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NP0038: Who’s Afraid of Couples Therapy?
Welcome to our “Who’s Afraid of Couples Therapy?” This exciting series, back by popular demand, is based on our November/December 2011 issue on this topic and will explore the challenges of couples work.
What are the most effective strategies in working with couples? How can therapists structure therapy—particularly in the early sessions—so that couples leave with a sense of hope, rather than frustration? Can working with individuals who have serious issues in their relationships actually be detrimental to them? Find out the answers to these questions and much more. In this first session with expert couples therapists Ellyn Bader and Peter Pearson, the creators of the Developmental Model of Couples Therapy, you’ll find out why clinicians often avoid working with couples and how you can better prepare yourself for couples therapy work.
How can therapists most effectively work with emotion in the consulting room—particularly when it comes to couples therapy? Learn with internationally known couples therapist Hedy Schleifer how to help create a nourishing connection between partners, define a role as therapist-as-guide, and much more. Schleifer, who’s pioneered the training of Imago Relationship therapists internationally, will go into how to use this theory in practice and how to best work with emotions.
What happens when partners in couples therapy have two different agendas in mind? Hear from expert William Doherty on this little spoken about topic. Learn how Discernment Counseling, an approach that helps couples clarify their feelings about the next step in their relationship, can help both clients and therapists.
Is it possible to rebuild trust and intimacy in a couple’s relationship after a partner has had an affair? How can therapists help? Hear from Esther Perel, author of the international bestseller Mating in Captivity: Unlocking Erotic Intelligence, on how to help couples after an infidelity and the role that cultural perspectives have in this emotional situation.
Explore this classic dynamic of couples therapy—an angry woman and a withdrawn man—that’s often confusing for therapists, with couples therapist Jette Simon. Learn more about what’s behind the feelings of anger and the behavior of withdrawing, and how clinicians can more effectively work with shame and fear of disconnection.
Hear an unconventional perspective on couples therapy from David Schnarch, who believes that the best way to help couples is to challenge partners to change their individual behaviors and attitudes. Schnarch’s direct, upfront approach to helping clients will illustrate a different viewpoint on effective couples therapy.
Join Marty Klein, a marriage and family therapist and certified sex therapist, us for a candid discussion about the assumptions that both clients and therapists often share that can get in the way of improving couples’ sexual relationships.
Discover with Kathryn Rheem how to respond effectively when clients express strong feelings in session. Based on Emotionally Focused Therapy, you’ll explore attunement and how to use your own emotions to help clients move beyond attachment injuries.
After the session, please let us know what you think. If you ever have any technical questions or issues, please feel free to email support@psychotherapynetworker.org.
Whole Psychiatry: Alternatives to Conventional Psychopharmacology with Robert Hedaya
Meds: Myths and Realities: NP0035 – Session 4
Is psychopharmacology is a 'go-to' in your practice? Join Robert Hedaya as he discusses how to treat the bodily systems that underlay many mental health issues while avoiding medication. After the session, please let us know what you think. If you ever have any technical questions or issues, please feel free to email support@psychotherapynetworker.org.Tough Customers: Is It Them or Us?
By Rich Simon As therapists, many of us practice in two different worlds. In the first, we see polite, well-behaved, articulate clients with solid values. They engage fully in therapy, talk cogently about their problems, listen attentively to our responses, make reasonably good-faith efforts to follow our suggestions, and sooner or later get better. No wonder we genuinely like these people! 
Requested page not available (because user or community was deleted) P004: Attachment, Session 1, Alan SroufeWelcome to “The Great Attachment Debate”—a 6-part webinar interview series with leading experts in the field, brought together to present the scientific foundations of Attachment Theory and how it influences—or doesn’t influence—our clinical work. The series, following the March/April 2011 issue on attachment, kicks off with Alan Sroufe, Ph.D., a leading Attachment Theory researcher.
03.31.2011 Posted In: P004 New Perspectives on Practice: The Great Attachment Debate By Psychotherapy Networker
This first session will delve into what research has shown us about the effects of our early relationships. Sroufe will explore John Bowlby’s work and how it’s led to attachment research, connections between attachment style and mental health, how Attachment Theory affects the process of change in psychotherapy, and much more. After listening to Sroufe’s presentation, please take a moment to comment here and share your thoughts. The Comment Boards will be on the Networker website throughout this webinar so we can share thoughts, experiences, and any questions, creating a space for learning and community. What did you learn today that was new or interesting? Please feel free to include your name and hometown along with your comment, and make sure to check out Alan Sroufe and Daniel Siegel's feature article on attachment in the March/April issue, "The Verdict Is In." Comments  |
© 2013 Psychotherapy Networker
CE Question: Am I supposed to do anything to demonstrate my attendance for CEs? (I did pay for CEs)
Content comment: I don't think the tree graphic slide was ever mentioned or explained. Wish it had been.
Becky Pine, Groton, MA
Sometimes, especially for the first session that kicks off a webinar, they do last a bit longer than an hour, but if for any reason you don't have the time to finish viewing it at that time, you can always watch it later on-demand.
After the attachment course is complete, you'll be able to take a CE quiz, which will appear under Your Purchased Items on the website, under New Perspectives. After you take and pass the quiz, you'll receive a certificate that shows that you've completed your CEs. If you have any technical issues in the future, please feel free to contact support@icohere.com, and if you have any general questions about CEs, our web offerings, etc., please feel free to contact support@psychotherapynetworker.org.
I find dreams completely fascinating but I have never linked them to my research. Someone who is steeped in attachment theory and who wrote a fascinating book on dreams is Louis Breger.
I have lots of opinions, but I direct you to FAMILY COURT REVIEW
July 2011, edited by Jenn McIntosh, that will have full coverage of this
I would love to see the pictures you mentioned.
As a psychotherapist who uses EMDR, which in addition to being mindful of the attunement in the therapeutic relationship, taps into nonverbal "mind/body" experiences and beliefs which, guided by attachment theory, seem to be due to early insecure attachment, I am privileged to witness the healing of the unarticulatable, yet deeply held belief/experiences - particularly around worthiness, which you specifically mentioned - and the movement towards positive outcomes.
Finally, I enjoyed that a seminar on attachment was not just one talking head, but a conversation. It was fun to notice the tiny mis and re attunements between you two as you discussed the "science of attunment."
Coral Springs, Florida
I believe you would find some useful information in what is called "The Handbook of Attachment Research..., published by Guilford and edited by Cassidy and Shaver. See especially the chapter by Dozier.
Thank you. I was lucky enough to take a class with you and consult with you on a case of two sisters in a failed adoption about three years ago. I have found that what little I knew about attachment through you and through Susan Johnson's work with adults has shaped my clinical practice and allowed me to have extraordinary experiences in practice with individuals with cluster B personality disorders. This is incredibly powerful as a tool for change and healing. Thank you and thanks to the Networker for this fine presentation.
There is a training opportunity I would point you to if you would like to email me (srouf001@umn.edu).
Marta Cullberg Weston
Stockholm, Sweden
This is including those who are pushed toward precocious independence...these will later be more dependent.
This statement is an important and strong reminder for the western cultural collective consciousness of pushing children to be more, do more, know more earlier...rather than attuning to, allowing and meeting their needs fully at each stage of development with sensitivity. I am very much looking forward to his book. Thank you for your work Dr. Sroufe...such an amazing study...35 years! An incredibly important and needed gift of concrete awareness to our field.
I really liked the view that attachment isn't linear and how a development perspective was emphasized..
The Bowlby/Ainsworth theory is both about how attachments are formed and the variations in quality of attachment among those who receive ongoing care from a particular person (a huge percentage in our society). There are unattached children (reared in institutions) and not yet attached children (recently adopted). But for most children, including abused children, attachment strength is not the issue. The problem with RAD is that extraordinarily few home reared children meet criteria; yet a substantial portion of child problems have there roots in attachment histories. Thus, DSM has paradoxically obscured the role of attachment by sequestering attachment issues into this single category.
I am touched by, and deeply appreciative of, the opportunity to experience the integrity and commitment of who you (both) are. I come at these most profound and far-reaching topics of attachment as an environmental advocate. One who is aghast at the level of polarization and utter dysfunction of the current US political system. A system that decrees our relationship to the natural systems on which our lives -- all life -- depends.
Just one example with titanic ramifications: In this moment, the future of the Environmental Protection Agency is in question. It’s mandate covers the elements from which we are composed: the air we breathe; the water we drink; the fire/warmth of climate; and the quality of the earth on which we stand and that produces our food.
Our ‘addiction’ to lives lived via fossil fuels -- oil, coal, gas -- is threatening those very elements essential for our survival.
A BIG question: could it not be said that addiction -- personal and collective -- is a sign of a mis-appropriated attachment? A compensatory relationship to matter, to material/mater/mother? The very thing that results in our relationship -- or lack of it, i.e., lack of attunement -- to Mother Earth?
Do you know of any person or organization addressing such root psychological causes of the human behavior that threatens the future of our species? Is anyone talking about our survival? about adaptation?!
I don't know if you're aware of a branch of psychology called ecopsychology (if it's old news to you, my apologies). I wonder if that might be an area where you could find some of the answers you seek. http://www.ecopsychology.org/
I've been studying Patricia Crittenden's Dynamic Maturation Model (DMM). Her approach to attachment is in understanding attachment as a self-protective, adaptation to danger. In this light, anxious attachment is seen as necessary for survival. This greatly changes ideas in working with children and families and, I find, promotes understanding and compassion. Instead of trying to change behavior and create security, one works harder to understand the danger and increase safety - physical or psychological.
Crittenden incorporates Bronfenbrenner's theory of social ecology into the DMM. This involves a nested system theory where the systems of global, political, community and family, interact in a transactional way effecting individual outcomes.
Perhaps, we, in the West, have been feeling very safe and not giving any thought to our Mother! Of course, this could change at any moment. We are never really secure ...but always needing to adapt. That's life!
I was thinking of my work with couples and wondering how I can get them to be more attuned with one another.
I liked the comment about humans running TO a person rather than into a whole. I also agree that safety comes from being connected to others. I see a lot of clients who are fearful of being alone. Finally, I apprecated his comments on that a person's developmental history also affects the circumstances that a person puts themselves into.
Rich, I think that I have learned more from these webinars than I did in the 2 years of grad school. They are a gift! Thank you!!
I am familiar with an attachment-based training program for clinicians that may be of interest to you. If you would like to hear about it you might email me (srouf001@umn.edu).
I am so helped as a therapist by these webinairs and in aprticular to have attachment theory explained, what it is and what it isn't. In this particular one I found Rich
asking questions and re-directing Alan before he finished
a thought or concept. I would have liked for Rich to wait until Alan made a complete statement, it was distracting and left loose ends.
I am now working on helping young couples address their own attachment issues as part of preparation for the birth of their baby so that they will be more likely to be responsive and sensitive caregivers as they attune to their new baby. Do you know of others who are interested in this preventive approach? Thanks again.
Barbara Stern,LMFT
Two people who have done great work on this question are Phil and Carolyn Cowan at UC Berkeley. You can google them and find this work easily
I was so pleased to hear Dr. Sroufe's presentation, having "discovered" his book Emotional Development while writing my 1995 dissertation. Thank you for clarifying the disputed points of Attachment Theory so effectively.
During the discussion, I was struck with the idea that Marcia's Identity Achievement research relies on the presence or absence of Exploration prior to Commitment as the axis elements necessary to the successful negotiation of (Ericson's) Identity Crisis Stage. This seems to echo the the Attachment/Exploration components of the current discussion.
Be assured the recent Networker issue is close at hand in my work with students and supervisees, and keep the wonderful webinars coming! (St. Louis, MO)
Thanks for the Webinar series.
I don't quite no what pictures you are referring to, but if you email me I'll see if I can help you
I was curious as to whether there has been any extensive research done on how divorce effects a child's attachment. If a child was securely attached as an infant, would a divorce that occurred when they were a toddler effect the quality of their attachment with their primary caregiver?
Thank you for this series. I'm very much looking forward to the future broadcast.
I direct you to FAMILY COURT REVIEW, July 2011, edited by Jenn McIntosh, that will have full coverage of this. It is a complicated matter with no simple answers, but some good thinking has been done. One thing that follows from our work is that were a child securely attached prior to the divorce that should serve as a protective factor.
'Humans do not run to a place when they are scared - they run to a person'
'Early experience initiates a path and frames subsequent encounters with the world.
'Relationships influence the development of the brain.'
'When people respond to your needs you discover that you are somebody.'
'To be sensitive does not mean to have a thin skin, but it means to do the things that others need.'
'The main ingredients for change are relationships'
'Prior development constrains the ability to chnage'
Thank you for the webinar.
Johan Cloete
South Africa
I am a clinincal psychologist in Melbourne Australia, and thought I would listen while I was working on other things. I was very impressed, actually stopped and took notes, it was a wonderful lecture, really crystallized some of the attachment and neurobiology concepts that are emerging at the moment. Thoroughly enjoyed it, Thank You.
I would like to respond to a couple of your points, because they are so important. In a short presentation it is hard to get across the complexity of the theory, but attachment theory certainly does not say that infant attachment determines the rest of one’s life. Our study showed explicitly that later parenting as well as early parenting, relationships with peers at every age, relationships with teachers, coaches and therapists, and adult romantic relationships all were important influences in development. This was precisely articulated in Bowlby’s pathways model. Early attachment is important, but because it initiates a path and impacts one’s later interpretation of and reaction to events, not because it determines outcomes in a linear manner. To give just one example, attachment is important because it impacts early peer relationships, which impact subsequent peer relationships and so forth. This is, in fact, demonstrated empirically.
As to blaming, the evidence we obtained in our study should keep anyone from blaming parents. Not only is it the case that the infant’s attachment in predictable from the developmental history of the parents, but from their current supports and stresses. Moreover, we found that when stresses and supports change (or parental depression changes), so does the attachment or at a later age the child’s behavior problems. Were I prone to cast blame it would be to our society that is giving too little priority to supporting parents and children.
So the "you're blaming me" defense has the effect of silencing/discreditting/vilifying the researcher as doctors and genetics rush to the rescue of the "poor victim parent". I have too admire such a clever move, it is amazing.
A person who is able to accept that they are imperfect has not fear of negative feedback on their performance. The really wonderful thing about attachment is that a change in parental behavior/attitudes/beliefs can have a possitive impact on their children's mental health at any point in their lives, because parents remain important through every stage of life.
My primary theoretical orientation is British Object Relations (Klein, Winnicott, Bion). Attachment theorists and Object Relations Theorists agree that early experiences with relationship - attachment - establish a template upon which ongoing development proceeds. In Dr. Sroufe's view, what are the major differences or disagreements between Attachment theorists and Object Relations theorists?
Attachment theory and object relations positions are indeed very simpatico. They get to almost exactly the same place; however, they get there in quite distinctive ways. In O-R theory, one the infant first cathects a “part-object” (the breast) and only in time, by extension, recognizes the mother and forms a relationship with her. In Bowlby’s theory, the relationship is primary (though at first of course orchestrated by the parent) and the self emerges in the context of the relationship. The organization of the self is forecast by the organization of the relationship the parent crafts. Bowlby’s theory not only takes a more direct path to relationships but is testable. I don’t know how one can test object relations theory, however much I resonate with the ideas of especially Bollas, Hamilton, and Fairbairn. I would add that Bowlby was especially negative about Melanie Klein's ideas since they were so removed from the actual experience of infants which is central in Bowlby's theory.
If you are interested in further exposure regarding how these two positions might be complementary, you might email me (srouf001@umn.edu)
I know of a training experience that might be of interest to you if you wish to email me (srouf001@umn.edu)
Edwin Miller
speople@sbcglobal.net
Charlie Love
Austin, Tx.
I know of a training that may be of interest to you if you would like to email me (srouf001@umn.edu)
Thank you for the ability to increase the size of the screen. It was easier to read the presenter's slides.
Not likely that I will be asked to write another Networker article, but I know of a training that specifically addresses your question. If you would like to find out about it, email me (srouf001@umn.edu).
Yes, alas, discussion of disorganization and trauma and the AAI was cut out of our article as well. But is people would like some pieces on this they can email me at srouf001@umn.edu
I am becoming attached to your webinars - even though I only get to see them by paying up and downloading much later when they are just as lively as live. Is the "downloading later but just as lively" a kind of description of what we do with our attachment representations?! And the present context is different so what we hear and learn may be different each time. An argument for paying up for long term re-downloading if ever there was!
When I was a baby child psychiatrist I was meant to read Bowlby's books, but they looked too big and serious for me! So I've winged it over the years. I also got put off by attachment seeming to be too theoretical, too simplistic (despite the size of the books I had not read!!), too scientific or behavioral almost and anti-psychoanalytical. I thought the word attachment was too mechanical sounding for relationships.
Now I'm a family therapist and older (and with kids and grandkids of my own) I think attachment is a very good word for the strong emotional bonds we have with all our nearest and dearest. I also have a growing respect for all the many things that Bowlby did - including the first clear description of family therapy (if you read this 1949 paper for example - view it here:
Link
Not sure who in the UK picked this up afterwards, and it was in the US that FT developed over the next 20 years. I have also seen Sue Johnson's stuff that shows how attachment patterns are just as vivid and useful to therapy in adult attachments.
So what a delight to have a comprehensive update delivered so clearly in one hour - oh ok, 68 minutes - and most unusually to find that the great originator of 60 years ago is still praised for the careful quality of his thinking then. Is there any field where the originator has not been gently buried by better disciples?!!
So, thanks again and au revoir.
Nick
PS Just checked. Paste the long URL in your browser and you can read the Bowlby article.
I am a student of psychology on master degree, asn \i am planing to do master thesis,,I red a lot about attachment theory but still don't have an idea what hypothesis can I test for my thesis,, what has not been done an who is a need to work on...If you can give me some direction oh which topic to focus on attachment,,all the best,,, besaa