This textbook aims to introduce students to the foundational concepts of the marriage and family therapy field, providing a comprehensive overview of a range of models and their practical application. Designed specifically for distance-learning, Yulia Watters and Darren Adamson bring together a collection of experienced marriage and family therapists to teach the absolute essentials of marriage and family therapy without peripheral or incidental information. Iterative in its presentation, the book introduces important systems concepts, provides a compelling history of family therapy, presents detailed exploration of classical and postmodern approaches to therapy, and covers clinical application and treatment planning. It uniquely follows the course structure of the first institution to receive Commission on Accreditation for Marriage and Family Therapy Education (COAMFTE) accreditation for both master’s and doctoral online programs, giving students the fundamental knowledge they need to help them prepare for their licensing examination and subsequent practice as MFTs. Written for students seeking to be MFT practitioners, this important volume adds a fresh perspective to teaching and application of family therapy.

Now in its fifth edition, The Practice of Family Therapy comes at a time when traditional approaches to psychotherapy have given way to multidimensional strategies that best serve the needs of diverse groups who are grappling with the many challenges unique to family therapy practice. With expanded coverage of different models, along with new developments in evidence-based and postmodern practices, this integrative textbook bridges the gap between science and systemic/relational approaches, as it guides the reader through each stage of family therapy. Part I lays the groundwork by introducing the first-, second-, and third-generation models of family therapy, teaching the reader to integrate different elements from these models into a systemic structure of practice. Part II explores the practical application of these models, including scripts for specific interventions and rich case examples that highlight how to effectively work with diverse client populations. Students will learn how to make connections between individual symptoms and cutting-edge family practices to respond successfully to cases of substance abuse, trauma, grief, depression, suicide risk, violence, LGBTQ families, and severely mentally ill clients and their families. Also included are study guides for each model and a glossary to review main concepts. Aligned with the Association of Marital and Family Therapy Regulatory Boards’ (AMFTRB) knowledge and content statements, this textbook will be key reading for graduate students who are preparing for the national licensing exam in marriage and family therapy.

Doug Sprenkle - Awarded the American Family Therapy Academy (AFTA) 2010 Award for Distinguished Contribution to Family Therapy Research and Practice! Grounded in theory, research, and extensive clinical experience, this pragmatic book addresses critical questions of how change occurs in couple and family therapy and how to help clients achieve better results. The authors show that regardless of a clinician's orientation or favored techniques, there are particular therapist attributes, relationship variables, and other factors that make therapy specifically, therapy with couples and families more or less effective. The book explains these common factors in depth and provides hands-on guidance for capitalizing on them in clinical practice and training. User-friendly features include numerous case examples and a reproducible common factors checklist.

This text will provide a comprehensive overview of traditional and evolving theoretical models of family therapy and intervention techniques. The objective of this text is to enable a student to gain beginning proficiency as a family therapist along with understanding the impact of a client's race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, disability, gender issues, age, socioeconomic status, disability, and differences from the “traditional” family on family assessment and intervention. The book has six goals, as follows: (1) acquaint students with the theoretical underpinnings of various approaches to assessing and intervening with families (2) assist students in understanding the similarities, differences and strategies of change among the major models of family therapy (3) introduce the student to the current available research on the effectiveness of different approaches to family intervention (4) help students assess family functioning from a life cycle perspective and make a valid plan, taking into account client's race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, disability, gender issues, age, socioeconomic status, disability, and differences from the “traditional” family (5) help students develop techniques and strategies related to stages of the intervention in family therapy (6) enable the student to critique the appropriateness of the theoretical models and its intervention techniques according to family developmental factors as well as the particular needs of the family. Features: (1) Comprehensive coverage of familty therapy theory and research 2) Presentation of clinical process issues unique to family therapy (3) Inclusion of family live cycle and developement issues and the impact on family assessment and treatment planning (4) Interventions in diverse family structures (5) Interventions with special family issues such as substance abuse, domestic violence and poverty (6) An emphasis throughout on helping students to develop beginning competencies in family therapy practice (7) Numerous case examples

The authors distill the central ideas from the many systems-based models of family therapy, add some concepts that have not been widely used before in family therapy, connect them all to one another in a new way, and apply these ideas to domains that family therapists have not explored from a systems perspective--domains such as intrapsychic process, human development, gender, and culture. For clinicians and theorists. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

Family Therapy: The Basics provides a clear and concise overview of the field of family therapy and its foundational models. This text explores the history, skills, and theories upon which family therapy rests, highlighting the main figures, concepts, ethical principles, and methods.Focusing on the breadth of the field, readers are provided answers to some of the most important questions for potential therapists: What are the primary skills family therapists use to help families change? How do family therapists incorporate aspects of diversity into their practice? What are the major models of family therapy practice? Where is the field of family therapy headed in the future? Family Therapy: The Basics is an ideal introduction for students exploring the field of psychotherapy and how a focus on the family and the use of various family therapy theories can help shift family organizations and relationships.

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.