Was Bowen Correct? The Relationship Between Differentiation and Triangulation

Willis, Kwin; Miller, Richard B.; Yorgason, Jeremy B.; Dyer, Justin S.

doi:10.1007/s10591-020-09557-3

Cited by 8 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 45 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Second, the findings that parents' marital conflicts contributed to adolescents' school refusal coincided with Bowen's triangulation theory ( 31 ). This result suggested that Chinese teenagers' school absenteeism may be triangulated with the marital conflicts of parents ( 34 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 70%

“…This finding coincides with Bowen's systems theory that emotional stress among the parental subsystem is contagious in the family and might be transmitted to the children's subsystem through mechanism of low differentiation. Then, the children may develop emotional and behavioral problems including depression, anxiety and school refusal in response to the parents' unstable emotions ( 31 ). Meanwhile, it is partially consistent with the opinions of attachment theory that the emotional instability of caregivers is correlated with children's uncertainty and insecure attachment experience and related to more psychosomatic complaints among children ( 32 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

What Contributes to the Development and Maintenance of School Refusal in Chinese Adolescents: A Qualitative Study

Liu

Zhao

et al. 2021

Front. Psychiatry

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Objective: Although, there has been a growing number of studies on school refusal in Western cultures, the underlying factors that contribute to school refusal in Chinese adolescents remain unclear. This study aimed to better understand why Chinese adolescents refuse to go to school and to further interpret what they want to express through their school refusal behaviors.Methods: We performed a qualitative study using an interpretative phenomenological analysis. Twenty adolescents with school refusal experiences were recruited from the clinical psychology department of two mental health hospitals in Shanghai, China. They participated in semistructured, face-to-face in-depth interviews. The interviews were transcribed verbatim and analyzed according to the guidelines of interpretative phenomenological analysis.Findings: Five main superordinate themes emerged from data analysis: (a) competition-oriented social environment; (b) family living space dominated by conflicts; (c) personal living space lacking meaningful support; (d) conflict between the pros and cons of being labeled with a psychiatric diagnosis; and (e) reintegration in school life.Conclusions: Our analysis emphasized the complex interacting effects of the social environment, family interpersonal conflicts, personal psychological factors and mental health complaints on the development and maintenance of Chinese adolescents' school refusal. These factors contributed to school refusal at each level and influenced each other's effects on school refusal behaviors. Therefore, interventions for Chinese teenagers with school refusal may need to integrate strategies that inspire reorganization and changes in different ecosystems, such as strategies related to government policy, peer relationships, family systems and individual inner dynamics.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 70%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

What Contributes to the Development and Maintenance of School Refusal in Chinese Adolescents: A Qualitative Study

Liu

Zhao

et al. 2021

Front. Psychiatry

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The enrichment of the existing research literature on the above relationship is its positive effect. It also emphasizes the importance of studying the mental well-being of teenagers raised in similar family environments [ 90 , 91 , 92 ]. Simultaneously, this study emphasizes the safeguarding influence of the self-esteem of these adolescents.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Clinical Symptomatology of Anxiety and Family Function in Adolescents—The Self-Esteem Mediator

Farmakopoulou,

Lekka,

Gkintoni

2024

Children

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Background: Family, the child’s first environment, shapes their psycho-emotional balance. The literature links adolescent anxiety to family relationships, interactions, and dynamics. The self-esteem of adolescents appears to protect their mental health. Goal: This study examines whether family cohesion and adaptability affect adolescent anxiety symptoms. It also examines whether teen self-esteem mediates this relationship. Method: This cross-sectional, descriptive study included 166 Attica youth aged 12–18 from schools and educational units. The adolescents completed Olson’s FACES-III cohesion and adaptability scale, Spielberger’s STAI-C, Rosenberg’s self-esteem scale, and a socio-demographic questionnaire. Results: Family cohesion, but not adaptability, was negatively correlated with state (rho = −0.25, p = 0.001) and trait (rho = −0.46, p < 0.001) anxiety in the adolescents. Teenagers from extreme families with the lowest cohesion and adaptability had higher trait anxiety (x2(2) = 6.91, p = 0.032) than those from moderately balanced/balanced families. Self-esteem mediated the relationship between the family cohesion functioning and adolescent’s state anxiety (p = 0.005) and trait anxiety (p = 0.011). Conclusions: The findings show that family dysfunction negatively impacts adolescent anxiety, as well as their self-esteem, which protects mental balance.

show abstract

“…Bowen shared the observation that higher fusion raises the probability of cutoff (Titelman, 2003). He also noted the tendency of anxiety to lead to triangles, as when parents pull a child into their dispute, though empirical support for this latter proposition is mixed (Willis et al, 2021). It appeared to Bowen that such triangles are unhealthy for all three members.…”

Section: Family Systemic Therapiesmentioning

confidence: 98%

The imprint of systems theory upon psychotherapeutic process.

Sossin

2024

APA Handbook of Psychotherapy: Theory-Driven Practice and Disorder-Driven Practice (Vol. 1).

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Was Bowen Correct? The Relationship Between Differentiation and Triangulation

Cited by 8 publications

References 45 publications

What Contributes to the Development and Maintenance of School Refusal in Chinese Adolescents: A Qualitative Study

What Contributes to the Development and Maintenance of School Refusal in Chinese Adolescents: A Qualitative Study

Clinical Symptomatology of Anxiety and Family Function in Adolescents—The Self-Esteem Mediator

The imprint of systems theory upon psychotherapeutic process.

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About