Structural Family Therapy Or Strategic Family Model
Introduction
Structural family therapy offers a clear framework that brings order
and meaning to the transactions that occur within family
relationship. The consistent, repetitive, organized and predictable
patterns allow us to consider that they a structural .
The emotional boundaries and coalitions that make up family
structures are abstractions ,using the concepts of family structure
enables therapist to intervene in a systematic and organized fashion.
The structural family therapy was developed by Salvador Minuchin
in the 1960’s through his work with delinquent boys from poor
family at Wiltwyck born and raised up in Argetina . He served as a
physician in the Israeli army before moving to the USA where in
training in psychiatry with Narthan Ackerman.
Minuchin realized that the family therapy applied at the time were
not effective so he suggested to his colleague that they should
develop concepts and technique that would be applicable to these
family. Hence coming up with the concept of enactment
Structural family therapy is a blueprint for analyzing the process of
family interactions. It provides a basis for consistent strategic of
treatment which obviates the need to have a specific technique-
usually someone else- for every occasion.
Three constructs (concepts) are essential for structural family theory.
i) Structures
ii) Subsystems
iii) Boundaries
I )Family Structure
The organized pattern in which family members interact is
deterministic concepts.
It describes the sequence that are predictable.
When they are repeated, the family transactions establish enduring
pattern.
The repeated pattern determine how, when and to whom family
members relate for example.
When a mother tells her daughter to pick up the toys and the
daughter refuses until the father shouts at her an interaction
pattern is initiated. If it’s repeated it creates a structure in which
father is competent as a disciplinarian, Mom is incompetent .
Consequently the mother is likely to be more affectionate to her
daughter while father the discipline remains the outsider.
Family structure involves set of covert rules which govern
transaction in the family. For example a rule such as family members
must always protect one another or a family members should live
together and should pray before every meal
Family structure is shaped partly by universal and partly by
idiosyncratic constrains
All families have some kind of hierarchical structure which parents
and children having different amount of authority family members
also tend to have reciprocal and complementary functions. If one
parent is super competent and responsible the other will be less so if
the super competent if one gets “sick” or less competent, the less
competent in some way takes over.
The transaction pattern foster expectations that determine future
patterns/then these become ingrained that the origin may be
forgotten and they are presumed necessary rather than optional
II)Subsystems
Families are differentiated into subsystems of members who join
together to perform various functions.
Every individual is a subsystem and dyds or larger groups make up
other subsystems determined by generations, gender or common
interest eg a family may be split into two camps with Mom and the
boys on one side and Dad and the girls on the other side.
Every family member plays many roles in several subgroups eg Mary
may be a wife, a mother, a daughter and a niece in each of their roles
she will be required to behave differently and exercise a variety of
inter-personal options. If she is mature and flexible she will be able
to fit the different subgroups in which she functions.
III)Boundaries
Individual subsystem and whole families are demarcated by
interpersonal boundaries.
There are invisible barriers that surround individual subsystem, they
regulate the amount of contact with others.
Boundaries serve the purpose of protecting the separateness and
autonomy of the family and its subsystems eg a rule forbidding
phone calls at dinner the establishes protection of the family from
outside intrusion or when small children are permitted to freely
interrupt their parents conversations at dinner the boundaries
separating the parents from the children is minimal
Interpersonal boundaries vary from being rigid to diffuse. Rigid
boundaries permit little contact with outside subsystems resulting in
disengagement
Disengaged individuals or subsystems are relatively isolated and
autonomous. On the positive side this permits independence, growth
and mastery.
On the contrary disengaged limits warmth attention and nurturance.
Diffused boundaries or enmeshed subsystems offer a heightened
sense of mutual support and guidance but at the expense of
independence and autonomy
Enmeshed parents are loving and considerate they spend a lot of
time with their kids and do a lot for them.
However children enmeshed with their parents learn to rely on the
parents as tend to the dependent
Rigid boundaries = _____________________(Disengagement
Clear boundaries= ----------------------------------(Normal Range)
Diffuse boundaries = ……………………………………..(Enmeshment)
Normal Family Development
What distinguishes a normal family is not the absence of problems
but the functional family structures . Normal husbands and wives
must learn to adjust to each other ,rear their children, deal with their
parents and cope with their jobs and fit in their communities .
When two people marry the structural requirements for the new
union are accommodation and boundaries making .The first priority
is mutual accommodation to mange the myriad details of every day
living , Each spouse tries to organize the relationship along families
lines and pressure the other to accommodate them .
In accommodating each other the couple must negotiate nature of
boundaries between them and the boundaries that separate them
from the outside .
They may also need to define the boundaries that separate them
from their original families
When children come they transform the structure of the new family
in to an executive parental system and the sibling systems .
NB All families face situations that stress the system although no
clear dividing line exist between normal and abnormal families ..
Normal families however modify their structures to accommodate
to the changed circumferences .Pathological families increase the
rigidity of the structures that no longer functional
