change in perception, beliefs, or perspective. The opposite of continuous change which is gradual, evolutionary, or developmental.

Time

Suggesting that a family's historic perception of a problem influences their current perspective on the problem, affecting their view of the past and present behavior. For example, if I perceive my mother as cold, I will only recall times in the past where my mother was cold and ignore current instances of my mother demonstrating warmth or compassion (Milan Systemic)

EFT Contributors

Susan Johnson with Les Greenberg Experiential, Post-Modern

Redefining Symptoms

Symbolic-Experiential Therapists will often r... s... from pathological to efforts toward growth (Symbolic-Experiential)

Person of the Therapist

Symbolic-Experiential Therapy attributes the psychological health and authenticity of the therapist as a person being a primary factor in effective therapeutic outcomes. The therapist is encouraged to be authentic and real with his or her clients, relying on the spontaneity of their emotional responses as they remain present with the family (Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Therapy of the Absurd

Symbolic-Experiential Therapy may be referred to as absurd given its unrecognizable structure, spontaneous process, and therapist transparency (Symbolic -Experiential Therapy)

Levels of Intervention

Targeting interventions at a specific family subsystem, such as the children or parents.

Avoider

Tends to distract other from potential conflict by acting helpless, weak, and lacking an understanding (Satir)

FACES

The Family Adaptability and Cohesion Evaluation Scale, is the report coming out of the Circumflex Model that identifies a family's level of cohesion and flexibility (Olson et al, Assessment in Family Therapy)

Positive Connotation

The Hallmark of the early Milan Systemic School. Illuminates upon circularity by assigning a positive motive or value to each family member's behavior—whether it be a desirable or undesirable behavior (Milan Systemic)

Functional

The ability of a system or subsystem to achieve its goals

Quantitative Analysis

The analysis of the numeric quantity of elements in an interaction.

Rubber-Fence

The boundaries around some families that are seemingly yielding, but are in fact nearly impermeable to information from outside systems. In these families, rules are in constant flux (Lyman Wynne)

Temporal Sequencing

The chronological order in which family behaviors occur.

Nonsummativity

The concept that specifies that you cannot combine individual elements of a system to recreate its essential character. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

Constitutionalist Self

The concept that the self is fluid, constantly constructed and deconstructed through interaction with others and the environment (Narrative Family Therapy)

Solution and Future Focus

The concept that the therapist does not need to understand the problem in order to resolve it as the solution is often unrelated to the problem. Maintaining a future focus of what works is what will bring relief to the individual/family (Solution-Focused Therapy)

Role-Function Discrepancy

The concept use to identify relationships comprised of inappropriate roles (Satir's Communications Approach)

Digital Message

The content of the message (objective) (Milan Systemic)

Hierarchy

The control and decision-making structure of a family, which may be based on age, gender, roles, or education. The structure of the family as determined by the system's rules, boundaries, and interactional patterns. Disordered h.... result in dysfunction (Structural Family Therapy)

Expressed Emotion (EE)

The degree of emotion expressed by family members. It has been observed that families with a schizophrenic member tend to have a high degree of intense and negative emotional interactions.

Self-Worth

The degree to which an individual feels as if their existence has value, influenced both internally and interrelatedly. Satir believed that developing an individual's s... should always be a primary goal of growth-oriented therapy (Satir's Communications Approach)

Double ABC-X Family Stress Model

The extension of Hill's early work on stress by McCubbin and Patterson which considers the cumulative effect of stress on families rather than the impact of a single stressor (see ABC-X Family Crisis Model).

Family of Origin

The family into which the person is born or adopted, used most extensively by transgenerational models.

Conflict Management

The family's capacity to resolve conflict and negotiate effective and balanced solutions (Structural Family Therapy)

Positive Feedback Loop

The flow of information back into the system that works to amplify deviations which increases instability and facilitates change toward meeting new goals. Positive feedback is not homeostatic.

Syntax

The form of a message

Exoneration

The goal of tx in which the therapist 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 bx can be seen in a human context, the hold of the past is loosened. The process in which an individual restores balance within his or her ledger (Contextual Family Therapy)

Attachment

The individual's basic need for trust and security, significantly influenced and developed throughout infancy and early childhood per the child's reaction to his or her primary caregiver. In early childhood... influences relationship styles throughout adulthood (Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy)

Narrative Solutions Approach

The integrated approach of Eron and Lund in which the therapists use MRI reframing techniques, narrative therapy techniques, and elements of solution-focused therapy. The therapist believes that people have a preference for how they would like to view themselves and others, which they call the preferred view. They ask clients questions about their preferred view and about their vision of a future without the problem. Therapists ask mystery questions, such as "How did a person who is so hard-working wind up feeling listless and depressed?"

Structure

The interrelationship among system elements that make up the organization of the system. In first-order change, structures can be affected without altering the organization of the system; whereas, in second-order change the organization's rules and structure are changed

Punctuation (different than Structural)

The manner in which individuals attribute their behaviors as a result of another's behavior. For example, I only nag you cause you never offer to help (Milan Systemic)

Ledger

The manner in which individuals within a family keep track of and balance debts and entitlements (Contextual Family Therapy)

Preference Questions

The manner in which the therapist checks in with the client to ensure that the discourse of therapy is congruent with the client's actual desires and hopes (Narrative)

Subjugated Story

The more positive, authentic, and congruent attributes of an individual that are vulnerable to suppression through a problem saturated or dominant cultural discourse. The subjugated story typically entails times in which the problem did not have power over the individual, or times that the individual was able to take control of the problem (Narrative Family Therapy)

Revolving Slate (of Injustice)

The multigenerational transmission of destructive entitlement in which one generation harms the next generation despite the fact that there was no wrong doing (Contextual)

Equipotentiality

The notion that different end states can occur from the same initial conditions. Similar events (e.g. natural disaster) can turn into depression or trauma as well as growth or happiness (Cybernetics)

Projective Hypothesis

The notion that the information people reveal varies according to the circumstance. For example, the process of constructing a genogram tends to encourage subjective responses that distort the information that is revealed. Therapists should pay attention not only to the information received from the client family, but also to their projections and distortions.

Vulnerability Stress Model (Diathesis Stress Model)

The notion that while some people have a predisposition or inherited vulnerability to a mental illness, the actual manifestation of the illness is determined by life events, particularly stressful events in the family

Marital Schism

The parents are overly focused on him/herself, undermines the other, and makes frequent threats of divorce, which harms the marriage, the individuals and the children. (Theodore Lidz)

Planning

The period of assessment in Structural Family Therapy when the therapist hypothesizes about the structure of the family while remaining curious about its actual structure (Structural)

The Dirty Middle

The phrase used to describe when therapy reaches an impasse, when couples have gained some insight about the nature of the problems and the irrationality of their demands on one another, but they still have differences as to what each want from one another and from the marriage. Framo uses as leverage to gain the client's willingness to bring in his or her family of origin (Framo, Object-Relations Theory)

Deconstruction

The postmodern process of constructing new meanings by examining implicit assumptions.

Acculturation

The process by which immigrant group members adjust to the culture of their new country

Model Integration Analysis

The process in which a developing child begins to make sense of his parents' differences, internalizing various perceptions of their behavior toward one another which will ultimately serve as a road map for his or her relational behaviors towards others (Satir's Communications Approach)

Insight

The process of raising unconscious forces to awareness, allowing clients to better understand how underlying dynamics impact their behavior and relationships (Object-Relations Theory)

Grief

The range of emotions following a loss, which are part of the process of integrating the loss

Recursiveness

The refers to reciprocal or circular causality. Rather than viewing an element in a vacuum devoid of interactions between its environment and its own system's levels or subsystems, r... speaks to the mutual interaction and influence that occurs between people, events, and their ecosystem (Cybernetics)

Family Life Cycle

The series of sequential developmental periods that occur over the course of a family's lifespan, each with transition points and specific tasks that need to be negotiated for healthy development; marriage, child rearing, launching of adolescents, aging, and death. Normal functioning requires adapting to the changes of each stage. Families are vulnerable to developing problems during transitions.

Culture

The set of shared beliefs, behaviors, values, customs, meanings, symbols, and the like, transferred from one generation to the next and from the social groups to which the person belongs

Triangle

The smallest stable unit in a family per Bowen

General Systems Theory

The study of how living systems organize, maintain, and regulate themselves, emphasizing the unity and interrelated hierarchical structure of the parts. Adapted from the biological, physical, and communication sciences, primarily through the work of von Bertalanffy.

Cybernetics

The study of how systems are controlled by information and feedback loops and the means by which they work

Semantics

The study of the way language conveys meaning

Epistemology

The study or theory of the nature, sources, and limits of knowledge. Used to describe how and what family members come to believe. The manner in which individuals (families) make sense of the world, including their relationships to and with others (Milan Systemic)

Presenting Symptom as Metaphor

The symptom was redefined as a metaphor of a larger problem. For example, a child wetting his bed was a metaphor for keeping focus on him so his father can maintain his addiction to marijuana (Strategic)

Homeostasis

The tendency of a system to strive for balance in order to achieve stability and limit the range of behavioral variability, resist change and maintain dynamic equilibrium or a steady state. Maintained by negative feedback and input loops (Cybernetics)

Transference

The tendency of individuals to attribute qualities to other individuals—partners, family members, or the therapist—that reflect unresolved grievances from a previous relationship (Object Relations Theory)

Societal Emotional Process

The term refers tot he impact of social influence on family functioning. Individuals (families) with higher levels of self-differentiation are less vulnerable to destructive societal influences, such as sexism and discrimination (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

Familial Boundary

The term used to represent the concept of Boundary Interface mentioned above within the literature of family therapies (Cybernetics)

Structural Family Therapy

The theory and therapeutic model developed by Minuchin, which focuses on family organization and boundaries and the ways in which these structures govern interactional patterns. Dysfunction, in this model, stems from boundaries that are either too rigid or too diffuse, both of which prevent the system and its subsystems from achieving goals.

Object Relations Theory

The theory that people are motivated by a basic need for human connection rather than basic sexual and aggressive drives, and that repeated parent-child interactions, particularly unsatisfying ones, are internalized in the form of objects (see introjects). In development, infants experience and internalize others in a variety of ways (see rejecting object; antilibidinal ego; exciting object; libidinal ego; libidinal system; antilibidinal system; central ego; ideal object; rejecting ego; exciting ego).

Humanistic

The therapeutic stance that emphasizes the uniqueness of individuals and promotes their potential for growth.

Mapping the Relative Influence

The therapeutic technique of asking about the effect of the problem on relationships and the effect of the relationships on the problem. As family members identify their influence on the problem a second, alternative description of the problem is generated. This alternative description, in turn, is a source for new responses (Narrative Family Therapy)

Ecosystemic Approach

The therapeutic view that it is important to attend to the family's relationship to the larger systems - community, school, and work.

Circular Questioning

The therapist asks one family member to comment on the interactions of two other family members to create circularity within the system and help the therapist build a more elaborate hypothesis. Based on Bateson's idea that people learn by perceiving differences (Milan Systemic)

Intensity

The therapist can achieve i... by increasing the affective component of an interaction, by increasing the length of a dialogue or by repeating the same message in different interactions through the use of tone, volume, and pacing (Structural Family Therapy)

Directives

The therapist gives a task with the intent of changing stuck sequences. Two types: straightforward and indirect. Straightforward directives are not paradoxical, and the therapist expects the family to carry out the task as given. Indirect directives are paradoxical and the therapist expects the family to resist the task. The process of negotiating relationships and bx is more important than whether they are carried out. (Haley and Madanes, Strategic Family Therapy)

Interpretation

The therapist's hypotheses pertaining to the influence of a client's past experiences on their current behaviors and struggles, the purpose is insight and "working through" (Object-Relations Theory)

Affective Confrontation

The therapist's intentional confrontation with the family where he or she will directly and openly share his or her subjective emotional experience of working with the family (Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Punctuation (different than Milan)

The therapist's intentional emphasizing of an individual's reaction (body language) or statement, allowing them to become aware of their responses and reflect upon their meanings (Structural)

Therapist Stance

The therapist's position (engagement style) in relation to both the family system and therapist's theoretical foundation, for example an engaged style in which the therapist tends to disclose personal experiences or disengaged in which the therapist remains emotionally distant.

Self of the Therapist

The therapist's self-knowledge regarding his/her values, beliefs, biases, strengths, and weaknesses. Also refers to the ways in which therapists make use of their personal experiences during therapy and the nature of the emotional bond offered to clients.

Neutrality and Irreverence and Curiosity

The therapist's stance of being open to multiple hypotheses regarding the family's behavior, the therapist is indifferent to tx outcome, recognizing that their role is simply to have an impact on the system (Milan Systemic)

Countertransference

The therapist's tendency to attribute qualities that reflect unresolved grievances from a previous relationship onto a client (Object-Relations Theory)

Existential Encounter

The therapist's willingness to both receive the family's reactions to him or her as well as disclose his or her own reactions toward the family (Whitaker, Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Primary Survival Triad

The triad consists of the child and both parents. These dynamics serve as the primary source of the infant's social interaction and only opportunity for a gratifying relationship—as so, it sets the stage for the developed internal sense of being within oneself and in relation to others. For example, a child will internalize how a woman treats a man based upon her perceptions of how her father treated her mother, and vice-versa with her mother towards her dad (Satir)

Individuality and Togetherness

The two counterbalancing life forces that drive human relationships. Bowen believed that each individual needs companionship and independence, and that anxiety is experienced when these two needs polarize the individual. Balance is achieved in relation to the extent that the individual has learned to mange emotionality—that is, the individual's level of self-differentiation (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

Equitable Asymmetry

The unequal, but healthy, degree of care and consideration given by parents toward children. Refers to the concept that children are not able to care for themselves and are entirely dependent upon their parents—making them both incredibly vulnerable or delightfully entitled based upon the circumstances of their upbringing (Contextual Family Therapy)

Solution-Focused Family Therapy

Theory and therapeutic model in the tradition of brief therapy, developed by Berg and de Shazer, which focuses on finding solutions rather than understanding the problem. The model evolved from the MRI group's focus on problems and from the postmodern interest in the construction of reality. Clients are encouraged increase behaviors that work well and notice situations in which the problem does not occur.

Cognitive Behavior Family Therapy (CBT)

Therapies based on both behavioral techniques, which grew out of scientific, laboratory experiments, and on the cognitive therapy models. People learn to modify behaviors both by altering the reinforcement contingencies and/or changing the cognitions that influence their behaviors and interactions.

Cultural Consciousness (Cultural Sensitivity)

Therapists' sensitivity to the existence and impact of the family's cultural rules and values. Such awareness enables easier engagement, reduces misunderstanding and misinterpretation of family members' behavior, and facilitates the development of trust. Therapists should be aware of their biases regarding the cultural background of others and their own.

Conjoint

Therapy that involves two or more family members, introduced by MRI psychiatrist, Jackson in 1959 to describe marital therapy in which the spouses were seen together

Structures

These are aspects of a system that are universal across systems, in that all systems have a structure to them. Structures can be adapted, changed, and influenced by a variety of events as well as intentionally through therapeutic intervention. Although all systems will have structure, there is no one universal structure or set measure of the objective quality of structure. Structure is defined subjectively by the observer (Cybernetics).

Feedback Loops

These are at the core of the cybernetics model. They are the self-correcting mechanisms which serve to govern families' attempts to adjust or vary from customary patterns and maintain its original sameness (homeostasis) (Cybernetics)

Boundaries (Cybernetics)

These are theoretical lines of demarcation in a family that define a system as an entity and separate the subsystems from one another and the system from its environment (Cybernetics)

Unique Outcomes (Sparkling Events)

These are types of questions aimed at exploring times when the problem did not have control over the individual's or family's life (Narrative Family Therapy)

Genogram (Guerin)/ Family Diagrams (Bowen)

These gather a rich family history through the creation of a diagram resembling a family tree with various symbols used to identify gender and the degree of conflict, fusion, emotional cutoff, or health between individuals. It identifies the multigenerational transmission process and triangles, among many other dynamics (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

Amplifying or Positive Feedback Loops

These increase change in a family's homeostasis (morphogenesis). They attempt to change these systems from its steady state to a new steady state or balance (Cybernetics)

Process Questions

These questions aim to slow individuals down, thereby decreasing emotionality and increasing rationality as the individual becomes more aware of how stress and anxiety influence behavior (Bowen)

Deconstruction Questions

These questions help individuals to unravel their stories and see them from different perspectives, creating an opportunity for them to decide whether or not they choose to continue identifying with it (Narrative Family Therapy)

Attenuating or Negative Feedback Loops

These reduce change in an existing homeostasis (Cybernetics)

Secondary Emotions

These referred to the surface level emotions designed to protect the primary emotions and reflect more upon the interaction than the individual. They are usually reactive in nature and resemble defensiveness, frustration and anger (Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy)

Primary Emotions

These referred to underlying emotions that drove relational behavior, but were hardly acknowledged or talked about directly. They were the more fundamental emotional experiences such as powerlessness, fear, loneliness, etc (EFT)

Relationship Experiments

These were used to help clients become aware of systemic processes within their relationship though understanding how their behaviors impact others. These were directive in nature and instructed clients to experiment with different ways of behaving and responding to one another (Bowen)

Shaping Competence

This changes the direction of interactions. Therapists avoid telling families what they are doing wrong; rather, they point out what they are doing right and express confidence in the family's competence (Structural Family Therapy)

Split Filial Loyalty

This concept arises when a child finds him or herself in a position where they have to choose loyalty toward one parent at the expense of being loyal to the other, child becomes symptomatic as they attempt to bring the parents together (Contextual Family Therapy)

Family Projection Process

This concept identifies that individuals with limited emotional resources are likely to project their needs onto others in the family. For example, a mother who was neglected as a child (too much individuality, not enough togetherness), and as a result, emotionally cut-off from her parents, may become over-involved (too much togetherness, not enough individuality) with her children. Lack of differentiation in parents often results in one of the parents becoming dysfunctional, immature, and fused with one of the children. Conflict in the parental sub-unit is avoided, but the child's emotional growth is sacrificed. In this manner symptoms and a lack of differentiation is transmitted from parents to children (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

Multidirectional Partiality

This concept is similar to neutrality while expounding upon the importance that the therapist remains accountable for everyone whose well being is potentially impacted by a therapeutic intervention. This concept elaborates that every intervention must serve the best interests of everyone involved (Nagy, Contextual Family Therapy)

Differentiation of Self

This concept refers to an individual's capacity to balance thinking with feeling--and thereby, balance individuality with togetherness. Highly differentiated individuals are able to act rationally in the midst of anxiety. Individuals with low levels of differentiation are highly reactive and easily drive to emotionality (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

Beginner's Mind

This concept refers to the therapist's stance in Solution-Focused Therapy. It is important that the therapist maintains an open mind which lends itself to possibilities, while being careful not to exert expertise which limits possibilities (Solution-Focused Therapy)

Filial Loyalty

This concept suggests that children are inherently loyal to their FOO. The care and concern given to children, in turn, results in Filial Responsibility towards parents (Contextual Family Therapy)

Tickling the Defenses

This denoted Ackerman's famous phrase for teasing, provoking, and stimulating members of the family to open up and say what is really on their minds (Nathan Ackerman)

Morphostasis

This describes a system's tendency towards stability and staying the same (Cybernetics)

Narrative Metaphor

This describes the primary tool people use to make sense of their lived experiences—that is, story and narrative as metaphor (Narrative Family Therapy)

Bridge Maneuver

This intervention calls for the manual stimulation of the female in an effort to produce orgasm. This would gradually decrease as treatment progresses as partners begin to fill that role (Sex Therapy)

Squeeze Technique

This intervention is used to work through preejactualtion. Prior to the male reaching orgasm, the partner squeezes the penis to disrupt the orgasmic process (Sex Therapy)

Network Effect

This is a goal of network therapy. It is a euphoric connectedness to others, likened to the energy and feelings of connectedness that can occur at religious revivals, and rock concerts. The result is to bind the group together into a supportive, purposeful, goal-oriented social network.

Isomorphism

This is a phenomenon in which two or more systems or subsystems exhibit similar or parallel structures. For example, a therapist seeing a family that starts showing up late to sessions will similarly begin showing up late to supervision to discuss the case (Cybernetics)

Expanding Distress

This is a process of expanding the symptom to the system, that is, e... t... d... to include each member, shifting the nature of anxiety within the family and reducing blame and scapegoating (Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Metaphor

This is a symbolic representation that captures the basic and essential features of an object or event by using a description of a different category of object or events (Cybernetics)

Deparentification Process

This is a two-part process. (1) The therapist become temporarily parentified to relive the parentified child and then (2) addressed the larger spectrum of family dynamics to work toward systemic change (Contextual Family Therapy)

Sensate Focus

This is an intervention that allows couples to ease into sex and overcome inhibition by becoming more familiar with one's body through a series of touch identifying pleasure responses and connecting mind and body, minimize performance anxiety and spectatoring (Masters & Johnson, Sex Therapy)

Softening

This is displayed when a partner withdraws from defensiveness and/or aggressiveness, and begins to open up to the emotional experience of his or her partner as opposed to remaining exclusively focused on his or her own experience (Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy)

Mapping the Influence of the Person

This process entails exploring the role that the person has had on the life of the problem (Narrative Family Therapy)

Mapping the Influence of the Problem

This process entails exploring the role that the problem has had on the individual's life (Narrative Family Therapy)

Ripple Effect

This refers to how a change that occurs at one level of a system will result in changes across other levels of the system (Cybernetics)

Destructive Entitlement

This results when individuals experience the denial of entitlement from their FOO, and in turn, seek what they believed to be owed to them through a different relationship--typically, their family of creation (Nagy, Contextual Family Therapy)

Parentification

This term is different from parentified child in Structural Family Therapy. Here, it refers to a process where a child attempts to earn love from their parent by acting as their caretaker. The child takes on the role of parent for the parent (Contextual)

Multigenerational Transmission Process

This term refers to the emotional forces in families that continue over the years in interconnected patterns, transmitting down from one generation to the next. Poorly differentiated individuals tend to marry one another and over several generations produce offspring who are increasingly less differentiated and as a result suffer from severe mental dxs including schizophrenia (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

Person to Person Interactions/Relationships

This type of relationship defines two family members that are able to relate to one another openly and freely without the need to triangulate in a third party. Here, individuals tell each other how they are feeling—typically through the use of taking an "I" position—with a sense of wisdom and rationality (Bowen)

Self-Mandala

This was an exercise where individuals would create a circle in the center of a page with the identifier "I am" along with eight other concentric circles labeled in the following order: 1- physical, 2- intellectual, 3- emotional, 4- sensual, 5- interactional, 6- nutritional, 7- contextual, and 8- spiritual. This illuminated upon an individual's strengths, resources, and interrelated nature of experience (Satir's Communications Approach)

Going Home Again

This was an intervention used to encourage adult individual clients to go home and repair any conflicted relationships (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

The "I" Position

This was an intervention used to encourage clients to learn more effective ways of expressing what/how they are feeling through ownership and not blame. For example, a client would be redirected from saying "you're so cold-hearted" to "I wish you would tend to my emotional pain more genuinely". This would break cycles of emotional reactivity and promote "person to person" relationships (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach)

Directed Masturbation Training

To treat anorgasmic women, this technique helps a a woman to touch herself, and then her partner, in various ways to trigger her orgasm. Woman is taught to become more familiar, more comfortable with, and more accepting of her body and sexuality. Encouraged to explore her genitals for tactile quality, then for pleasure; to use erotic materials and fantasy; to use orgasm "triggers;" and, if necessary to use a vibrator. The woman then teaches her partner (partner training) about the kinds of stimulation that she finds pleasurable. She is instructed to use Kegel exercises, which are thought to increase orgasm potential. The couple is instructed to engage in a variety of mutally pleasurable, non-demanding and initially non-genital, sexual experiences (LoPiccolo, Sex Therapy)

Stop-Start Technique

To treat premature ejaculation in men. Preferred source of stimulation would occur until the male reaches premonitory sensations, then stimulation stops. This process is repeated, allowing the male to build a greater tolerance for pleasure as well as better control over his body. Also builds confidence by extending the duration of sexual interaction (Semans, Sex Therapy).

Triangles

Triangles are created when an individual in a relationship pulls in a third party (i.e. another person, a hobby, a substance, etc) to create the illusion of emotional closeness that they are not receiving from the other individual in the relationship. The third party then creates a triangle, decreasing the anxiety between the two individuals by spreading it across a third. The smallest stable emotional unit in a family. (Bowen's Multigenerational Approach).

Strategic Humanism Interventions

Triangulation, Dramatizations, Pretending, Make-Believe Play

The Invariant Prescription

Typically during the third session , the therapist(s) will instruct the mother and father to tell their family that they have a "secret" and to then take a trip together, away from the family, for a few days. They are cautioned not the tell the family anything more than the mere fact that they have a secret prior to leaving, creates clearer generational boundaries (Milan Systemic)

Games

Unacknowledged strategies that result in destructive interactions within families—often, are unspoken and used as attempts to control another's behavior (Milan Systemic)

Coding Schemas

Used in information management and research, these systems establish an organized and consistent approach to identifying and counting clinical phenomena.

Digital Communication

Verbal communication that is perceived and interpreted based on meaning (Communications Theory)

Entitlement

What individuals are inherently due from others in their family as well as what is earned from others based upon behavior towards them (Contextual Family Therapy)

Merit

What is earned through the accumulation of care and concern towards others (Contextual Family Therapy)

Projective Identification

When a child is born, each parent of the couple system projects the remnants of his or her repressed object relationships onto the child. The child then internalizes these projections into becoming significant components of his or her personality development (Object-Relations)

Flight Toward Health

When a family would abruptly stop showing up for treatment, Whitaker would take this as a positive sign that the family experienced sudden and profound growth and no longer requires therapeutic support. Whitaker would always be supportive of a family's request to terminate therapy regardless of the phase of treatment (Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Problem-Saturated Stories

When client construct a story about oneself by emphasizing problematic experiences and ignoring competencies. Individuals and families then function under the influence of such stories. When clients identify with a narrative that emphasizes a metaphoric problem throughout time, thereby influencing their perception of the past as well as their experience of the present and future. These are traditionally externally influenced and repress the subjugated story more congruent with the authentic reality of the individual (Narrative)

The Dirty Game

When parents struggle for control, they triangulate a symptomatic child who then works to defeat the parents (Milan Systemic)

Spectatoring

When sexually active, one focuses all mental attention on his or her own sexual behavior (or, quality of performing that sexual behavior). This can either be a result of performance anxiety or result in experiencing performance anxiety (Sex Therapy)

Coalitions

When two family members join to create a .... against one or several other family members, covert alliance, usually form across generational boundaries (Minuchin, Structural Family Therapy)

Battle for Structure

Whitaker stated that the therapist must first win the... if therapy is to be effective— this entails determining who attends the session, what time sessions are, how frequently sessions occur, and for how long. If the family is not willing to meet these expectations set by the therapist, then they are not prepared to invest in the growth process and change would be unlikely (Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Co-Therapist

Whitaker would always work with a ... , as he believed this allowed him to be more crazy in session as he could rely on his co-therapist to ground him. In Symbolic-Experiential Therapy, the co-therapy team was used as a therapeutic tool (Symbolic-Experiential Therapy)

Nuclear Family Emotional System

the emotional forces in a nuclear family that are expressed through recurrent patterns of individual behavior and interpersonal connectedness, a fused family that is unstable and unable to cope with stress, characterized by conflict and dysfunction which are transmitted across generations (Bowen)

Cognitive (from Steve Treat)

• Automatic thoughts • Attributions • Thought creates feeling • Cognitive rehearsal • Generalizations & Globalizations • Distorted thoughts & qualifying thoughts • "I'm dumb" • "I'm incapable" • "We can never be intimate" • "We're hopeless" • How often do you say that? • Go after cognitive rehearsal (cognitions under the behavior) • Negative rehearsals • How often do you say/rehearse that? • What do you say about yourself? • What are the "I AM..." statements that you make? • What do you say about others? • People use to create distance

Structural (from Steve Treat)

• Boundaries (flexible, rigid, diffuse, structural, emotional) • Parental Hierarchy/subsystems • Search for power & effectiveness • Coalition • Alignments • Infantilization • Parentification • Generational boundaries • "Can't get kid to bed" • "5 y/o sleeps in parents' bed every night" • "We never go on dates anymore" • How do you boundary your relationship? • Fusion/lack of boundaries • How do you boundary your relationship? • Do you spend time as a couple? (talking, vacations, shut doors, turn off phones) • Can you set a boundary before setting consequences? • Is there a bedtime? Where do the kids sleep? • Balance in work/pleasure/children • Do you work together in raising the children?

Bowen (from Steve Treat)

• Differentiation • Enmeshment • Disengaged • Emotionally cut-off • Triangulation • Parentification • Infantilization • Undifferentiated ego-mass • Splitting perspectives of self or parents as lack of integration • "I get really anxious when I see my family on holidays" • "I haven't talked to my parents in 20 years" • Reactivity • Taking sides in family • Want ability to think & break reactivity • Do you argue with your family members? • Can you disagree with family and hold onto your opinions? • What do you think? (want the answer to be a thought and not "I don't know" or a feeling) • Create ability to break reactivity - How reactive are you? • Passion is different than reaction • No right/wrong, no one up/down • Are you having children? How many? Why?

Object Relations (from Steve Treat)

• Introjects • Complexes • Splitting • Projection • Projective identification • Repetition compulsion • Cognitive rehearsal • Listening & interpreting in the complexes • Extremes always/never • Tied to emotion/attributions • "I constantly feel rejected by all of my relationships" • "All of my partners cheat on me - I feel abandoned" • "My mom was always critical" • Go after organized emotion • Always/never extremes • Interrupt the pattern • Express the feeling • Hug someone • Don't play it out again • After you argue is there a place you go? Feeling that dominates? • Is there an organized fashion where this emotion surfaces? • Have you felt this way before? When? Do you know where it comes from? Someone that raised you? • When you feel rejected what do you do? (e.g. shut down or get angry)

Contextual (from Steve Treat)

• Loyalty (invisible) • Legacy • Split loyalty • Divided loyalty • Positive & negative entitlement • Debit/Merit ledger • Multilateral impartiality • Fairness • Justice • "I don't know if college is right for me" • "I feel like I'm failing my parents" • Invisible loyalty structures • Explains why you're doing what you're doing • Understand levels of entitlement & indebtedness • Who in family went to college? Why? • Why are you doing what you're doing? (Job, law school, degree) • Take care of parents: what drives that? Moves you? (FOO) • Why is this your only option?

Strategic (from Steve Treat)

• No insight, all about changing behavior • Counterdependence • Paradox • Embedded truths • Prescribing symptoms • Predicting intimacy dances • Successful w/stuck couples • "Every other therapist has failed" (they are in the game of defeating therapists) • Process of intervention

Contract (from Steve Treat)

• Verbal/nonverbal contracts • Secretive contracts • Beyond awareness contracts • Common entry into therapy • Inability to recontract • Agreements/Roles • Unconscious Agreements • "My wife just got a new job & we're in turmoil" • "My wife is about to retire" • "We're having a baby" • "This isn't what I was expecting" • How does it change the roles? • Who does what? • What was your template? Is it healthy? • Use w/premarital couples • Issues - money, chores, roles, religion, etc. • What are the agreements? Roles? • Unconscious contracts • Healthy couples recontract as needed every six mths. • Have them think through contractual arrangements/issues (above) • Unconscious: can you figure out why you married your spouse? (introjects) • What attracts you and is it healthy? Do they respect you? If not, why are you attracted to that? (FOO)