Systemic Family Therapy

Vocabulary flashcards from lecture notes on systemic family therapy.

Systemic Approach to Therapy

Seeks to understand conflict and psychological problems through the lens of patterns of interaction within larger systems (generally the family system) and not as individual issues within a person.

Maintaining Current Pattern of Behavior

The idea that behaviour is adaptive and maintained by the environmental processes around it

Social Constructivism

Reality is constructed; people's selves (and therefore behaviour emerging from it) are adaptable and malleable, changing, shaped by their contexts.

Complementarity

The idea that family behaviour and roles are interdependent and mutually reinforcing.

Circular Causality

The idea that relationship difficulties are not linear and do not have a starting point or cause, but are circular and impacted by communication and the relationships between individuals.

Circularities

Repetitive patterns of interaction within a family system: action → response → action → response etc.

Homeostasis

The process of maintaining a system goes through once patterns have been established.

Triads

A structural unit involving three individuals

Triangulation

The process in which two people in conflict draw in a third person to reduce anxiety or stabilize their relationship.

Conflict Detouring

The process in which a symptom presented by the third party (eg. bad behaviour) is involved and intensified to maintain the homeostatic dynamic.

Stable Coalition

When one of the parents joins the child across generations against the other partner (this often has the effect of a loss of authority of that parent over the child).

Patterns of Behaviour

Sequences of behaviour between and within people – containing cognitive, emotional and behavioural aspects + patterns in relationships between people, beliefs, events and behaviours.

Process (Communication)

The way (HOW) people communicate within a relationship.

Content (Communication)

What is being said within the communications.

Family Structure

The subsystems (shaped by interactions – which are shaped by specific qualities of the individuals – age, gender, function/role etc.) which are demarcated by interpersonal boundaries which affect the amount and type of contact with others.

Family Life Cycle

The model of change and development – including the common hurdles within the specific stage they are going through - of the family unit as is normative within the Western context.

Beliefs (Family Systems)

The guiding, unspoken principles which dictate and organise how families conceptualise the world and how they should behave.

Punctuation

The beliefs influence behaviour in a way that becomes predictable – forming repetitive patterns.

Genogram

A basic grounding map, used within therapy as an organising tool, of the client and their relationships within their family units.

Constructivism

The theory which states that individuals actively construct their realities through experience and interaction – they are not merely passive observers, but interpreters and builders of their own meaning of what is observed.

Social Constructivism

Meaning is shaped and constructed; however these are also influenced and shaped through personal, social, and cultural contexts. Reality is co-constructed through language, interaction, and shared meaning.

Family Narratives

The constructed narrative/s which the family creates in order to explain and make sense of their experiences; which in turn impacts the interactions individuals within the unit have with each other.

Reframing

Changing the conceptual/emotional setting in relation to how the situation is experienced to fit a better one; thus changing the meaning.

Paradoxical Interventions

Asking the clients to do something which goes against common sense to interrupt problem maintaining behaviours.

Restraining Technique

The therapist discourages the family from changing too quickly, or the therapist expresses worry about the possibility of relapse if improvements occur

Subsystems (Family)

Smaller groups within the larger family system which may have different rules and relationships with each other.

Boundaries (Family)

Defines participants and their actions.

Joining

The therapist joins the system; showing understanding and acceptance to make sure the family accepts them and the interventions before they unbalance the system.

Formulation/Conceptualisation

The working model the therapist creates based on their experience with the family.

Enactments

A therapeutic technique whereby the therapist encourages the family to act out real interactions during the session in order to assess and alter maladaptive behaviours.

Positive Connotation

Symptoms are given a positive explanation for whatever is being exhibited; this is told to the family during the intervention with the injunction that it should remain the same.

Rituals (Family Therapy)

Exaggerated, deliberate, time-bound (often odd-and-even day format) actions which either contradicted/ran contrary to family rituals, exaggerated rigid familial rules, dramatically positive connotations, broke down rigid stances.

Circular Questioning

Questions which activate a feedback loop; designed to get the family to reflect about their own dynamics and internal processes.

Triadic Questioning

Another person is asked about the other two individuals to explore different perspectives.

Invariant Prescription

To strengthen family ties and hierarchies, parental system is asked to go out and not tell anyone where/what they did; which strengthens the ties between partners.

Second-Order Cybernetics

Acknowledges the role of the observer (the therapist) in the description of the system.

Reflecting Teams

Team from behind the glass emerges and discusses in front of the family.

Solution-Focused Therapy Interventions

Therapeutic interventions are focused on finding exceptions to the rule.

Miracle Question

Clients imagine their ideal scenario – useful for envisaging treatment goals.

Scaling Questions

Placing client position within a scale (1-100).

First Session Formula Task

Client is told to focus on something positive that happens within the family they want to keep occurring.

Alternative Story

The story which does not align with the dominant paradigm but still explains and has meaning; indicates a possibility for change.

Problem Saturated Story

A dominant story saturated with issues which prevents the family/individual from finding new meaning through alternative stories.

Externalization

The objectification of the problem in order to separate it from the person.

Searching For Unique Outcomes

Looking for times when the norm was not the case and the situation surrounding it + what it means

Mapping of Influence

Uncovering the impact of beliefs on the lives of individuals

Unique Outcomes

Times when the problem was not present – which lies contrary to the dominant story

Outsider-Witness Group

A third person/audience (could be a stranger or someone the person knows – although generally it is either someone familiar, a trained professional or people who have gone through the same struggles) is invited to listen to and acknowledge the constructed narratives