SOWK 360 Final

Strategic founders

MRI, Milan, Bateson, Haley

Strategic focus

On current presenting symptoms

Strategic premise

Observe families, change interactions and patterns, not individual members

Strategic interventions

Circular questions, metaphor, directives, paradox, ordeals, pretend techniques

Are strategic interventions brief or extensive?

Brief (8-10 sessions)

Feedback loop cycle

Homeostasis → tension rises (early positive feedback) → symptom (positive feedback) → tension subsides (self-correction)

In strategic, the social worker is a _____

Strategist

Structural premise

every family has a structure

Structural focus

Family interactions

Which theory uses joining?

Structural

Types of circular questions

Behavioral sequences, behavioral difference, comparison and ranking, before and after, hypothetical

Alignment

For or against

Power

Relative influence

Structural: social worker as ______

Director

Bowenian: social worker as _____

Coach

Key aspects of Bowenian

Differentiation vs. fusion, triangulation, emotional cutoffs, family projection, multigenerational patterns

Experiential: social worker as _____

Choreographer

Four communication stances

Placating, blaming, super-reasonable, irrelevant

Four Horsemen

Defensiveness, criticism, stonewalling, contempt

CBT: Social worker as _____

Educator/coach

Process for CBFTs

Assessment → target behaviors and thoughts for change → educate → replace and retrain

Types of cognitive distortions

Mind reading, mislabeling, overgeneralization, magnification/minimization, dichotomous thinking, personalization, selective abstraction, arbitrary inference

Narrative: social worker is _____

Co-author and co-editor

Solution-focused: social worker is _____

Inquisitive encourager

Founder of narrative therapy

Michael White