Person-Centered Family Therapy: Old wine in new bottles.

Ned L. Gaylin

Abstract.   In the half century since its inception Carl Ransom Rogers' seminal exposition of the necessary and sufficient conditions for psychotherapeutic change has confirmed both its reliability and validity despite efforts to condense or augment the conditions. Furthermore, their application beyond the individual therapy hour has enhanced their veracity and proven their effectiveness as determinants for effective change within and between persons. This paper addresses the application of the conditions to the practice of couple and family therapy.

Response to Couples and Families in Distress: Six conditions lived with respect for the unique medium of relationship therapy.

Charles J. O'Leary

Abstract.   Trends in relationship therapy support more client-centered ways of being with couples and families. Since many relationship problems are rooted in lack of contact, incongruence, unwillingness to understand and accept, and inability to perceive intended good will or positive effort, Carl Rogers' (1957) non-coercive, non expert-centered therapeutic conditions are most relevant. I present a 'job description' for relationship therapists on the way Rogers' conditions inform and strengthen this approach to dialogue.

The Therapist's Inner Conversation in Family Therapy Practice: Struggling with the complexities of therapeutic encounters with families.

Peter Rober

Abstract.   Notwithstanding the complexity of family therapy practice, family therapists do not have a lot of concepts at their disposal to talk and reflect about their experiences in practice. Family therapy literature provides some general principles about the therapist's stance (for example neutrality, curiosity, and not-knowing), but these fail to deal with the full complexity of the relational processes within a family therapeutic encounter in practice. The concept of the therapist's inner conversation offers more promise than these general principles and guidelines, as it addresses the mutuality and shared activity of the therapist's self within the complexity of family therapy practice. In this paper the author first outlines a dialogical perspective on family therapy. Then the spotlight is put on the contribution that the notion of the therapist's inner conversation might make in dealing with issues of the person of the therapist in practice, and especially in addressing the complexity of what it means to be a family therapist in practice. In the last part of the paper a case story is presented that illustrates how the concept of the therapist's inner conversation can help practitioners to talk and reflect about some of the experienced, but unnoticed aspects about their self in therapy practice.

The Dynamics of Emotion, Love and Power in an Emotion-focused Approach to Couples Therapy.

Leslie S. Greenberg & Rhonda N. Goldman

Abstract.   In this paper we introduce the reader to our recent developments of an emotion-focused approach to couple therapy. We identify three core motivations that need to be attended to in facilitating conflict resolution in intimate relationships - the need for attachment, the need to have identity validated by the other and attraction to the other. These motives, we suggest, are governed by the feelings they engender, making couple relationships a key means of emotion regulation. We describe different categories of feelings, distinguishing between primary emotions that are directly related to satisfaction of our core motivations and those emotions that are influenced by other factors in our psychological make-up. A five-stage model of an Emotion-focused way of working with couples is outlined. These steps are designed to help partners gain awareness of and constructively express their different emotions. We emphasize that in order to resolve couple conflict it is not only important to develop the capacity to empathize with and soothe the other in a relationship but also to be able to soothe one's own anxieties and sense of shame and to tolerate disappointments.

The Integration of Systems and Humanistic Approaches in Emotionally Focused Therapy for Couples.

Melissa Burgess Moser & Susan Johnson

Abstract: Emotionally focused couples therapy (EFT: Johnson, 1996/2004) is an integrative approach which combines theory and techniques from experiential and client-centered approaches with attachment theory and systems theory. This paper outlines the humanistic foundations of EFT and demonstrates how systems and attachment theory strongly complement the client-centered and experiential underpinnings of this approach. The paper goes on to show how specific aspects of these theories combine to provide a comprehensive framework in which to conceptualize and treat relational distress. Finally, clinical examples of how the combined techniques from these approaches are used in the treatment of distressed relationships is provided.