Integrative Family Therapy

Pastoral counselors, therapists-in-training and clergy are usually introduced to one method of family assessment and treatment, which works better in some situations than in others.

Integrative Family Therapy introduces the major schools of family therapy, proposes a tested model that integrates the various approaches, and illustrates how this model functions both for assessing and treating family problems.

Seven central concepts are discerned as a way of understanding the various family therapies as a group. Then the major family therapy theories are discussed, including cognitive, family life cycle-developmental, interactional-communication, multigenerational, object relations, problem solving and structural family. After examine their deep structures, an integrated model of six discrete moments is presented and illustrated.

Charts direct the reader through the model and illustrate how the model is employed by means of several case studies.

David C. Olsen is Executive Director of the Samaritan Counseling Center of the Capital Region. He is a clinical member and approved supervisor in the American Association of Pastoral Counselors and has supervised the training of family therapist for several years.