Family Therapy Education Research Articles

Marriage and Family Therapy Trainees’ Experiences of Learning and Applying Common Factors in Therapy: A Qualitative Participatory Study With Thematic Analysis

ABSTRACTIn recent marriage and family therapy literature, there has been increased discussion about the role of common factors in marriage and family therapy training, specifically in advocating for a more prominent role (Karam et al., 2014; Sprenkle, Lebow & Davis, 2009). This article describes a study exploring the marriage and family therapy master’s students’ experiences of learning and applying the common factors approach to their clinical practice. The sample consists of four current marriage and family therapy master’s level students in a Commission on Accreditation in Marriage and Family Therapy Education (COAMFTE)-accredited training program. Qualitative data were collected and analyzed using thematic analysis. The themes that emerged from our analysis demonstrate that marriage and family therapy students found the common factors approach to positively inform their clinical training.

MFT Program Policies on Referral of LGBT Clients

The purpose of this exploratory study is to examine program policies that govern whether or not student therapists can refer lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer clients, based on the therapist’s religious beliefs. We conducted a qualitative survey with program directors of Commission on Accreditation for Marriage and Family Therapy Education—accredited marriage and family therapy programs to ask what policies monitor client referrals that are solely based on the therapist’s beliefs toward sexual orientation and gender identity. Implications revolve around finding congruency between the program’s philosophy, policy, expectations for students, and ethics. We provide recommendations for addressing these issues early on in the recruitment process.

Most and Least Meaningful Learning Experiences in Marriage and Family Therapy Education.

Marriage and family therapy educators increasingly emphasize training competencies. What we know less about is what makes family therapy education meaningful to marriage and family therapy (MFT) graduate students and what does not. In this study, through an Internet survey, we explored the most and least meaningful learning experiences of 68 MFT graduate students and recent graduates of Commission on Accreditation for Marriage and Family Therapy Education-accredited programs. We used thematic analysis to identify and illustrate resulting themes, which included the importance of experiential and personal components to learning, the professor-student alliance, tying theory to practice, and the experiences of students with their clients, among others. We discuss the implications of these findings to support family therapy education and offer tentative suggestions for formative discussions both within and across programs. Video Abstract is found in the online version of the article.

Gender in family therapy education: reflections of cis-females

Purpose: Research indicates that family therapy courses in gender studies affect both female and male students to the same degree. How female students experience a gender-focused family therapy class has yet to be explored. This qualitative study focused on self-identified cis-female students' experiences in a ten-week course on gender in family therapy. The purpose of this study was to present female students' critical reflections of taking a clinical training course dedicated to gender studies. Method: Using transcendental phenomenology, we analysed reflections from 86 student-participants regarding how they perceived themselves as gendered and how new information had transformed their thoughts and actions. Thematic analysis from the data was inductive, we read and reread the reflections and then generated several main themes. Results: Participants were challenged to revisit gendered assumptions about significant and insignificant concerns in their development. We organized women's self-reports into four domains: Affect, Identity, Empowerment, and Action. Conclusions: In summary, addressing gender-related topics in the classroom had impacted students intra-personally and interpersonally. As they processed internally, they began to reshape their relationships. Additionally, they planned to become agents of change in therapy room. Practitioner points Therapists recognize how gender-related power differences, gender roles in societal and familial systems, and the ways unequal gender relations affect relationships Therapists address not only the position of women in their cultures but also how their social environment reproduces this positioning within its own ranks Educators ensure that their pedagogies and therapeutic practices constantly reflect gender-aware practices in order to be culturally competent

Supporting Couples, Marriage, and Family Therapy Trainees in Need of Performance Improvement

Couples, marriage, and family therapy (CMFT) educators and supervisors are required to differentiate between typical developmental struggles and more severe competency concerns. This process has the potential to become highly subjective and supervisors may differ in their perceptions of severity of trainee concerns, the need for intervention and/or remediation efforts, types of interventions utilized, and when to discontinue remediation efforts after interventions have failed to be effective. Ethical and competency standards, Council on Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP) guidelines, and American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy (AAMFT) core competencies can be utilized in combination with a collaborative supportive approach to identify and encourage remediation of competency concerns for couples, marriage, and family therapists in training (CMFT-ITs). A composite case study is utilized to illustrate the unique demands of CMFT programs, promote early identification of ineffective trainee behaviors, consider ethical and legal mandates, and provide recommendations for intervention and remediation.

021–Multifamily Group Problem-Solving Intervention for Adherence Challenges in Pediatric Insulin-Dependent Diabetes

Background: Adherence challenges are common among children over 12 years old with type 1 diabetes. Family functioning affects hemoglobin A1c (A1C) and has long been considered an important target of psychosocial interventions to address adherence. Behavioral Family Systems Therapy for Diabetes (BFST-D) is a well-established family-based intervention teaching families communication skills, cognitive restructuring, family therapy and problem solving and has positive effects on family adherence and metabolic control.

Marriage and Family Therapy Trainees' Reports of Explicit Weight Bias.

Discrimination based on an individual's weight has been observed in health care, education, retail, and other public sectors (Puhl & Huer, Obesity, 17, 941, 2007). Such inequity, known as "weight bias," generates negative short-term and long-term consequences for the individuals that experience it (Puhl & Brownell, Weight bias in health care settings, 2007). Past research has shown that healthcare trainees exhibit weight bias (Phelan etal., Obesity, 22, 1201, 2014; Wigton & McGaghie, Journal of General Internal Medicine, 16, 262, 2001), yet little focus is given to weight bias in marriage and family therapy (MFT) education. The purpose of this study was to survey MFT students (N=162) to explore weight bias and how contextual factors associate with weight bias. Participants in MFT programs reported explicit weight bias, with specific contextual factors associating with more bias. Female participants reported more fear of gaining weight, and individuals who identified as overweight had higher rates of explicit weight bias. Contextual differences and implications for training programs are discussed.

Qualitative Study on Cis-Male Students’ Gender Perspectives in the Couple and Family Therapy Classroom

The purpose of this qualitative study was to hear cis-male participants' voices after completing a gender-training course in a Commission on Accreditation for Marriage and Family Therapy Education couple and family therapy program. Participants' narratives included reactions and responses to being shaped by the dominant society, their thoughts about self-transformation, and behaviors associated with this change. Moreover, the authors addressed the implications of gender role conflict on males in couple and family therapy training courses.

A Black and White Model for Teaching Family Therapy: Empowerment by Degree

In this article, I describe and reflect on the rationale, development and teaching of the first university-based post-graduate course in family therapy delivered to Aboriginal child, family and health workers. Alongside my Cultural Consultant, Shaun Coade, and with support from key staff at the Bouverie Centre in Melbourne, I developed and delivered the first four iterations of the La Trobe University Graduate Certificate in Family Therapy to Aboriginal students and a relatively small number of non-Aboriginal students. Since 2008, the course has been successfully completed in six Victorian locations and is currently being delivered at Shepparton and in Cooktown, Queensland. The term, ‘Black and White’ was coined by Shaun and by the Aboriginal family therapy students to describe the delivery of a family therapy curriculum that meets mainstream University requirements while being embedded in Aboriginal culture and Aboriginal wisdom. A largely unanticipated bonus was the realisation that the model of teaching also has important implications for the mainstream teaching of family therapy. After providing a brief summary of enrolment and graduation rates, the article picks up on elements of the teaching and learning that proved to be central to the successful delivery of the course.

Current Status of Marriage and Family Therapy Education in Uzbekistan

Although the practice of marriage and family therapy in the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) has been gaining popularity since the late 1990s, the establishment of formal marriage and family therapy education in Uzbekistan has proceeded much slower than the other regions of the former USSR. The purpose of this study was to ascertain the quality and quantity of marriage and family therapy education in Uzbekistan by studying a sample of current practitioners. This article provides (a) an overview of Uzbekistan’s culture and family dynamics, (b) the status of current psychotherapeutic services provided, and (c) the availability and quality of education in psychotherapy and marriage and family therapy in that country. Implications for curriculum development and training are included.

Relationships, Environment, and the Brain: How Emerging Research is Changing What We Know about the Impact of Families on Human Development

Recent research is providing family therapists with new information about the complex interaction between an individual's biological makeup and his/her social and physical environment. Family and social relationships, particularly during sensitive periods early in life, can affect a child's biological foundation. Additionally, stress during the early years can have a lasting effect on an individual's physical and mental health and contribute to the onset of severe mental illness. Community programs have been developed to intervene early with families who have an at-risk child to prevent or minimize the onset of mental illness including providing partnerships with at-risk mothers of infants to shape attachment relationships. Programs are also developing individual and family interventions to prevent the onset of psychosis. Practicing family therapists can incorporate emerging neuroscience and early intervention research and leverage the growing base of community programs to enhance the effectiveness and sustainability of mental health outcomes for clients. Additionally, family therapy education programs should broaden student training to incorporate the growing body of information about how family relationships affect individual mental health development.

On Learning and Teaching Family Therapy

This paper explores some ideas about the process of learning to be a family therapist. It considers the questions: how does one learn to think like a family therapist? How is family therapy best taught? How is it learned? The author's experiences in learning and teaching are described. It is argued that family therapy differs from other approaches to therapy in some fundamental respects, and that learning to ‘be’ a family therapist is a different kind of task than learning to be a practitioner of other therapeutic approaches. The paper examines some key theoretical constructs, especially the idea of ‘levels’ of thinking, which are seen as central to both the learning and practice of family therapy.

What Brings Me Here? Integrating Evidence-Based and Critical-Reflective Approaches in Social Work Education

This article discusses some of the key debates in the literature about the benefits of practice-based research in the teaching of counselors and family therapists. The author proposes that practice-based research embedded activities places the emphasis back on the “critical” in critical reflection in counselor and family therapy education by evoking reflection on practice. Whilst the two approaches (practice-based research and critical reflection) are often considered as deriving from differing knowledge bases and epistemologies, the author argues that a synthesis between practice-based research and critical reflective paradigms is needed in counselor and family therapy education to bridge the divide between research and practice in day to day practice in a variety of contexts and organizational settings. Two examples are used to illustrate how practice-based research in teaching can inform critical reflection among undergraduate counseling and family therapy students. The implications are discussed with ...

Teaching and Learning Theory For Family Therapy Practice: On The Art and Craft of Balancing

As with all practice knowledges, family therapy theory sits in a complicated relationship to practice. This paper offers a set of reflections exploring challenges of teaching and learning theory for, and about, practice in family therapy. The importance of teaching particular frameworks of practice sits in tension and balance with the importance of the common factors of therapeutic change, and the inseparability of the use of self and the use of particular practice knowledge. Passion and commitment to particular ways of working is held in balance with the need for flexibility and the freedom to think independently. Discipline and focus is balanced with creativity and the room for integration. A number of balancing practices are identified in the art and craft of teaching, and the contextual issue of power and vulnerability in the teaching and learning relationship is acknowledged. Finally, the three ‘Rs’ in teaching and learning family therapy practice theory are drawn out – reflection, the recursiveness of theory and practice, and the reflexivity of self in relation to context and knowledge.

What Does This Mean for Graduate Education in Marriage and Family Therapy? Commentary on “The Divide Between ‘Evidenced–Based’ Approaches and Practitioners of Traditional Theories of Family Therapy”

The Dattilio, Piercy, and Davis article is a welcome addition to the conversation focusing on how to bridge the divide in the MFT field between research and practice. The present commentary challenges us to see the divide as an indictment of our training programs resulting from a lack of focus on MFT research. Suggestions for increasing expectations for students to monitor client progress, get involved in research at all levels, and for doctoral students to expect to be able to conduct independent, fundable research in the MFT field when they leave their programs are offered.

The divide between "evidenced-based" approaches and practitioners of traditional theories of family therapy.

Evidenced-based approaches continue to grow in the field of family therapy. However, practicing family therapists do not always embrace these approaches. In this article, we explore factors contributing to practitioners' concerns with evidence-based treatments and suggest a broader, more clinically palatable view of evidenced-based treatment. We also suggest how family therapy researchers, practitioners, and educators might begin to close the researcher-clinician divide in the best interest of all concerned.

Family Therapy in Norway: Past and Present

This article will describe the development of family therapy in Norway. First, this article will review the main theoretical influences on Norwegian family therapy, followed by a discussion about its international influence in the field. The second section of this article will address psychiatric health care, family counselling, and how systemic thinking and systemic practice have spread to other areas in the fields of health, social work, and pedagogy. Particularly, a special emphasis will be placed on child protection work in Norway. Then, the family therapy union and Norwegian and Scandinavian congresses will be presented. This article will then describe family therapy education and research in Norway. Finally, future developments in the field will be discussed.

Social Privilege and Accountability: Lessons from Family Therapy Educators

This study focuses on the process by which white family therapy scholar activists learn over time to acknowledge and become accountable for their social privilege. Comparing two case studies, the authors analyze the complexities of micro- and macro- systems relative to interconnected social positions of race, class, gender, age, professional role, and sexual orientation. Implications for family therapy education, supervision, and practice are addressed.

The Golden Pig, Reflections As Ancestral Blessings: The Reflecting Process in Teaching Family Therapy

This is an example of a postmodern, dialogical approach to teaching family therapy based on the work of such practitioners as Tom Andersen, Michael White, and Lynn Hoffman, among others. It demonstrates the way in which the reflecting process connects all of the participants in a web of meanings both educational and transformational. This particular consultation, which includes the author, her graduate students, the client, and guest participant Lynn Hoffman, ends with an unexpected ritual of intergenerational appreciation. Privileging the transcript, it is presented as a kind of theatre where the learning is revealed more through the dialogue than through authorial analysis. The experience is embedded in an "ethics of participation" (Hoffman, 1992) where social connectedness and attunement are key.

Speaking of Privilege: Family Therapy Educators’ Journeys toward Awareness and Compassionate Action

This study explores how family therapy educators from privileged social locations understand issues of privilege and the process by which they integrate their personal and professional journeys to create and model equity in family therapy training and professional development. These educators developed awareness about issues of privilege and oppression and owned their privilege. Increased awareness involved personal struggles with guilt and managing internalized voices of prejudice that are constantly reinforced in society. These educators adopted a stance of action and accountability for equity. We hypothesize that the process leading to owning one's privilege involves the ability to be compassionate for others' suffering and one's own limitations.