Essay

Family Systems Theory: Family Therapy
Candidate’s Name
Institution’s Name
Family Therapy
The week’s readings entailed the reading of chapter one, two and three of the Family Therapy (FT) text by Nichols (2017). From this text, chapter one deals with the progression of FT. The author investigates the precursors and initial periods of FT. Nichol (2017) gives two persuasive narratives of personalities and ideas. The first narrative is about founders of FT who changed the view of problems as a role of individuals. The curiosity of these founders made the therapists to formulate new approaches of conceptualizing the problems of family living forming the second narrative of ideas. In the past, therapists opposed the notion of dealing with the patient’s family to protect the client’s privacy. For instance, the Freudians rejected the household to expose the unconscious. However, therapy advancements during the 1950s resulted in a perception that a family is a natural whole. For example, Cullin (2006) explains that Gregory Bateson, Jay Haley, and Don Jackson found out that schizophrenia was meaningful within the framework of pathological family interaction. These research outcomes introduced the FT, and the researchers discovered that the conduct of patients with schizophrenia matches with those of the family and that it is the family that generates schizophrenia. Nichols (2017) also explains that during the initial years, family psychotherapists were vibrant with self-confidence and belief.

Nowadays, following the introduction of managed care as well as other natural psychoanalysis, people are minimally certain. However, even though the present therapists may be less confident, Sexton and Datachi (2014) explains that they are very efficient. Whereas innovative dreams controlled the past FT, the present researchers concentrate on very effectual interventions (Lebow, 2014).
In the second chapter, the author deals with essential techniques of FT. Nichol (2017) explains that in FT, the entire family should be involved; the therapists should create a methodological theory, drive for transformation and recognize when to finish. The therapist must be responsive to ethnicity, sex as well as social categorization. However, he cautions that certain techniques may not be learned in books; individual qualities, for example, genuine care for others, as well as a commitment to change, are vital as well. Nichols (2017) state that these techniques are tools for the therapist; however, the human traits are the things that separate the finest psychotherapists.
Lastly, in the third chapter, Nichol (2017) discusses the essential concepts of FT. Before FT, the individual was regarded as the locus of psychological problems and the target for treatment. It implies that the previous researchers believed that every force that molds a persons’ conduct were within the person and the therapy needed only the patient and the psychotherapist. FT changed all this view to include all the family members in the therapy. Nichols (2017) explains that through cybernetics, families are like closed systems and reactions to any predicament might propagate it. Therefore, therapists should recognize the way family members are reacting to their dilemmas and then make them attempt different things. The author explains that as per the systems concept, it is impracticable to comprehend a person’s conduct without looking at the way the entire family functions. Constructivism concept brought cognition to family psychoanalysts. Interpersonal contacts might control families; however, they are molded by the way family members construe one another’s conduct (Parker, Chang & Thomas, 2016). Further, from this chapter, through social constructionists, families are viewed as open structures and people’s construes are molded by ideas from society’s culture. Thus, these concepts widen people’s concentration past individual to family and the entire society. Further, the author illustrates how therapists may utilize these notions in medical practice. In my opinion, the author aimed at presenting a family as not just a gathering of people. A family has certain features that affect individuals within it and solutions to individual problems may be obtained with consideration to the patient’s family.
References
Cullin, J. (2006). Double Bind: Much More Than Just a Step ‘Toward a Theory of Schizophrenia’. Australian & New Zealand Journal Of Family Therapy, 27(3), 135-142.
Lebow, J. L. (2014, September). Editorial: Whither Family Therapy: Alive and Flowering Amidst the Challenges. Family Process. pp. 365-370.
Nichols, Michael P. (2017). Family Therapy: Concepts and Methods. (11th ed.). Pacific Grove, CA Brooks/Cole.
Parker, E. O., Chang, J., & Thomas, V. (2016). A Content Analysis Of Quantitative Research In Journal Of Marital And Family Therapy: A 10-Year Review. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, 42(1), 3-18. doi:http://dx.doi.org.proxy1.calsouthern.edu/10.1111/jmft.12138
Sexton, T. L., & Datchi, C. (2014). The Development and Evolution of Family Therapy Research: Its Impact on Practice, Current Status, and Future Directions. Family Process, 53(3), 415-433.