Stages in the Family Therapy of Adolescents

Abstract

Family therapy is considered from the systems point of view as a process with a series of stages including definitive beginning and end points. The stages are identified as crisis points in family therapy ‐ i.e., moments in the therapy process when the equilibrium of the family is upset and when stress reactions among family members are most likely to be intense. Since times of crisis also provide special opportunities for growth and change, they can be utilized therapeutically provided the therapist is knowledgeable about the kinds of upheavals that a family may experience and the time sequence in which they may occur. Eight such crisis points and their relation to therapeutic intervention are presented. The purpose of this paper is to outline the role of the crisis as therapeutic opportunity in the course of family therapy.

Multiple Family Group Therapy: A Review of the Literature

“…This has been the subject of some interest in the group (4,11,41,76) and family (28,36,63) literature, as well as those describing their experience with MFGT. This has been the subject of some interest in the group (4,11,41,76) and family (28,36,63) literature, as well as those describing their experience with MFGT.…”

“…Like all standing organizations, groups develop over time, evolve internal forms, rules, and structures, and pass from a gathering to a group. This has been the subject of some interest in the group (4,11,41,76) and family (28,36,63) literature, as well as those describing their experience with MFGT. The number of precise developmental stages vary with each author, often depending upon whether he has focused on the group or the family.…”

Beginning Work with Families of Hospitalized Adolescents

“…A number of other issues have contributed to the neglect of work with families in hospital settings (1, 39), not the least of which is the ongoing disagreement between various schools and philosophical constructs about what causes individual dysfunction (37, 38, 42, 47, 52). Boyd (10) observes: “In general, the individual psychotherapy literature tends to speak as if family therapy did not exist, and the family therapy literature speaks as if individual therapy should be abolished and supplanted by family therapy” (p. 99).…”

Multiple impact therapy : evaluation and design for future study

“…Very often the scapegoated member in a family under stress is an adolescent (Counts, 1967;Homer, 1973;Howes, 1976;Langsley, Fairbairn, & DeYoung, 1968;McPherson, Brackelmanns, & Newman, 1974;Parsons, 1972;Patrick & Wander, 1974;Rhodes, 1977;Scherz, 1967 she is especially vulnerable and may be the first family member to be overwhelmed by internal stresses (Counts, 1967). Rhodes (1977) (Scherz, 1967;Vogel & Bell, 1960).…”

“…While some authors highlight the importance of identifying the crisis causing stress as the first step of assessment (Morris, 1968;Morrison & Collier, 1969), most authors focus their attention on the family's way of coping with the crisis, rather than on the event itself (Parad & Caplan, 1960;Mackey, 1968 (Berlin, 1975;Counts, 1967;McPherson et al, 1974;Patrick & Wander, 1974;Rosenberg, 1975;Strickler & Bonnefil, 1974). In addition, it focuses on the degree to which the family has a natural helping network which provides it with support (McGee, 1974;Rueveni, 1976;Speck & Rueveni, 1977 Many authors agree that the best approach to assessing a family's pattern of communication is to observe family members interacting with one another (Haley, 1964;Parad & Caplan, 1960;Watzlawick, 1966), rather than merely questioning them about how they communicate.…”