Bowenian Theory of Family Counseling - Research Paper Example

?Running Head: Bowenian Theory of Family Counseling Bowenian Theory of Family Counseling [Institute’s Bowenian Theory of FamilyCounseling Introduction Dr. Murray Bowen was a medical doctor from a large family in Tennessee. After receiving his degree of MD from Medical School of the University of Tennessee Medical School in Memphis, Bowen was all set to start his career as a surgeon (Gladding, 2002). In fact, he even engaged in a couple of internships followed by a five-year active duty in United States military during the Second World War. It was during these five years that Bowen realized that mental illness was a more pressing and important issue then physical illness after seeing soldiers facing immense mental stress leading to various psychological problems. Therefore, he decided to shift his focus from surgery to psychiatry (Skyttner, 2005). After spending great deal of time on studying parent-child and parent-parent relationship in form of dryads, he moved on to focus his attention on triads or three way relationships, for example, parent-parent-child or parent-child-child and so on (Papero, 1990). It was during a conference organized by one of his students from Georgetown University, where Bowen gave his services as a teacher of psychiatry, that Bowen presented a case study of his own family in front of the world and in light of the same, explained his own theory of family therapy or counseling. Despite the fact that his theory has been not able to gain widespread attention in New Zealand and Australia, Bowenian theory has remained the center of family therapy and counseling theories in Europe and America (Becvar & Becvar, 2006; Patterson & Edwards, 2009). This paper is an attempt to take briefly a glance at the Bowenian approach of family therapy, its dynamics, variables, tools, approaches and others. Lastly, the paper would very briefly compare and contrast with other theories and approaches. Discussion Bowenian theory is one of those theories of human behavior, which sees family as an emotional unit, tied with emotional connections and interdependent on each other. Even if the family members “feel” sometimes that, their connection is getting weak and they are distant from each other, that is indeed more of a “feeling”. Consciously or subconsciously, members of a family have profound effect on each other (Gehart, 2009; Papero, 1990). Bowen believed that the variables of “togetherness” and “individuality” are instrumental in defining the overall structure of the family. Togetherness refers to the degree of cohesiveness in the family and in the presence of high degree of cohesiveness; it is highly likely that the family will present a picture of a nuclear family (Gladding, 2002). Individuality is the flip side of togetherness and in presence of higher level of individuality, the family structure may break loose and worse, family members may part their own ways (Skyttner, 2005). Bowenian theory is spread over eight interlocking concepts, which formulate the most part of Bowenian arguments and research. First, is “differentiation of self” (Papero, 1990), which refers to the ability of differentiating one’s thoughts, feelings and ideas from that of the family. The more refined concept of “self” a person has, the less likely is that he or she would depend on his or her family for acceptance and approval (Patterson & Edwards, 2009; Papero, 1990). These people are able to differentiate between their feelings and thoughts and when required, they would be able to put their feelings aside and would come up with rational arguments for solving problems (Gehart, 2009). However, people who a poorly differentiated “self” become the victims of “group think” and they are always putting their effort to conform to their family norms, rules and thought patterns. They rely heavily on the acceptance and approval of other family members and quickly adjust to the changing group opinions (Winek, 2009; Gladding, 2002). Second, rather than focusing on the dyad approach, Bowen believed that family units and systems follow a triad or triangle based system because whenever any two members in the family have a problem, any one member is most likely to bring in a third member to arbitrate or confine in (Titelman, 2003; Papero, 1990). For example, when a wife and husband are having problems in their relationship and neither, one of them is able to talk it through or reach to a solution, the wife leaves the place for a while to live with her best friend. With this step, the anxiety and tension (even if on a temporary basis) decreases and the credit goes to the interference on the third person. In another scenario, the husband may spend more time at work to avoid confrontation thus making a husband-wife-work triangle in the relationship (Titelman, 2007). Triangulation in relationships can sometimes help in solving the problems; however, at other occasions it may intensify or fuel the problem. Important here to note is that the higher the differentiation of a person, the less likely it is they would triangulate since they are better capable to solve their own problems (Gehart, 2009). Furthermore, triangles are more likely to form to in instances of high stress and problems and less likely to occur in times of stability (Patterson & Edwards, 2009). The higher the stress in a relationship, the greater is the need to include an outsider in the relationship. After the inclusion of more than one person in the scenario, they resolve themselves into multiple triangles. With A and B the subjects in relationship and C is the initial person to with which the triangle forms. However, with the inclusion of person D, it will form disintegrate into smaller triangles, ABC, BCD, CDA and ABD (Hanna & Brown, 2003). Third, nuclear family emotional process is the third cornerstone of Bowenian theory. When couples have low levels of differentiation, it ends up causing high levels of fusion. To a limit, fusion is healthy, after which it starts causing anxiety and stress in the relationship. In these conditions, there are four basic relationship patterns (Kerr & Bowen, 1988). First pattern is of “martial conflict”, where reach spouse tries to externalize the blame and tries to find the answer that what is wrong with the partner (Papero, 1990). Second, “dysfunction in one spouse is the pattern where one spouse tries to put pressure on the other to change his or her way of reacting and feeling to preserve harmony” (Patterson & Edwards, 2009). Third, one spouse may try to focus all their negative energy, tension and anxiety on one or more children, worrying greatly about his or her future. Fourth, spouses mat try to take time off and refer to other people creating a distance between each other (Winek, 2009). Fifth, “Family Projection Process” focuses on the impact of heightened tensions and anxiety on the next generation. The child who is the closest to the parents is more likely to develop symptoms of physiological, mental, or physical illness (Titelman, 2003). In these cases, parents often feel that they have not given enough time and energy to that child but in reality, he or she has been their focus of attention since long. However, other siblings, who have not received much attention, tend to develop healthier and mature relationship with their parents (Gehart, 2009). In addition, “multigenerational transmission process” (Kerr & Bowen, 1988) explains how small differences in the differentiation levels between the parents and their family may go on to impact many generations. This information may transfer consciously in form of teachings, stories, advices, and others or may subconsciously become a part of the overall genetic makeup of the person and define his or her “self” (Kerr & Bowen, 1988). Children tend to reform similar triangular relationships that they experienced during their childhood and try to reinforce the healthier aspects of the relationships within their children (Hanna & Brown, 2003). Sixth, “emotional cutoff” refers to an extreme position in the family projection process where the family members reduce their emotional closeness and contact as a way to decrease or dampen the negative energy. Bowen added this aspect to his theory later in 1975 after further research. Bowen believed that “the person who runs away from his family of origin is as emotionally dependent as the one who never leaves home” (Gehart, 2009). People who use emotional cutoff tend to generate and accumulate unresolved feelings and tensions which goes on to affect their future relationships (Titelman, 2003). A person who runs away from his family to start a new relationship may have thoughts about running away again, when problems occurs in a new relationship. Therefore, Bowen reinforces the idea that “the more a nuclear family maintains some kind of contact with the past generations, the more orderly and asymptomatic the life process in both generations” (Kerr & Bowen, 1988; Titelman, 2007). Seventh, Bowen also asserted that sibling positions also pay an important role in defining the overall family structure. Elder siblings are viewed as more responsible, disciplined, and mature; however, the youngest in the family would be seen as careless, undisciplined, and irresponsible. This goes on to impact people’s lives and careers because eldest ones make good leaders, in charges and bosses and youngest ones may go on to be good followers (Hoffman, 2002). Eight and last, societal emotional process helps in understanding that how this theory can be applied to societal groups who react like families. For example, Bowen noted that the behavior of courts during the 1960s and 1970s could be explained with the help of Family theory (Titelman, 2003). They behaved more like parents of delinquent children who were ready to consider juvenile offender for the first time and may try to explore the conditions in which they committed the offences. However, after repeated offences they may tend to give stricter punishments (Winek, 2009). Conclusion As mentioned earlier, that there are some striking differences between Bowenian approach to family theory and other approaches. Quite understandably, these differences also form the basis of the mild criticism that Bowen has received from his critics and other researchers (Titelman, 2007). For example, the cognitive behavioral family therapy focuses too much on the operant conditioning principles and tends to avoid the genetic and communicational issues that arise in the family. Collaborative language systems therapy avoids most of the points and claims of the Bowenian approach, believes that most of the problems can be solved with speaking out about the problems, and issues (Becvar & Becvar, 2006). This allows the family members to explore their subconscious problems and feel easy about it. The Feminist Family Therapy takes up the principle of differentiation from the Bowenian but focuses most of its efforts on filling up the gaps of cultural, religious and class differences between the spouses to solve their problems (Hanna & Brown, 2003). References Becvar, D. S., & Becvar, R. J. (2006). Family therapy: a systemic integration. Pearson Allyn and Bacon. Gehart, D. R. (2009). Mastering Competencies in Family Therapy: A Practical Approach to Theory and Clinical Case Documentation. Cengage Learning. Gladding, S. T. (2002). Family therapy: history, theory, and practice. Merrill. Hanna, S. M., & Brown, J. H. (2003). The practice of family therapy: key elements across models. Thomson/Brooks/Cole. Hoffman, L. (2002). Family therapy: an intimate history. W.W. Norton. Kerr, M. E., & Bowen, M. (1988). Family evaluation: an approach based on Bowen theory. Norton. Papero, D. V. (1990). Bowen family systems theory. Allyn and Bacon. Patterson, J., Williams, L., & Edwards, T. M. (2009). Essential skills in family therapy: from the first interview to termination. Guilford Press. Skyttner, L. (2005). General systems theory: problems, perspectives, practice. World Scientific. Titelman, P. (2003). Emotional cutoff: Bowen family systems theory perspectives. Routledge. Titelman, P. (2007). Triangles: Bowen Family Systems Theory Perspectives. Taylor & Francis. Winek, J. L. (2009). Systemic family therapy: from theory to practice. SAGE. Read More