Basic Concepts in Family Therapy: An Introductory Text, Second Edition

By Linda Berg-Cross

Book Overview

Gain confidence and creativity in your family therapy interventions with new, up-to-date research Basic Concepts in Family Therapy: An Introductory Text, Second Edition, presents twenty-two basic psychological concepts that therapists may use to understand clients and provide successful services to them. Each chapter focuses on a single concept using material from family therapy literature, basic psychological and clinical research studies, and cross-cultural research studies. Basic Concepts in Family Therapy is particularly useful to therapists working in a family context with child- or adolescent-referred problems, and for students and clinicians treating the problems they see every day in their community. The book builds on the strengths of the first edition, incorporating ideas and articles that have become worthy of investigating since 1990 into the original text. This new edition also introduces five new chapters on resiliency and poverty, adoption, chronic illness, spirituality and religion, and parenting strategies. The new chapters make the book far more relevant for students and clinicians try ing to use family theory and technique in response to the problems they see in their communities. Basic Concepts in Family Therapy will assist you in offering clients better services by providing a deeper understanding of the contemporary family in its various forms, the psychological bonds that shape all families, and the developmental stages of the family life cycle. This exploration of how family demography, stages and life cycles affect family functions is a solid foundation from which all of the therapeutic concepts in this book can be explored. Some of the facets of family therapy you will explore in Basic Concepts in Family Therapy are:

the importance of spirituality and religion in family therapy generational boundaries, closeness, and role behaviors managing a family's emotions defining problems and generating and evaluating possible solutions teaching children specific attitudes, values, social skills, and norms transracial adoptions and normative processes and developmental issues of adoptive parents strategies for reducing conflict . . . and much more Basic Concepts in Family Therapy will help to broaden your understanding of the ways families function in general. You can use the effective concepts explored in this text to make a thorough assessment of the impact of a disorder on a child and on the rest of his or her family, as well as how family dynamics might have shaped or exacerbated the problems. The concepts described in this text can be customized to clients'cultural values to avoid unnecessary resistance. As a new therapist, you will gain confidence in your assessments, and if you are already a seasoned professional, you will gain creativity in your interventions.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0789009412
• ISBN13: 9780789009418
• Release Date: April 2000
• Publisher: Routledge
• Length: 642 Pages
• Weight: 2.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.4" x 6.1" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

Basic Concepts in Family Therapy

Had bought this book for a class in group and couples therapy; though I have only read a few assigned chapters at this point, it is well=written, easily understandable, and has excellent examples. I'm looking forward to finishing the book. It is not a stuffy, textbook-like tome, but an informative and enlightening book.

Basic concepts in family therapy

This is an excellent book, well researched with up-to-date references and written with numerous case stories to illustrate the point in every relevant chapter. Linda Berg-Cross is affiliated with Howard University in Washington, DC, but also active in private practice working with individuals, families and groups with a another textbook on Couple Therapy to her name. This book is devided into six units: Getting acquinted with the family; Systems perspective on family concepts; Ecological stressors; A cognitive perspective on family concepts; A sibling perspective and A social psychological perspective with a total of 22 chapters. I especially liked the two chapters on "Family resiliency and poverty" and the last chapter on "Spirituality", both new additions to this second textbook edition. In the chapter on resiliency it is stressed that self-efficacy versus dependence and growth versus stagnation are two important issues in working with families living in poverty. Four models are discussed: The moral model, where the individual is responsible for his own problems and their solutions; the enlightenment model suggests that the individual is responsible for his problems, but the solution must be given oor told (to enlighten) from an outside source; the medical model sees the problem as a disease, where the individual has little power over the cause or the cure and the compensatory model that takes the position that the individual must compensate for the deficits imposed and overcome the barriers. It is very essential to realize that the solutions are not outside the client, but within and the function of the therapist is to assist the client to remove the stressors and unveil the family unit as resourceful and capable of solving their problems. The chapter on spirituality is interesting, because it is a subject that many professionals often shy away from, but nevertheless important for many families (40% of all Americans attend a place of worship at least weekly and 90% of all American adults say the pray to God at least occasionally). In fact spirituality and religion have many overlapping roles and functions together with family therapy like: to foster a sense of perspective, to give meaning to life, to provide rituals that transform and connect, to provide social support networks, to structure society and set ethical norms, to give an identity and heritage to family members, to support families, to facilitate posie change in individuals, to look out for the physical and emotional welfare of family members and finally to educate family members. All in all a book for therapists, students and people interested in the dynamics of family life. All will get something out of reading it.Professor Joav Merrick, MD, DMSc Medical Director, Division for Mental Retardation, Box 1260, IL-91012 Jerusalem, Israel. E-mail: jmerrick@aquanet.co.il

An excellent survey of family therapy issues.

Any collection strong in psychology or family therapy at the college level will find this newly revised and expanded edition of Basic Concepts In Family Therapy essential, providing over twenty basic psychological concepts therapists may use to understand and help clients. From poverty to family productivity, this provides an excellent survey of family therapy issues.

Basic Concepts in Family Therapy: An Introductory Text

Good overview of treatment considerations associated with family intervention. Some areas would benefit from updating, otherwise pretty sound. A respectable introductory text.