CONTEXTUAL FAMILY THERAPY:
Assessment and Intervention Procedures
PRACTITIONER'S RESOURCE SERIES

BACKGROUND

FOUR-DIMENSIONAL FRAMEWORK

The Existential Dimension
The Psychological Dimension
The Dimension of Transactions and Power
The Dimension of Fairness in Balancing Give and Take in Relationships
Distinctions Between Fairness and Other Dimensions

BASIC CONCEPTS OF FAIRNESS IN RELATIONSHIPS

The Right to Give

• Joey: A Child's Right to Give to a "Abusive" Mother (Vignette #1)

An Intergenerational Perspective
Loyalty

• Sheila and Robbie: Two Case Illustrations of Split Loyalty

Destructive Parentification
Therapeutic Leverage
Constructive Entitlement
Destructive Entitlement
Reliance on Constructive Versus Destructive Entitlement

GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF CONTEXTUAL ASSESSMENT AND INTERVENTION

How Assessment Issues Blend into Treatment Issues
Multidirected Partiality
Structuring Techniques
Some Practical Issues

• Session Attendance and Participation

• Privacy

• Responses to Emergencies

• Custody Evaluations

CONTEXTUAL ASSESSMENT

Sequence of Steps in Assessment
Assessing Psychological Factors
Assessing Individual and Family History
Assessing Family Transactions

• Paul: A Scapegoated Child

Assessing Fairness Issues
Assessment of Injustice, Destructive Entitlement, and Parentification

• Eunice: A Case of Injustice as the Result of Chronic Illness (Vignette #1)

• Ricky: A Father's Destructive Entitlement Arising from a Serious Medical Condition (Vignette #1)

• Sally: Parentification as the Result of a Parent's Reliance on Destructive Entitlement

• Debbie: Injustice Leading to Reliance on Destructive Entitlement and Parentification (Vignette #2)

• Mr. S: Parentification and Invisible Loyalty

INTERVENTION PROCEDURES

Assessing Fairness Issues Leads Directly to Intervention

• The M Family: Initial Session

Anger and Disruptive Behaviors in Children

• The M Family: Later Sessions

• Roberta: Anger, Depression, and Substance Abuse in Adolescence

Multidirected Partiality Versus Impartiality

• Kerry: Multidirected Partiality and Split Loyalty

• The A Family: Partiality to Divorced Parents

• The B Family: Multidirected Partiality in a Case of Parental Separation

• The C Family: Severe Marital Discord and Split Loyalty

Uncovering Resources
Acknowledgment

• Joseph: Acknowledgement of a Child's Giving to His Parent

• Kevin: Multidirected Partiality and Acknowledgment of a Child's Concern for an Ill Parent

• Bobby: Acknowledgment of Giving Between Siblings

• Albert: Acknowledgment of Caretaking Behavior

• Eunice: Acknowledgment of Unfairness (Vignette #2)

Giving Room

• Jack: Giving Room in a Case of Subtle Parentification

The Funnel: A Model for Timing Interventions
Crediting

• Debbie: Crediting Injustice (Vignette #2)

• Ricky: Multidirected Partiality to a "Neglectful" Parent (Vignette #2)

Lending Weight
Exoneration

• Ms. H: Partiality to a Grandparent

Helping Parents to Provide Their Children Opportunities to Give

SUMMARY

REFERENCES