Lecture 1: What is a Family?

Adopting a Family Relationship Framework

- 1st social group

o Relationship
o Shared space
o Occur in diverse forms
- Commonality among all families: Naturally sustained social system with the following
properties:
o Evolved set of rules?
o Assigned and ascribed roles for each member
o Organized power structure
o Intricate overt/covert forms of communication
o Ways of negotiating and problem solving that allow tasks to be performed effectively

The Family System

o What ties individuals to each other in the family system? (Attachment and Loyalties)
i.e. Family systems are embedded in a community/society
o Factors that influence the systems development
Race, social class, level of education, finances, values, beliefs, religion
o How do these factors affect the system?
- Non-Family System (Business Organization)
o May fire an employee
o Employee may resign
o Permanently sever all relationships with business structure
o Business structure will find replacement
- Family Systems
o Pressure to maintain family membership
o Member may move to far distance or divorce but cannot relinquish family membership
i.e. ex-husband/wife
o Member is irreplaceable even in death, each members forms personal and emotional
bonds to each other in unique ways (attachment)
- How do families maintain a history?
o By telling and retelling stories
o Ex: story that grandmother cooks for husband, the grandfather gets up early in order to
work all day shows gender roles and hard work
o In order to teach certain values
- A successfully functioning family system must be able to adapt to the changing needs/demands
of member (expectations of community, larger kinship network)
o Aka compromise
- Identity (Individual and Family)
o Treated and act differently
- Why are family members dependent on each other?
o Love, shelter, and food
Enabling and Disabling Families (Can Not Find in Book)

- Enabled Family Systems: (Healthy System)

o Balances systems needs as a family unit while simultaneously addressing the individual
interests of all members
How does the system achieve this results?
Devise strategies for meeting needs of individual family members equally and
the group as a whole (share nurturance, caring, brainstorming, and support
governed by accepted rules)
- Disabled Family System (Unhealthy System)
o To prevail at the expense of certain members, often manifested in unstable, rigid, or
chaotic family patterns. One member may receive preference over the other. Families
may not be able to provide basic necessities.
o What are some explanations for disabled family systems?
Family feels depleted due to excess external stressors (social/environmental)
such as poverty, health problems, legal issues accidents, migrations, language
barriers or internal stress such as isolation, little social support, mental health
issues (i.e. depression)

Family Interactive Patterns

o A family typically develops rules that outlines the roles and functions of its members
o Families are resistant to change
o Families display stable, collaborative, purposeful and recurring patterns of interaction.
They are usually invisible to outsider and members may not be consciously aware of
them.
- Is this family enabled or disabled and how can you tell?
o Clip 1: Disabled because extreme reaction and unable to understand, no health
communication
o Clip 2: Enabled because good communication,
o Clip 3: Disabled because violent behavior, others are treated differently
- Verbal patterns of communication. i.e.
o Who speaks to whom?
o How often do sentences begin with you instead of I?
o Who dominated discussion
o Do members speak for one another
o What tone dominates i.e. hostility, pleading, hurt, confusion
o Do members listen or interrupt
- Nonverbal patterns of communication i.e.
o Nods of head
o Eye contact
o Where do members sit
o Avoidance
o Who leads family into therapy office
- Shared family rituals such as holiday celebrations are part of ongoing gamily interacting patterns
- Participating in rituals links members to the family system and the wider community and culture
Overview of Family Systems

- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPWoUZd9gQ4
- Questions to keep in mind:
o Considering the meaning of enabling and disabling families, where do you observe
instances of this in the counseling session with the family?
o What effect do you think has on the family?
o What are the interactive patterns of the family, both verbal and non-verbal?

*Post Modern Outlook subjective constructed by the family