1. CHAPTER 12: Structural Family Therapy
Family Therapy: History, Theory, and Practice
6th Edition
Samuel T. Gladding
Developed by Nathaniel N. Ivers, Wake Forest University
© (2015, 2011, 2007) by Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved

2. Overview Why Structural Family Therapy was created Major Theorists
Premises
Techniques
Roles of the Therapist
Processes and Outcomes
Uniqueness

3. Structural Family Therapy
Initially based on the experiences of Salvador Minuchin and his colleagues at the Wiltwyck School
Major thesis: Individual’s symptoms are best understood when examined in the context of family interactional patterns

4. Major Theorists Salvador Minuchin Braulo Montalvo Bernice Rosman
Harry Aponte
Charles Fishman

5. Salvador Minuchin Medical director of the Wiltwyck School
Director of the Philadelphia Child Guidance Clinic
Created the Institute for Family Counseling
Has written several books, including Families and Family Therapy and Mastering Family Therapy: Journeys of Growth and Transformation.

6. Premises of the Theory Every family has a family structure.
The structure is revealed only when the family is in action.
Structure influences families for better or worse.
Emphasizes the family as a whole, as well as interactions between subunits of family members.
Recognizes the potential for coalitions.
Stable coalition
Detouring coalition

7. Premises of the Theory
A person’s symptoms are best understood as rooted in the context of family transaction patterns.
Subsystems, or small units of the system as a whole, exist to carry out various family tasks.
Spousal subsystem
Parental subsystem
Sibling subsystem
Boundaries, the physical and psychological factors that separate people from another and organize them, must be clear for healthy functioning

8. Premises of the Theory
Boundaries, the physical and psychological factors that separate people from another and organize them, must be clear for healthy functioning
Strengths of boundaries represented in structural family mapping systems
Clear Boundaries
Rigid Boundaries
Diffuse Boundaries
Triangulation
Alignments

9. Premises of the Theory
Roles
Rules
Power
Dysfunctional Sets

10. Treatment Techniques Joining Tracking Mimesis
Confirmation of a family member
Accommodation
Reframing
Punctuation
Unbalancing

11. Treatment Techniques Enactment Working with Spontaneous Interaction
Boundary Making
Intensity
Restructuring
Shaping Competence
Diagnosing
Adding Cognitive Constructions
Pragmatic fictions
Paradox

12. Role of the Therapist Observer Active expert (Theater director)
Assumes responsibility for setting up dramatic scenes that show the family in action
Changes roles, based on circumstance

13. Process and Outcome Change occurs gradually yet steadily
Emphasizes action over insight
Families are given homework to do outside of the session
Successful treatment means that the overall structure of the family is altered and reorganized
It enables family members to relate to one another in a more functional and productive manner.

14. Unique Aspects of the Theory
Its versatility
Its emphasis on terminology and ease of application
It helped make family therapy as a whole acceptable to medicine and psychiatry
Its emphasis on symptom removal and reorganization of the family
Its emphasis on pragmatism and problem-solving