How Does Change occur?

Typically, in structural family therapy change occurs when the structure of the family changes (Nichols, 2014). This can mean that roles in the family change, positions of various members of the family, etc. (Standish, 2013).  In this stage the goal is usually to change the family structure in such a way that promotes postive change and addresses the reason why the family is in therapy (Nichols, 2014).

 

During this stage in structural therapy, the therapist will work on developing  boundaries with the families (loosening/tightening as appropraite) and unbalancing.

 

Unbalancing in a technique that is used to change the relationships within a family subsystem (Nichols, 2014 p. 123). When the dysfunctional relationships can be altered, change can occur within the family.

 

Structural Family therapists view problems within the family due to dsyfunctional organization of the family and their familial structure. From the way that problems are viewed, the primary goal of structural family therapy is to change the dsyfunction by changing the family structure (Kim, 2003). More specifically to create a family structure that has subsystems and members of the family that are differentiated clearly and can intergate fully into their specific family heirarchy (Navarre, 1998).  

 

Structural family therapists work to treat the whole family before treating individual systems. Strucutral family therapy states that structural changes must first occur within the family, because how a family functions directly correlates to individual behavior. Therefore, if a family's function improves, the individual distress of the family members should improve as well (Standish, 2013).