Question

Describe the three main theoretical perspectives on marriage and family. Which one makes the strongest argument in your view? Support your position with sociological evidence.

Answer 1

Marital and family treatment can be defined as a systematic effort to produce beneficial changes in a marital or family unit by introducing changes into the pattern of family interactions. Its aim is the establishment of more satisfying ways of living for the entire family and for individual family members.A continuum exists between the intrapsychic system, the interactional family system, and the sociocultural system. Different conceptual frameworks are used when dealing with these systems.

The following theoretical perspectives are suggested

1. Bowen Family Systems

2. Strategic Family

3. Structural Family

Bowen Family Systems Therapy

According to Bowen, human relationships are driven by two counter- balancing life forces: individuality and togetherness. We need companionship and independence. What makes life interesting—and frustrating—is the tendency for those needs to polarize us. According to Bowen, we have less autonomy in our emotional lives than we like to think. Most of us are more reactive to one another than we realize. Bowen’s theory describes how the family, as a multigenerational network of relationships, shapes the interplay of individuality and togetherness using five interlocking concepts (Bowen, 1966, 1976): differentiation of self, triangles, multigenerational emotional processes, emotional cutoff, and societal emotional process.

The cornerstone of Bowen’s theory is both an intrapsychic and an interpersonal concept. Roughly analogous to ego strength, differentiation of self is the capacity to think and reflect, to not respond automatically to emotional pressures (Kerr & Bowen, 1988). It is the ability to be flexible and act wisely, even in the face of anxiety. Undifferentiated people are easily moved to emotion- ality. Their lives are ruled by reactivity to those around them. A differentiated person is able to balance thinking and feeling: capable of strong emotion and spontaneity but also possessing the self-restraint that comes with the ability to resist the pull of emotionality. In contrast, undifferentiated people tend to react impetuously—with submissively or defiantly—toward others. They find it difficult to maintain their own autonomy, especially around anxious issues. Virtually all relationships are shadowed by third parties—relatives, friends, even memories. What drives triangles is anxiety (Guerin, Fogarty, Fay, & Kautto, 1996). As anxiety increases, people experience a greater need for emotional closeness—or to avoid pressure, a greater need for distance. The more people are driven by anxiety, the less tolerant they are of one another and the more they are polarized by differences. The involvement of a third party decreases anxiety in the twosome by spreading it through three relationships. A group of three isn’t necessarily a triangle. In a healthy threesome, each pair can interact independently; each person has options for his or her behavior; and each can take I-positions without trying to change the other two. In a triangle, on the other hand, each pair’s interaction is tied to the behavior of the third person; each person is driven by reactive behavior; none of them can take a position without feeling the need to change the other two; and each person is entangled in the relationship between the other two. Triangulation lets off steam but freezes conflict in place. It isn’t that complaining or seeking solace is wrong, but rather that triangles become chronic diversions that undermine relationships. Bowen originally used the term undifferentiated family ego mass to describe an excess of emotional reactivity, or fusion in families. Lack of differentiation in a family produces reactive children, which may be manifest as emotional overinvolvement or emotional cutoff from the parents, which in turn leads to fusion in new relationships—because people with limited emotional resources tend to project all their needs onto each other. Because this new fusion is unstable, it is likely to produce one or more of the following: (1) emotional distance; (2) physical or emotional dysfunction in one partner; (3) overt conflict; or (4) projection of discord onto children. The intensity of these problems is related to the degree of undifferentiation, extent of emotional cutoff from families of origin, and level of stress in the system. In every generation the child most involved in the family’s fusion moves toward a lower level of differentiation (and chronic anxiety), while the least involved child moves toward a higher level of differentiation (and less anxiety). Emotional cutoff describes how some people manage anxiety in relationships. The greater the emotional fusion between parents and children, the greater the likelihood of cutoff. Some people seek distance by moving away; others do so emotionally by avoiding intimacy or insulating themselves with the presence of third parties. Bowen anticipated the contemporary concern about social influence on how families function. Kerr and Bowen (1988) cite the example of the high crime rate in communities with highly stressful environments. Bowen recognized sexism and class and ethnic prejudice as examples of toxic social emotional processes, but he believed that families with higher levels of differentiation were better able to resist these destructive social influences.

Optimal development is thought to take place when family members are differentiated, anxiety is low, and partners are in good emotional contact with their own families. Most people leave home in the midst of transforming relationships with their parents from an adolescent to an adult basis. Thus the transformation is usually incomplete, and most of us, even as adults, continue to react with adolescent oversensitivity to our parents—or anyone else who pushes the same buttons.

What makes Bowen’s theory so useful is that it describes the emotional forces that regulate how we relate to other people. The single greatest impediment to understanding one another is our tendency to become emotionally reactive. Like all things about relationships, emotionality is a two-way street: Some people express themselves with such emotionalism that others react to that pressure rather than hearing what the person is trying to say. Bowenian theory describes this reactivity, traces its origins to the lack of differentiation of self, and explains how to contain emotionalism and move toward self-control—by cultivating relationships widely in the family and learning to listen without becoming defensive or untrue to one’s own beliefs.

Research has supported Bowen’s notion that differentiation is related to trait anxiety (negatively) (Griffin & Apostal, 1993; Haber, 1993; Peleg-Popko, 2002; Skowron & Friedlander, 1998), psychological and physical health problems (negatively) (Bartle-Haring & Probst, 2004; Bohlander, 1995; Davis & Jones, 1992; Elieson & Rubin, 2001; Haber, 1993; Skowron & Friedlander, 1998), and marital satisfaction (positively) (Haber, 1984; Richards, 1989; Skowron, 2000; Skowron & Friedlander, 1998). Several studies have shown a significant relationship between triangulation and marital distress (Gehring & Marti, 1993; Peleg, 2008; Vuchinich, Emery, & Cassidy, 1988; Wood, Watkins, Boyle, Nogueira, Zimand, & Carroll, 1989) as well as problems in intimate relationships (Protinsky & Gilkey, 1996; West, Zarski, & Harvill, 1986). Finally, consistent with Bowen’s belief in the multigenerational transmission process, researchers have found that parents’ and children’s beliefs are highly correlated (e.g., Troll & Bengston, 1979) and that violence (e.g., Alexander, Moore, & Alexander, 1991), divorce (e.g., Amato, 1996), marital quality, (e.g., Feng, Giarrusso, Bengston, & Frye, 1999), eating disorders (e.g., Whitehouse & Harris, 1998), depression (Whitbeck et al., 1992), and alcoholism (e.g., Sher, Gershuny, Peterson, & Raskin, 1997) are transmitted from one generation to the next.

Strategic Family Therapy

Strategic therapy grew out of the communications theory developed in Bateson’s schizophrenia project, which evolved into three distinct models: MRI’s brief therapy, Haley and Madanes’s strategic therapy, and the Milan systemic model. Strategic therapists made the concept of the positive-feedback loop the centerpiece of their model. According to general systems theory, families, like all living systems, depend on two vital processes (Maruyama, 1968). First, they maintain integrity in the face of environmental challenges through negative feedback. No living system can survive without a coherent structure. On the other hand, too rigid a structure leaves a system ill-equipped to adapt to changing circumstances. That’s why normal families also have mechanisms of positive feedback. Negative feedback resists disruptions; positive feedback amplifies innovations to accommodate to changed circumstances. Recognizing that the channel for positive feedback is communication makes it possible to state the case more plainly: Healthy families are able to change because they communicate clearly and adapt. In strategic models, there are three explanations of how problems develop. The first is cybernetic: Difficulties are turned into chronic problems by misguided solutions, causing positive-feedback escalations. The second is structural: Problems are the result of incongruous hierarchies. The third is functional: Problems result when people try to protect or control one another covertly, so that their symptoms serve a function for the system. A therapist can either point out problematic sequences or simply block them to achieve therapeutic change. The first strategy relies on insight and depends on a willingness to change. The second does not; it is an attempt to beat families at their own games.

In general, solutions that perpetuate problems fall into one of three categories:

1. The solution is to deny that a problem exists; action is necessary but not taken. For instance, parents do nothing despite evidence that their teenage son is using drugs.

2. The solution is an effort to solve something that isn’t really a problem; action is taken when it shouldn’t be. For example, parents punish a child for masturbating.

3. The solution is an effort to solve a problem within a framework that makes a solution impossible; action is taken but at the wrong level. For instance, a husband buys increasingly expensive gifts for his wife, when what she wants is affection.

To interrupt problem-maintaining sequences, strategic therapists may try to get family members to do something that runs counter to common sense. Such counterintuitive techniques are called paradoxical interventions (Haley, 1973; Watzlawick, Weakland, & Fisch, 1974).

Strategic therapy reached the height of its popularity in the 1980s. It was clever, prescriptive, and expedient—qualities appreciated by therapists who often felt overwhelmed by the emotionality of families in treatment. Several studies of both individual problems (Shoham, Bootzin, Rohrbaugh, & Urry, 1996; Shoham-Salomon, Avner, & Neeman, 1989; Shoham-Salomon & Jancourt, 1985) and couple problems (Goldman & Greenberg, 1992) suggest that strategic interventions are more effective than straightforward affective or skill-oriented interventions when clients are resistant to change. Over the years, the developers of the BSFT have run numerous clinical trials and found that their model is successful in engaging and retaining families in treatment (Robbins, Turner, Alexander, & Perez, 2003, 2008; Szapocznik, Perez-Vidal, Brickman, Foote, Heris, & Kurtines, 1988), decreasing adolescent substance use and associated problem behaviors, as well as improving family functioning (e.g., Robbins et al., 2000; Santisteban et al., 2003).

Structural Family Therapy

Structural family therapy provides a framework that brings order and meaning to transactions among the members. The consistent patterns of family behavior are what allow us to consider that they have structure, although of course only in a functional sense. The emotional boundaries and coalitions that make up a family’s structure are abstractions; nevertheless, the concept of family structure enables therapists to intervene in a systematic and organized way. The discovery that families are organized into subsystems with boundaries regulating the contact family members have with each other turned out to be one of the defining insights of family therapy. Perhaps equally important, though, was the introduction of enactments, in which family members are encouraged to deal directly with each other in sessions, permitting the therapist to observe and modify their interactions. The three constructs that are the essential components of structural family theory are : structure, subsystems, and boundaries. Family structure refers to the way a family is organized into subsystems whose interactions are regulated by boundaries. The structure of the family is where family members sit in relation to one another. Who sits next to whom makes it easier to interact with some people and less so with others. As family transactions are repeated, they foster expectations that establish enduring patterns. Once patterns are established, family members use only a fraction of the full range of behavior available to them. Family structure is reinforced by the expectations that establish rules in a family. Families are differentiated into subsystems—based on generation, gender, and function—which are demarcated by interpersonal boundaries, invisible barriers that regulate contact with others. Subsystems that aren’t adequately protected by boundaries limit the development of relationship skills. Interpersonal boundaries vary from rigid to diffuse . Rigid boundaries are restrictive and permit little contact with outside subsystems, resulting in disengagement. Disengaged subsystems are independent but isolated. On the plus side, this fosters autonomy. On the other hand, disengagement limits affection and support. Disengaged families must come under extreme stress before they mobilize assistance. Enmeshed subsystems offer closeness but at the expense of independence. Too much closeness cripples initiative.

What distinguishes normal families isn’t an absence of problems but a functional structure for dealing with them. All couples must learn to adjust to each other, raise their children, deal with their parents, earn a living, and fit into their communities. The nature of these struggles changes with developmental stages and situational crises. Structural therapists use a few simple symbols to diagram structural problems, and these diagrams suggest what changes may be needed. Structural treatment is designed to alter the organization of the family so that its members can better deal with their own problems. The goal of therapy is structural change; problem solving is a by-product. A therapist produces change by joining the family, probing for areas of flexibility, and then activating dormant structural alternatives. What makes structural family therapy unique is the use of enactments within therapy sessions to reveal structural patterns, and later to change them.

Some of the strongest empirical support for structural family therapy comes from a series of studies with psychosomatic children and young adult drug addicts. Studies demonstrating the effectiveness of therapy with severely ill psychosomatic children are convincing because of the physiological measures employed and dramatic because of the life-threatening nature of the problems (Minuchin, Rosman, and Baker 1978). Structural family therapy has been successful in reducing the likelihood that African American and Latino youth would initiate drug use (Santisteban, Coatsworth, Perez-Vidal, Mitrani, Jean-Gilles, & Szapocznik, 1997), engaging and retaining families in treatment (Robbins, Turner, Alexander, & Perez, 2003; Szapocznik, Perez-Vidal, Brickman, Foote, Hervis, & Kurtines, 1988), decreasing adolescent substance use and associated problem behavior, as well as improving parental and family functioning (e.g., Grief & Dreschler, 1993; Robbins, Alexander, & Turner, 2000; Santisteban et al., 2003). Other studies indicate that structural family therapy is equal in effectiveness to communication training and behavioral management training in reducing negative communication, conflicts, and expressed anger between adolescents diagnosed with attention-deficit-hyperactivity disorder and their parents (Barkley, Guevremont, Anastopoulos, & Fletcher, 1992). Structural family therapy has also been effective for treating adolescent disorders, such as conduct disorders (Chamberlain & Rosicky, 1995; Santisteban et al., 2003; Szapocznik et al., 1989), and anorexia nervosa (Campbell & Patterson, 1995). The structural model directs clinicians to look beyond the content of problems and even beyond the dynamics of interaction to the underlying family organization that supports and constrains those interactions.